--On Thursday, 23 December, 2004 11:30 +0100 Harald Tveit Alvestrand <harald@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > Ticket #733 questions whether it's right to state a principle > that things should be outsourced: > >>> In principle, IETF administrative functions should be >>> outsourced. >> >> I would remove this sentence. We later say that it is the >> IAOC's job to decide what is outsourced and what isn't, and I >> am more comfortable with that than with stating this as a >> general principle. > > No discussion recorded. > > Remembering the discussions that led us here, I think we had > consensus on a strong principle of outsourcing - this is based > on two beliefs: > > - That some functions are performed more effectively and > efficiently by people who do "that sort of thing" for others > - That building a large team that performs functions > "in-house" will lead to a greater temptation to consider "how > to make work for our staff" rather than "what's best for the > IETF" (this has happened to other organizations). Mumble. Just so there is not "no discussion", both of these beliefs are questionable. The first could also be an argument for hiring someone who "does that sort of thing" if there were enough of that sort of thing to be done to justify a long-ish term appointment. And there is a case to be made that managing a collection of contractors, especially contractor organizations, is more difficult, time-consuming, and expensive, than managing employees. The second is a position I've taken, and one in which I firmly believe, but I'm not sure that "...functions should be outsourced" is quite the right way to capture it. It would be closer to say that any decision to create an in-house position should be strongly justified to and by the IAOC, that in-house positions other than the IAD should be, to the extent possible, zero-based on an annual basis, and that in-house staff should be kept as lean as possible, but no leaner. > I believe that these are valid reasons to keep the mention of > the outsourcing principle in section 3, so I suggest we close > #723 with "no changes needed". I think that, if you really want to capture the intended principle, the relevant text would be modified to read something like... In principle, IETF administrative functions should be outsourced. Decisions to perform specific functions "in-house" should be explicitly justified by the IAOC and restricted to the minimum staff required, with these decisions and staffing reviewed by the IAOC on a regular basis and against a "zero base" assumption. Anything less is likely to be construed as making it a violation of principle to make decisions that we may need to make. For example, as discussed on other threads, there may be very strong arguments, at least in the longer term, for making the IETF Executive Director and/or IESG Secretary an employee. > > Another tack would be to edit the text to mention the beliefs > above explicitly - but I think that's a level of detail in > justification that we have not done for other principles. Agreed. john _______________________________________________ Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf