Advisory Board re-structuring

I noticed this on the agenda:

Paolo encouraged me to post some questions / here on this; so here we go:

  • Why is the discussion of ideas about the structure of our governance that are relevant to all Trustees, and potentially of interest to other FLOSS non-profits being done in private ?
  • I just noticed that AB fees are not being billed. I assume thinking on re-structuring things here is well advanced. Is there any public idea of the goals or direction of that ?
  • Has the board considered consulting the AB itself in such a review ? so far I’ve seen nothing there.

While the Advisory Board gives only advice, and its advice is frequently ignored - there is a nervousness here about the current board (which owing to resignations of several of the community’s most popular elected members is not as representative of Trustees as it could be) acting hastily to change our governance just before an election. Can the board & MC re-assure the Trustees, that these ideas will be brought to trustees, and discussed before action is taken.

Thanks,

Michael.

Which discussion do you refer to? No discussion has started on this yet. That’s exactly why for the moment we postponed meetings and invoicing, until the path is clearer.

We’ve informed you via e-mail why the AB is not being billed.

The AB has been informed via e-mail about “Postponing October Advisory Board meeting”. I’ve received postitive, encouraging feedback on this from the AB itself.

Actually not. The last time I remember this happened is when several members of the AB warned about putting a staff policy in place. I remember hearing several AB members only said that “because they were friends with me”, which is an undue accusation of me and the AB members.

Dear @mmeeks,

I’ve actually encouraged you to check your sources before making public comments and to provide constructive feedback but it seems like you keep ignoring my invitations to participate in this forum in a positive manner.

Surely from the context it is clear that I was asking about the board + MC private agenda I quoted the board agenda:

There was to be ten minutes spent on this in private. My ask was what the need for confidentiality was there.

If you say you didn’t get to the item on the agenda - that’s fine of course.

There has been a lot of ignored advice, that could easily be shown. One example from (a wise but sadly now departed) AB member: not to rush-through changes to the governance such as introducing complex new policies against significant disagreement - without taking the time to iterate and get it right.

As I recall there were two consecutive AB meetings on this. The first (which I was not at) you published the result of, but the second I recall had a consensus that having clear staff policies is a totally normal part of any mature organization and is unobjectionable. IIRC you didn’t published the second result, which didn’t support your public, personal demands to not have any staff policy.

That’s life - but I am always amazed by how much effort goes into resisting an executive staff policy that would require impartial advice and assistance to be made available to all board members of whatever perspective. Such a policy should exclude those with a demonstrated CoI on a topic of course, and should transparently improve trust, and the quality of board discussion and decision making.

As for undue accusations - it seems there is an epidemic of these currently.

https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/infra/documentfoundationorg/+/194416

TDF/Advisory Board: Difference between revisions - The Document Foundation Wiki

You were a party to keeping the AB completely cloistered from the trustees, so - are you really asking about “public idea” of anything?

More secret communications and affairs conducted far from our sight.

@floeff , @mmeeks : Please share it information with the rest of the trustees - as well as how billing has worked usually so far .

Not blaming you for this, but remember that the weakness of bodies constituted by a small executive body, with no direct mandate from the wider body politic of the trustees, and with no anchoring in our statutes: They can be easily and quicky reconfigured or even axed by the BoD - on little more than a whim. This is part of the overall problem of strong centralization of power and knowledge at the TDF.

Seeing how the AB’s structure and mode of operation have not been brought before the trustees before - in recent years, or perhaps ever - I don’t see why the BoD or the MC would reassure you of that. If anything, they could probably reassure you of the opposite.

The billing information is actually public on this wiki page: Advisory Board - The Document Foundation Wiki

The page itself is linked from our website: Advisory Board — The Document Foundation

You can also see the income TDF makes via the advisory board in our ledgers: Accounting Ledgers - The Document Foundation Wiki