[HOT] Conflicts of Interest

Dale Kunce dale.kunce at gmail.com
Wed Mar 11 23:46:55 UTC 2015


Several members have asked me questions about how I would handle potential
conflicts if elected to the HOT Board.

First, I want to talk about the value of partnerships and why HOT should
pursue more deeply integrated partnerships. My work at the American Red
Cross overlaps a lot with HOT, this is a good thing. As HOT has grown it
has engaged with more and more with larger partners. Kate and others have
done a great job expanding those partnerships to get more funding to expand
HOT's work around the world.

Through partnerships the American Red Cross and Medicine Sans Frontiers,
HOT co-founded the Missing Maps initiative. Until Missing Maps HOT lacked a
way to truly engage partners that are interested in being more than
consumers of HOTs work. Missing Maps provides a great way for HOT to
leverage the size and skill sets of partners to further its own mission.
Working with partners HOT expanded programming in Indonesia, Dar es Salaam
and others. These expanded programs helped to bring together funding for
technology projects such as the original Tasking Manager, Tasking Manager
v2, HOT exports, InaSafe, and the soon to be released OpenMapKit.

As representatives from partners such as myself seek to become more engaged
in HOT will of course have some potential conflicts. These conflicts are
natural and are not something that should preclude any employee of a HOT
partner from running or serving on the board. This type of cross
pollination is healthy not only for HOT as a whole but it provides great
opportunities for skilled partner representatives to give time and skills
in areas needed by HOT such as technology project management, fundraising,
governance, networking, and visioning. These skills and relationships are
desperately needed by HOT as it seeks to secure long term non-project
funding and become more sustainable.

I believe conflicts should be handled in the follow 2 basic ways.

1. Potential conflicts should be talked about and acknowledged well before
any actual conflicts arise.
2. Board members should completely recuse themselves from any conversation.
They should not listen to or be a part of the conversation during any
activities where a conflict exist.

In following with the basic conflict rules above I think it should be every
board candidate to explain any potential conflicts within their candidate
statement. As such I'll be posting my conflicts the the Board Election Wiki
and encourage others to do the same.

I also encourage those candidates that haven't yet created a candidate
statement of manifesto to do so now. Explain why you are running for the
HOT board. Why you are passionate about HOT and what your priorities will
be in the next year. This is important for voting members and for other
board candidates so that we can have a frank, honest, and robust discussion
about the future of HOT.
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