> -----Original Message----- > Behalf Of Niels Voll > Subject: [clug-talk] [in preparation for AGM] term limits?
>>>a) is the concept of term limits fundamentally a good idea or a bad idea >>>(for clug)? I will concur with Jarrod's statement as I assisted the original Executive in drafting the original bylaws. It was felt that in a lot of cases organizations tend to have life cycles and at any point in their history you can see when a membership ebbs and flows with the times. The number required for the Executive (3 min) and for a quorum (7) at an AGM were set very low on the idea that it was possible that CLUG may eventually come to the sunset hours of its lifecycle and only have 10 members before it rises from the ashes again. My own opinion on this is that a Presidency could/should actually be a _minimum_ of two years. I see things opposite of the way you are presenting them. I believe as in most 'jobs' your vision and your ideas for your own stamp on the position may (and probably should) take more that a year. So a question might be -- Should you choose to be involved with the executive for 2 or 3 terms to evolve your vision (with input for your other Exec and the members) to do the best for the group OR should you spend a year changing things to your vision and ideas and then abruptly leave the Executive and the members without a follow through. Hmmm... I think that may have a way of confusing and fracturing the membership. >>> Therefore I was wondering, if we should adopt the concept of term limits >>> for at least some board positions. For example, what if we would basically >>> say, that the presidency should rotate on an annual basis? There's really >>> an implied second year (and therefore some continuity) due to the concept >>> of the "Past President" being part of the executive board in the current >>> setup. The idea of Past President was a position appointed by the Elected Executive. It has not been used in the last two terms. In the 2003 term Jeff was appointed as Communications Coordinator as we felt that title was more telling of his actually duties and then in 2004 Jason Louie was appointed as CC. Your idea that the President retires to become an appointed position (or required by bylaw) on a board where a new President has been elected may not (IMO) serve the needs of the Executive Board or the group as a whole. The way I envision that (worst case scenario as always :) is that the newly transplanted Past President had not had enough time to fulfill his vision/agenda for the group in his 1 year term. Now a new President is elected who has entirely different visions and agenda and proceeds to negate and alter everything done by the Past President during his/her term. This may not facilitate workable, reasonable and productive Executive meetings and the board and the group could suffer. That is just my 2 cents. I will say however, that in having knowledge of or being a member of the Executive of CLUG for 3 years now, during those 3 terms the Exec has gone out of its was to be polite and respectful and reasonable with each other, the result is a good working board that can get things done. I have been involved with and witnessed other boards whose members are not reasonable nor can they work together because their ideas are so polar. It is that kind of Board that will tear a group apart. (The Calgary Catholic Board comes to mind) Cheers. Kari _______________________________________________ clug-talk mailing list [email protected] http://clug.ca/mailman/listinfo/clug-talk_clug.ca Mailing List Guidelines (http://clug.ca/ml_guidelines.php) **Please remove these lines when replying
