--On Friday, July 24, 2020 15:15 -0400 Victor Kuarsingh <victor@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > John, > > > This is certainly a concern, however, I would point to > >> However, if there are perceptions in the community that things >> are not going well -- because an incumbent has become >> problematic despite possibly having a large and loud fan club, >> because an area (or the entire IAB) is structured badly >> relative to community needs but incumbents have been >> resistant to change, or because the relevant body has gone >> astray (our best example predates the Nomcom but would be the >> IAB during the "Kobe" period whose behavior led to the >> current general structure of the IETF)-- then there is >> considerable risk that the liaisons will act as forces to >> resist change. >> >> Especially if it is time to rethink liaison or advisor roles, >> what is visible to them and how much they are visible to the >> Nomcom, and who determines procedures, it may be worth >> thinking about those risks and what might be done to mitigate >> them. > Would I be correct in interpreting this as there is premise a > single liaison can effectively overcome good and plentiful > feedback made available to the Nomcom from the community to > affect a different outcome from what the community wanted > (irrespective of not having an actual selection vote)? There are three presumptions / premises, neither quite like that: * One is that we expect our various liaison-sending leadership bodies, with the possible exception of the ISOC BoT [1] to maintain a relatively high level of coordination and cooperation. That is why the IETF Chair has a voting seat on the IAB, the IESG has a voting representative on the LLC Board, the IAB has a liaison to the IESG, and so on. If the views and perspectives of the different bodies are seriously out of sync, I'd expect that would be very clear to the community and this concern would be moot. But, if they are in harmony, then the assumption of the voice of a single liaison (as in your question above) may not be correct, with multiple liaisons advocating for the status quo. * But, from what I've been told by former Nomcom members, good and plentiful feedback is often missing and, in the case of someone controversial who has a circle of articulate supporters, the feedback may be quite contradictory with, in a hypothetical extreme case, comments clustered around "best ever" and "total disaster, worst ever" and with little in between. It is inevitable that the Nomcom voting members are going to have a tough time sorting those things out, but it seems clear to me that the sorting process should not be dominated, or even influenced, by the supposed inside knowledge of liaisons or advisors. With the understanding that this is no more than anecdotal and that the people who come to me for advice may be far from the IETF mainstream (whatever that means), I've had people come to me with complaints about the behavior of particular IAB members or ADs toward them, their ideas, and/or people they see as being similar to them (demographics or employment being the most common components if similarity). Unless there is a clearly-appealable action, I try to give the advice that I believe is organizationally correct: tell it to the Nomcom and be sure to provide specifics and sufficient detail that they can evaluate the situation rather than just knowing that you are unhappy. And the response I've gotten back in several of those cases has been "liaison X or voting member Y is the best friend of the subject, works in the subject's department, etc., my comments would leak, and I'd be subject to retaliation". I try to explain that I think it is reasonable for us to trust the commitments to confidentiality of the Nomcom but that is rarely believed those are comments the Nomcom isn't going to hear (and, in addition to the liaison or advisor issue, those same kinds of perceptions are another reason to put limits on the number of Nomcom members from one company or organization). * I have no idea how much or how often it has affected Nomcoms or their discussions, but almost anyone who has studied or observed human small group behavior knows that, especially if other members of the group are uncertain about preferences or best outcomes (or even trying to keep open minds), it isn't hard for one dominant, loud personality who is very sure of their (sic) opinions, to control the conversations. Bullies often win, especially if they are good at their work and the approach is forceful and not obviously bullying. How well that works depends in part on the Nomcom chair and I have a lot of confidence in Barbara but, from an organization and procedural planning standpoint, the possible effects of one loud and aggressive personality cannot be dismissed by saying "1 of 10". > I guess that could happen, however, my understanding is that > the confirming body, whom would have a different liaison which > reports back to that body on the process followed, could > consider this before confirmation of a selection. Unless the confirming body's liaison, or the confirming body itself, were part of the problem. > The feedback provided (which can a only be provided and/or > discussed within the Nomcom) form the community would be quite > evident. If there was a large issue, that information would > be available for consideration by the voting members. See above. I didn't want to go into this because I've wanted to keep my examples either clearly hypothetical or far in the past rather than being accused of saying bad things about incumbents. However... There are people in the community who find the decision making processes of the last five month or so to be very troubling. The concern is not necessarily about what decisions were made, but about whether the IESG has turned itself from a body that does a certain amount of steering and coordinating but is basically directed by the the rough consensus of the IETF community into one that runs the IETF. I think it is clear to everyone sensible that we've faced real emergencies before IETF 107 and that quick decisions were needed. But, at least to those who are most worried, there seems to be a risk of emergencies continuing. From the perspective of some of them, we are still operating by generating proposals top-down and then asking for community consultations on them with the people who generated the proposals (or authorized them) being the same ones who will evaluate and approve the results. It is possible, nay likely, that there is rough consensus in the community that the way in which things have been proceeding are fine. But those who believe that things are getting seriously off-track and that we are seeing variations on behavior patterns similar to the Kobe affair probably deserve the opportunity to make their case to the Nomcom with minimal fear of the results being manipulated by liaisons who are comfortable with the way decisions are being made(because they have been part of those decisions) or retaliation from people who disagree. > I would suggested we study actual outcomes from previous > Nomcoms to see how well they have made selections and/or > changes during times of issue as evidence as to the quality of > the current process and setup. I would suggest that such a study attempt would rapidly hit a dead end over the confidentiality rules. regards, john
