Dave Crocker <dhc@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 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.
There are first logistical issues.
- the datatracker does not have a slot for feedback on other people.
- the liasons have access to all of this feedback, so it's not particularly
anonymous; there could well be feedback on the laisons themselves.
- the nomcom is generally overwhelmed with feedback already
- we may wish to accept feedback about all manner of IETF "managers"
(so including WG chairs too)
Second: while it is valuable for people to be able to give feedback in an
anonymous way, the actual content of the feedback may well be too
revealing.
What I think we need is for the feedback to be provided in a *structured*
way such that we can get to an objective view of what is sometimes a very
subjective interaction. In some sense, our recent move towards ombudsman and
harassment process is about what to do when the informal methods we have
fail. (This occured to me only now)
I am imagining a situation where an AD/chair/etc. may say something like:
(creating silly situation to illustrate point)
"It has been pointed out to me that I'm too easily annoyed by people
wearing white pants after labour day. It's an issue from my culture,
and I understand I need to be less sensitive about it; particularly since
we will be shortly meeting in the southern hemisphere where winter and
summer are interchanged. If I appear to snear at you based upon your
dress code, please understand that this is a cultural hangup where I am
from, and please remind me that of the commitment I'm making now to be
more tolerant"
I don't have a method of doing the "pointing out" part.
I don't want the nomcom to do this.
What I think needs to happen though, is that:
a) people on the receiving end of the poor behaviour receive some
public acknowlegement that their were wronged.
b) other people do not get the idea that being intolerant is acceptable
here.
c) the "offender" gets help to get better. Perhaps someone better
schooled in theories of ego/id/internal-judges can better explain
this part; I am still a "nestling" in this space.
One of the problems the nomcom has is judging whether complaints about poor
interactions are one-of events, particularly if occured some time ago.
Did things get better? Is this still an issue, or have there been changes?
--
] Never tell me the odds! | ipv6 mesh networks [
] Michael Richardson, Sandelman Software Works | network architect [
] mcr@xxxxxxxxxxxx http://www.sandelman.ca/ | ruby on rails [