Comments below [MB].
Mary
On Thu, Mar 26, 2015 at 9:28 AM, Michael StJohns
<mstjohns(_at_)comcast(_dot_)net>
wrote:
While this is an interesting idea, I worry about yet more work for the
Nomcom and its affect on the nomcom timeline. And then there's the whole
confidentiality model the Nomcom and CBs are currently tied to and how that
would need to be morphed to enable this.
[MB] And the latter is my biggest concern. I think this feedback model has
the potential to seriously compromise the Nomcom process. My interpretation
of the process as a past chair was that providing this feedback actually
violates the confidentiality of the Nomcom process. I know it happens
unofficially, but I don't think that's ideal.
[/MB]
And finally, there's the problem that the Nomcom is 10+ people who might
not have direct knowledge of how the AD (or IAB or IAOC member) is doing -
its difficult to come up with a coordinated and useful and agreed upon set
of feedback with that many folk involved. (This is substantially different
than taking a vote for whether or not to send someone forward for
confirmation).
Several other possible approaches:
1) This isn't a nomcom problem, but a organization problem. Once a year
have the AD or IAB member sit down with the IETF chair or IAB chair and get
feedback on the chair's perception.
2) Have the nomcom do a straw poll: For AD or IAB member X, given what
you know currently would you continue them in office if they were up for
reappointment. What's reported is for/against/abstentions.
3) Have the IETF as a whole do a straw poll (same question as above) but
allow individuals to provide anonymous feedback through a tool.
4) During the area meetings during the face to face meeting specifically
ask the questions: How am I doing? How can I do things better? What's
broken with the area? What's working with the area? Point to (3) as a way
of providing more detailed feedback.
[MB] I agree with the above. It gets down to some basic people management
procedures. There are all sorts of tools, surveys, etc that one can do to
get feedback - e.g., 4 way feedback forms. I would posit that this will
provide a more objective set of input than what Nomcom receives since it
can be done totally anonymously. I would hate to put the Nomcom in the
position of having to filter what information might be appropriate (or not)
to share. I think it would be way too easy to leak information that could
reveal the identity of who provided the input. I don't think the average
Nomcom member has the experience to necessarily do that well. And, I think
getting that feedback every 2 years is way too infrequent to be very
effective.[/MB]
So - not a big fan of involving the Nomcom until other venues have been
tried and have failed.
[MB] I totally agree. [/MB]
Mike
At 10:09 AM 3/26/2015, Adrian Farrel wrote:
Way back when I was on the IESG I was always asking NomCom for feedback
(especially negative issues, but in a constructive way).
I think it is crucial for ADs to know what issues they are causing and
what they are doing well.
Getting this feedback through any channel, anonymized or otherwise, would
be brilliant.
Of course, the ideal is that the feedback is delivered promptly and
direct, but that requires a certain amount of resilience on the part of
back-feeder. It also does not benefit from aggregation. So feedback from
NomCom or another "progress review" body would be very helpful.
Adrian
-----Original Message-----
From: ietf [mailto:ietf-bounces(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org] On Behalf Of Dave
Crocker
Sent: 26 March 2015 12:41
To: IETF Discussion
Cc: Michael Richardson
Subject: Nomcom feedback to appointees not up for renewal
Howdy,
During yesterday's plenary, this year's Nomcom chair, Michael
Richardson, made a comment that I responded to at the mic. I'd like to
see whether there is interest in pursuing it:
Michael noted that the two-year cycle for appointees means that those
/not/ up for renewal go at least 18 months without feedback. He put
forward the need for feedback to them sooner than that, but asserted
that having Nomcom do it would not be appropriate.
As a natural consequence of its interviewing process, Nomcoms always get
quite a bit of information about /all/ appointees, not just the ones
currently up for renewal. No one else acquires this kind of information
regularly and reliably.
Of the 4 nomcoms I've been on, at least two acted on this feedback,
having a directed conversation with at least one such appointee each
time.
So I suggest that providing explicit feedback to all appointees not up
for renewal become a regular part of nomcom's deliverables.
d/
--
Dave Crocker
Brandenburg InternetWorking
bbiw.net