At 6:22 AM -0400 3/10/13, IETF Diversity wrote:
For example, ten years ago, in February of 2003, there were 25 members
of the IETF leadership (12 IAB members and 13 IESG members). Of those
25 members, there was one member of non-European descent, there was one
member from a country outside of North America or Europe, and there were
four women. There were 23 companies represented in the IETF leadership
(out of a total of 25 seats).
In February of 2013, there were 32 members of the IETF leadership
(12 IAB members, 15 IESG members and 5 IAOC members). Of those 32
members, there was one member of non-European descent, there were no
members from countries outside of North America or Europe, and there
was only one woman. There were only 19 companies represented (out of
a total of 32 seats).
Using only two measurement points (February 2003 and 2013) may not
give an accurate picture, especially given the small population.
Measuring only I* may not be the best gauge; it might be helpful to
include document authors/editors, WG secretaries/chairs, nomcom
makeup, etc. A broader measurement may be a better tool to let us
know if we are making progress or getting worse.
It is important to the continued relevance and success of the IETF
that we address this issue and eliminate whatever factors are
contributing to the lack of diversity in our leadership. We believe
that this is an important and urgent issue that requires your
immediate attention.
There are several steps that could be taken, in the short-term within
our existing BCPs, to address this problem:
- Each of the IETF leadership bodies (the IESG, IAB and IAOC)
could update the qualifications that they submit to the
Nominations Committee (through the IAD) to make it clear that
the Nominations Committee should actively seek to increase the
diversity of that body in terms of race, geographic location,
gender and corporate affiliation.
Perhaps the nomcom might be a place to actively seek to increase the
diversity of the bodies to which it selects members?
- Each of the confirming bodies (the ISOC Board for the IAB, the
IAB for the IESG, and the IESG for the IAOC) could make a
public statement at the beginning of each year's nominations
process that they will not confirm a slate unless it
contributes to increased diversity within the IETF leadership,
or it is accompanied by a detailed explanation of what
steps were taken to select a more diverse slate and why it was
not possible to do so.
I wonder if such a step might be better kept in reserve if other
steps don't work? Especially because one of the later proposals is
to better understand the causes of lack of diversity in the I* and
specific measures to increase diversity? It might be better to take
that step before this one.
- The ISOC President could continue to select Nominations
Committee Chairs who understand the value of diversity and are
committed to increasing the diversity of the IETF.
Sounds good, although I wonder about the already difficult process of
finding high quality candidates for many positions. I suppose what I
am really wondering is if part of the problem of why the I* members
are not diverse is that it is so hard to find a pool of willing and
able candidates.
- The Nominations Committee could be offered resources or
training on the value of diversity, techniques to recruit a
more diverse candidate pool, and/or information about how to
minimize conflict-of-interest and personal bias in their
selection process.
This sounds like a terrific idea.
We also feel that more substantial and longer-term changes may be
needed to fully address this issue. Therefore, we request that the
new IETF Chair assemble a design team (with diverse membership, of
course) to determine the causes of this problem and to make
suggestions for longer-term solutions to be considered by the IETF.
I think this is also a very good suggestion.
We are committed to working within the IETF to make the changes
that are needed to correct this serious issue.
Best Regards,
(In alphabetical order)
Bernard Aboba
Cathy Aronson
Alia Atlas
Mary Barnes
Mohamed Boucadair
Brian Carpenter
Stuart Cheshire
Alissa Cooper
Spencer Dawkins
Roni Even
Janet Gunn
Stephen Hanna
Ted Hardie
Sam Hartman
Fangwei Hu
Geoff Huston
Christian Jacquenet
Mirjam Kuehne
Olaf Kolkman
Suresh Krishnan
Barry Leiba
Ted Lemon
Kepeng Li
Dapeng Liu
Allison Mankin
Bill Manning
Kathleen Moriarty
Monique Morrow
Nurani Nimpuno
Matt Nottingham
Erik Nordmark
Karen O'Donoghue
Iuniana Oprescu
Jaqueline Queiroz
Hosnieh Rafiee
Pete Resnick
Lea Roberts
Simon Pietro Romano
Peter Saint-Andre
Eve Schooler
Rifaat Shekh-Yusef
Larissa Shapiro
Melinda Shore
Barbara Stark
Brian Trammel
Tina Tsou
Justin Uberti
Margaret Wasserman
Renee Wilson-Burstein
James Woodyatt
Lucy Yong
Jessica Yu
Lixia Zhang
--
Randall Gellens
Opinions are personal; facts are suspect; I speak for myself only
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If dogs could talk, it would take a lot of the fun out of owning them.
--Andrew A. Rooney