[Noisebridge-discuss] meet tomorrow?

Mitch Altman maltman23 at hotmail.com
Tue May 27 20:44:36 UTC 2008


I look forward to discussing this tonight at Noah's.  Thanks for hosting, Noah.  And thanks for your thoughts, well described.

Mitch.


---------------------
> Date: Tue, 27 May 2008 13:33:04 -0700
> From: albill at arcanology.com
> To: noahbalmer at gmail.com
> Subject: Re: [Noisebridge-discuss] meet tomorrow?
> CC: noisebridge-discuss at lists.noisebridge.net
> 
> Noah Balmer wrote:
> > My gedanken experiment went something like this.  I'm sure that after 
> > Julia's class I might have other ideas for actions the board might 
> > take if things go bad, but here's what I've got for now:
> >
> > *Scenario: a board member (or a minority of the board) is not doing 
> > their job*
> > *No members:* The rest of the board figures out what's going on with 
> > them and takes appropriate action, including removal by a majority of 
> > board members then in office (note, not a majority of a quorum) if 
> > necessary.
> > *With members:* same thing happens, but the members are talking about 
> > whether or not they should get involved, and fighting out the drama, 
> > instead of talking about how to build a better solar powered whiskey 
> > fountain.
> > *Assessment:* Making a whiskey fountain is more fun than arguing about 
> > what happens to the board. Board is fine either way.
> >
> > *Scenario: the whole board goes gradually lazy or evil, together
> > No members:* Board members have a legal responsibility to do their 
> > job, so there's a strong motivation for individual board members not 
> > to let this happen. It is of course possible, however.  We can 
> > encourage directors to get their act together or resign but can't 
> > force them. This fucking sucks, we'd better avoid it.
> > *With Members:*  The members vote the board out, and vote a new board 
> > in.  The new board is starting from scratch, but the organization is 
> > already in full swing, with active contracts and other legal 
> > responsibilities which have, until this moment bun run by a presumed 
> > incompetent board. Inexperienced board, suddenly legally responsible 
> > for an unfamiliar inherited mess equals total organizational 
> > disaster.  Kicked out board is pissed, so are any supporters they had, 
> > past donors wonder what the deal is and what they spent their money 
> > on, PR nightmare.  This fucking sucks, we'd better avoid it.
> > *Assessment:*  The detail-oriented may have noticed that both outcomes 
> > fucking suck and are better avoided.  As Julia put it "If you get to 
> > the point that you need to kick out the whole board, you've already 
> > failed."  So lets make sure we always have new, not yet corrupted 
> > people represented as well as experienced, 
> > possibly-corrupted-but-at-least-know-what's-going-on people.  Julia's 
> > suggestion was to start with a five person board, with a commitment to 
> > add board members at regular intervals over the first year or two so 
> > that people's terms end in a staggered fashion.  The bylaws can allow 
> > a varying number of positions on the board (she'd suggested 5-15, and 
> > 50%+1 as a quorum, though we'd probably want to start on the lower end 
> > of this range).  Term limits ensure that new people show up on the 
> > board at regular intervals.  The idea is to structure the organization 
> > in such a way that it stays healthy, rather than structure it in such 
> > a way that it can make desperate attempts to save itself when it's 
> > unhealthy. 
> >
> 
> So, people are advocating for people to, possibly, pay a couple of 
> hundred dollars a month in order for us to get a space in San Francisco 
> but these same people putting in money won't get any say in how the 
> group is run, legally? Not everyone who pays a bunch of money is going 
> to be on the board (or want to be) and we also shouldn't limit board 
> membership to those who have enough money to pitch in a lot.
> 
>  What is the solution?
> 
> Al
> _______________________________________________
> Noisebridge-discuss mailing list
> Noisebridge-discuss at lists.noisebridge.net
> https://www.noisebridge.net/mailman/listinfo/noisebridge-discuss
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.noisebridge.net/pipermail/noisebridge-discuss/attachments/20080527/b88757b6/attachment-0003.html>


More information about the Noisebridge-discuss mailing list