For what it's worth ...
On Thu, Oct 9, 2014 at 8:00 AM, Jari Arkko
<jari(_dot_)arkko(_at_)piuha(_dot_)net> wrote:
John,
Thanks for your comments.
This isn't quite a suggestion since the IESG has apparently made
up its mind, but, especially in a time of transition, there are
some major advantages to having two ADs in an area, including
the ability of two specialists with different perspectives to
talk with each other and sort out ideas. Everyone who has
gotten a cross-area review comment that seemed to be off the
wall from an out-of-area AD will understand why general
conversations with the rest of the IESG are no substitute (even
though they may be very helpful and important for other
reasons).
So, all other things being equal, I think it would have been
better to ask the Nomcom to make a one-year appointment if they
could find someone satisfactory [1] and then sort things out
during the next year as planned but with two Apps ADs rather
than cutting the slot now on the assumption that one AD could
and would be able to handle all relevant working groups,
thinking about new plans, and all other IESG responsibilities.
….
john
[1] If the IESG and Nomcom could interpret the rules
appropriately, my thought would be to explicitly tell the Nomcom
that it would be ok to not make an appointment if they concluded
that they couldn't find someone satisfactory for the role, i.e.,
without either making an appointment of someone inexperienced in
the area or scraping the bottom of the proverbial barrel.
This could have been another alternative. And still is, because we are
indeed asking for feedback and want to understand if the suggested path is
the best one.
And having two ADs to discuss amongst themselves what to do is very
useful. It certainly was essential for me when I was the INT AD. And
especially useful in the first year or two.
However, I wanted to just talk a bit about the timing and the number of
ADs. And again, some of this is theoretical because we have definitely not
decided _what_ to do; we are still exploring the exact re-organisation that
we would like to make. But for the sake of argument, lets assume that we’d
for instance combine APP and RAI and put in three ADs. Now, today we *do*
have two ADs in APP. For the recruitment of proper number of ADs with the
suitable expertise in next year’s Nomcom cycle, the restructuring should be
ready in the summer, preferably in June. So that we could inform the Nomcom
of what the desired expertise is. If we have the right number of ADs at
that point, we can just go ahead and make the transition. So we wouldn’t be
without a second AD in the area for a long time.
That would be a non-issue if the IESG already had a plan worked
out to transition some specific WGs into other areas by March 27
or earlier, but the announcement implies that is not the case.
I think the key is that we do not have the plan worked out _today_ so that
we can not inform the Nomcom what kind of a person(s) and how many we’d
like to recruit. We might have a plan by March and certainly will have a
plan by May which even the new IESG can stand behind. But that is not today
and therefore it would be difficult for anyone to volunteer for that
undefined task today.
Several years ago, Russ gathered what was then all of the previous Nomcom
chairs who would still answer his e-mail into a design team, to see what
issues came up year after year. I was honored to be the scribe for that
design team.
The past chairs (not ¨we, including Spencer¨, because I was just typing)
came up with http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-dawkins-nomcom-3777-issues-00,
which is a fairly interesting document to look over. In my opinion.
Some of the issues they identified have been addressed (for example, ¨5.3
<http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-dawkins-nomcom-3777-issues-00#section-5.3>.
Soliciting Feedback on Non-Incumbent Candidates¨ led to Open List/
http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5680), but others have not been.
I have been thinking about ¨3.1
<http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-dawkins-nomcom-3777-issues-00#section-3.1>.
Shortening the NomCom Epoch¨ recently, because it would be really handy if
the Nomcom epoch wasn't like 9 months long, and basically a train that
leaves once a year, when we are talking about proposed IESG structural
changes ... and the consensus of the past chairs was that shorter would be
better ...
Speaking only for myself, of course.
Of course.
Spencer