PASS Board of Directors Election Comments
I have difficulty finding fault with anyone who took the time and made the effort to run for the PASS Board of Directors. The application alone was quite a challenge (unless you truly enjoy answering the same question multiple times, with simple phrasing changes (right Candidates?) Seriously though. These individuals on the slate before us now, and those that were filtered through the interview process wanted to contribute in some manner to the success of PASS. I did not interview well. I love what I do and who I do it for; I’ve not had to interview for anything in over ten years – it showed. It is not the fault of the Nomination Committee that I put up a poor performance on the interview round; that was all my doing (or lack thereof.) These individuals, tasked with such an important decision, acted professionally, and diligently from all corners of the globe (at least for my interview) to put up what they thought was the best slate.
My only recommendation going forward is that when placing a final slate of candidates out to membership vote they may wish to broaden the pool of candidates to select from. By the pool of candidates being only one larger than the amount of slots the argument can be made, though I think incorrectly, that the Nomination Committee was “stacking the deck”. Perhaps, and maybe this has been stated already, they should review the applications, make a first round of cuts, and then perform written interviews to be posted on the PASS website. Also require resume, campaign video, and position statements from the candidates and post those as well. Then allow for the voting members to make their decision at the ballot box. Not everyone who applies is qualified and we need a Nomination Committee to filter those willing, but unqualified individuals from the pool of candidates. Don’t forget that PASS needs to run as a business in order to succeed. This time around the Nomination Committee may have only felt these four candidates had what it took to run a business. In that regard I feel differently, having a background and education in Business Administration, but the decision has been made.
Whether you vote for those who’ve demonstrated their volunteerism, run successful SQL-centric businesses, or media companies the important thing is to vote. Hopefully we can all learn from this vigorous debate and make change that will please us all. That will be a task for this new Board of Directors and we as volunteers and voting members to work on together in the months ahead.
I want to thank those who’ve provided kind words both in the light of day and privately since this debate started to ramp-up. It’s a pleasure to count you all as friends.
I’ve said more on this matter than I planned to. If you feel strongly that the slate is not up to par then I ask that you make the effort to run when the next term opens eleven months from now. I am not sure if you’ll be running against me. That is a long time off. However I am sure that there there are more than a few of you reading this that would earn my vote.
Venting is cathartic.
I’ve seen via Twitter during the past 24 hours a little bit of a brouhaha over the slate of candidates for this year’s PASS Board of Directors on Brent Ozar’s blog. When I saw my name was mentioned I was humbled at first. I’ve seen it come up a few more times and even though I planned on remaining in my normally Chaotic Neutral alignment, it’s compelled me to comment publicly here.
I think that social media is bringing about more transparency whether organizations like it or not. I was surprised that my profession’s association could present someone to the slate who had never attended our community’s PASS Summit, never attended any of our community’s Chapter meetings, never attended a Code camp, etc. — and who had no history at all in any capacity serving within our community. On top of this, this individual isn’t even in our profession! This individual is obviously qualified to run a company – but is painfully unaware of even the basics of our particular professional community.
Whether this was a mistake by the Nomination Committee or simply a misunderstanding by most of the community as to what it means to be a Board member serving us is somewhat gray to me. I think the arguments being presented that service in our community (or even actually being a part of our community) has never been a prerequisite to serve on our Board are a bit weak, but I won’t guy there right now…
The issue is that social media lets EVERYONE see for themselves these dynamics that would have otherwise gone unnoticed and behind closed doors. Those doors are WIDE OPEN now. Twitter makes sure of that, as we have all seen.
I would like to see a process moving forward that is codified and doesn’t change its nomination criteria from year to year and I want to see social media employed to allow the COMMUNITY to decide who is part of the slate. All candidates should have to interact with the community live via twitter and UStream and the COMMUNITY should vote and decide upon the slate.
Will it happen? I doubt it will any time soon, but I do have faith in some of the many encouraging new stars in our profession – like you, Tim – and I’m behind you all 100%.
Chuck
@chuckboycejr
I feel for you Brotha’ …LOL!
I was with you in the final ‘bottom’ three after the interview obviousyly. To tell you the truth I lost track of how the BoD elections were going until the SQL Satuday event this weekend in Louisville when people started talking to me about it. Now I have spent the last hour getting up to speed and WHEW! I’ll have to post my thoughts later this week.
Cheers!
AJ
[…] have expressed concern about the exclusion of Tim Ford from the final pool of candidates; although he admitted that he had not done well on the interview portion, it’s my opinion that the nominating committee put too much weight on that interview without […]