Questions to the GNSO Council Candidates

[Mamadou LO]

Yes Stéphanie..looking  forward to attend..
Mamadou



Envoyé depuis mon smartphone Samsung Galaxy.


-------- Message d'origine --------
De : Stephanie Perrin <stephanie.perrin at mail.utoronto.ca>
Date : 18/08/2017 14:50 (GMT+00:00)
À : Mamadou LO <alfamamadou at hotmail.com>, NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
Objet : Re: Questions to the GNSO Council Candidates


Yes, perhaps we should save some time to discuss on our next policy call?

cheers Stephanie

On 2017-08-18 01:59, Mamadou LO wrote:
+ 1 Mickael; Stephanie but very challenging as this UNIQUE document has to be handled live permanently with required and updated contents. It can be very usefull for our community as an communication tool but managing it may required additional job from councilors or Secretariat..
Just thoughts
Mamadou


Envoyé depuis mon smartphone Samsung Galaxy.


-------- Message d'origine --------
De : Stephanie Perrin <stephanie.perrin at MAIL.UTORONTO.CA><mailto:stephanie.perrin at MAIL.UTORONTO.CA>
Date : 17/08/2017 14:46 (GMT+00:00)
À : NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU<mailto:NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU>
Objet : Re: Questions to the GNSO Council Candidates


I agree and think this is a good idea.  Sort of a running blog on how the issues are developing.  More work though, always a challenged for the over-stretched....

Stephanie Perrin

On 2017-08-17 10:39, Michael Karanicolas wrote:

Hi,

I'm still in the process of drafting my candidate statement, but I'd
be happy to respond to Bill's queries in the interim.

1. Regarding meetings - although my travel schedule can get hectic
sometimes, I should be able to commit to missing no more than two NCSG
and Council calls, and I fully intend to be an active participant in
them.

2. With regard to community engagement - this is something I've given
some thought to, so I'd like to offer a bit of a twist on your
proposal. While minutes are a useful update for people already
familiar with the topics and issues under discussion, they make it
very difficult for people who haven't been consistently tuned into the
process to "catch up" to where we are, and even more challenging for
new arrivals (as I certainly found myself!). As a result, I would
suggest that a good alternative might be to create thematic "living
documents" which are updated after every meeting. When an issue is
raised first, you create a Google doc with a few lines introducing the
issue, and then after every meeting a rep updates the documents for
each issue under discussion. This creates a one stop shop for
community members who want to see where debate stands on a particular
issue, and allows people to trace how the conversation evolved - to
better participate themselves. Just an idea.

Best,

Michael


On Thu, Aug 17, 2017 at 11:16 AM, Tatiana Tropina
<tatiana.tropina at gmail.com><mailto:tatiana.tropina at gmail.com> wrote:


Dear Bill, dear NCSG members,

why my candidate statement is still on its way, I am happy to answer Bill's
questions - but firstly to thank him for asking them! Please find my reply
in line.



1.  Can you commit to missing no more than two NCSG and Council calls, and
in the latter case to ensuring you give apologies and get a proxy at least a
day prior to the meetings?  (if there are technical issues with attendance
those would need to be planned for)  And since silent attendance is really
not enough, can you indicate what you would do to be a visibly active and
effective participant?



I have quite a good record of attendance in the groups I have been active
at, such as CCWG Accountability WS2 Human Rights, NCSG EC calls (be it just
a EC call or budget discussions or bylaws drafting meetings), and others. As
the GNSO calls are known well in advance, it's easy to plan the time and
secure attendance. Even with my travel schedule, I was able to attend the
most important calls on the regular basis. One of the weirdest cases was
attending the CCWG WS2 HR call in the evening from the main square in
Tallinn on a public WiFi network, because even though I sent my apologies I
felt like the call was too important to miss and I connected anyway :-).

So, yes, I can commit to do my best to attend the calls and my track record
proves that once I am committed. I can commit to appointing a proxy well in
advance if I have to miss something due to any scheduling conflicts. But I
will do my best to avoid any scheduling conflicts.

Furthermore, I fully understand that just attendance is *not* enough.

I decided to accept the nomination because I think we need vocal and
participating councillors -- and that's what I want to be. I think many of
you who kow me from IG and ICANN spaces can believe that I am vocal,
committed, and passionate about work.

This commitment has two dimensions for me: first of all, it's taking part in
the Council's work and be vocal there -- not only at the ICANN meetings or
on the calls, but also in between the calls, on the mailing lists, etc.
Well, I think we all are going to make such a promise. My promise can be
supported by the evidence of my work on the policy committee (before I
became NCUC EC member because I had to resign due to NCUC EC position), my
work in CCWG accountability WS1 and WS2, CCWG-IG, my commitment to NCUC
outreach, to NCUC procedures and bylaws drafting teams, and other tracks of
record. I am fully committed to do be present and to be active at the
Council.

The second dimension is link between the Council and NCSG membership and
NCSG policy committee (PC). I was a policy committee member already as NCUC
representative, and I was active there. Right now since a few days am back
on the PC and I am taking part in PC deliberations again -- feels great to
be back :-). If elected, I will continue and can commit to having a good
track of this activity. Furthermore, I understand that it is also about
informing the membership about policy development processes, public
comments, help in drafting the comments, help to observe the deadlines etc.
I can commit to this too. I will do my best to contribute to the
communications between councillors and NCSG membership -- I have already
seen the good practices established, for example, by Rafik. He informs
members about GNSO processes and decisions and I am going to take an active
part in this activity.

This goes well with your second question, because it's the part of
communication between the councillors and the NCSG membership:



2. While interested members can read the Minutes of Council meetings at
https://gnso.icann.org/en/group-activities/calendar to see which of their
Councilors attended and what was discussed, a) people often don’t have the
time, and b) the minutes don’t provide an assessment of how things are going
from an NCSG standpoint.  After-meeting reporting to the membership on the
issues and votes would be helpful, and should be routinized. We tried doing
this with volunteers but only got a couple reports (much appreciated).  So,
would you be willing to rotate the responsibility among our six Councilors
and ensure every meeting gets at least a two paragraph report, ideally with
some indication as to whether the contingent is coordinating and in
agreement or not on particularly hot topics?



I am absolutely ready to commit to writing a report based on rotation and
also -- if necessary -- contribute to any report even if it's not my turn to
write it. I think this shouldn't be a problem for active councillors and
it's time to commit to the promises we make before elections. And here you
all can have my full commitment (and hold me responsible for this promise).


Warm regards,
Tatiana






Thanks much

Bill

On Aug 19, 2016, at 12:03, William Drake <wjdrake at gmail.com><mailto:wjdrake at gmail.com> wrote:

Hi

Yesterday’s call provided a useful opportunity for dialogue on the
candidates’ views and priorities and also turned out to offer some folks a
chance to start clearing the air, however uncomfortably, regarding issues
that arose within our Council contingent the last cycle.  I’d like to
suggest a couple take-aways in hopes that we can re-set that which needs to
be and move forward on a firmer footing.  Purely my own views, which I guess
some folks will disagree with, in which case fine, let’s talk it out.

1.  Differences of perspective among Councilors are fine but these should
be openly shared in order to preserve trust. It might make sense for the
interested parties to find some congenial space in which to privately work
through past bits of friction that arose re: e.g. Marrakech, the GNSO chair
selection, and whatever else.  It doesn’t make sense to leave
misunderstandings unresolved and entrenched as it can impact on the
effectiveness of the team effort going forward. Hyderabad obviously offers
F2F options, which are likely to be the most productive in coming to
resolutions, but it might make sense not to wait entirely on this.

2. It would be helpful if Councilors could be sure to attend the monthly
NCSG calls and proactively share their thinking about upcoming Council
meetings and votes with each other and the wider membership.  In ancient
times when I was on Council we regarded these as fairly mandatory and tried
to miss only exceptionally and with notification, but more recently
participation seems to have be spottier at times (I believe the NCSG chair
has attendance records?).  Yes we’re all volunteers with day jobs and
travels so things can happen, but it shouldn’t be the case that people miss
more than a couple per annual cycle.

3. In parallel, it’d be good to have greater open discussion of pending
votes and positions on the NCSG PC mail list.  I’ve been on that list since
we set it up in 2011 (first as a Councilor, then as an observer) and think
it’s under-utilized resource that should work in synch with our monthly
calls and those of the Council.  Of course, issues should not always be
sorted purely on an internal PC basis; important policy choices at least
should also be vetted on ncsg-discuss so the PC is well informed by a feel
for general member sentiment, even if it’s divided.

Either way, between the monthly calls and the PC, we shouldn’t have cases
where members of the team don’t know until they arrive at a Council meeting
how their colleagues will vote, or what contacts and representations of the
group’s shared positions are being made to other stakeholder groups, etc.
You can’t have a team effort if people are unaware of each others’ doings.

4.  Part of the PC’s challenge has always been to ensure effective
chairing, including tracking of progress on open projects, herding cats,
etc.  We’ve always appointed Councilors to chair but the results have been
variable as people are already maxed out.  On yesterday’s call Ed made a
suggestion that merits consideration: having a non-Council member as chair,
and allocating one of the NCSG travel slots to this person so as to promote
their continuous coordination of the process.  It’d be interesting to hear
views on this.

5.  After-meeting reporting to the membership of the issues and votes
should be routinized.  This doesn’t have involve demanding magnum opus
treatments, a couple paragraphs one a month should be sufficient and doable.
I’d suggested (below) that the six Councilors could rotate the
responsibility, as was briefly attempted in 2009-2010.  Stephanie
counter-proposed on the call that reporting be done by non-Councilors, in
part as a way of on-boarding ‘new blood’ and helping to prepare folks to
stand for Council in a future election.  This could work too, although it
may involve some extra coordination to ensure every Councilors’ votes and
views are reflected to taste.  Worth a try…

If we could do at least some of this, I think it’d increase our team’s
solidarity and our general members’ understanding of what their
representative are up to, what’s in play in the GNSO, and what the
opportunities for engaging in working groups and such are.  It’d also make
our votes in elections more well informed.

Thoughts?

Bill


On Aug 17, 2016, at 10:39, William Drake <wjdrake at gmail.com><mailto:wjdrake at gmail.com> wrote:

Hi

On Aug 16, 2016, at 23:38, Robin Gross <robin at ipjustice.org><mailto:robin at ipjustice.org> wrote:

Agreed.  It is important for members to become more acquainted with our
representatives and resumes are extremely helpful for that.


Sharing candidates’ resumes is not a bad idea.  But I’d like to suggest we
go beyond this.  Two issue we might want to consider on tomorrow’s call:

When I joined Council in 2009, we discussed the need for better reporting
to members as to what their reps were actually doing in Council.  We
launched an attempt to deal with this by having Councilors take turns doing
brief reports about Council meetings. Alas it didn’t get far, after a couple
times the sense of urgency faded, people told themselves “well, members can
always look at the Council archive to see what’s happening," and the effort
drifted off.  But of course it’s actually not easy for a member to dive
through the Council archive and try to reconstruct what’s happening, and
it’s not so hard to compose a one or two paragraph summary of a monthly
Council meeting indicating how our reps voted on which issues, especially if
the workload is rotated among six Councilors, making it just a few times per
year each.  So while it’s a bit uncomfortable suggesting work to be done by
others, I’d like to put this idea back on the table ahead of our Meet the
Candidates call tomorrow.  It need not be an one onerous thing, and after
all we exist to participate in the GNSO, so surely we should be able to know
how our reps are representing us in the GNSO.  Especially when we’re being
asked to vote them into ‘office’ (for incumbents) on the basis of past
performance.

More generally, we have long debated the matter of coordination among
Council reps.  Unlike most if not all other parts of the GNSO, NCSG by
charter doesn’t normally do ‘directed voting,’ where the members are bound
to vote in conformity with a rough consensus position.  We have a charter
provision to do this in exceptional cases, but I don’t recall it ever being
invoked.  We’ve always been content to operate on the notion that the
Councilor does what s/he thinks is in the best interest of civil society @
GNSO, and if members don’t approve of anyone’s action they can vote them out
in the next cycle.  But as that has not really happened, it’s sort of a
meaningless check and balance.  And this is not without consequence, as
we’ve sometimes had internal differences within our contingent that have
arguably undermined our effectiveness and credibility in the eyes of the
community and staff, and can even allow our various business stakeholder
group counterparts to exploit the differences in order to push through what
they want in opposition to our common baseline views.  So at a minimum, we
need to do better somehow at team coordination and make sure all our
Councilors know what each other is doing and why and so there’s no real time
surprises, especially during meetings with high stakes votes.

Thoughts?

Best

Bill






-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.ncsg.is/pipermail/ncsg-discuss/attachments/20170818/9f52a28f/attachment.htm>