[Osmf-talk] Consultation on the Advisory Board

[Frederik Ramm]

Hi,

On 31.07.20 12:35, Mikel Maron wrote:
> The OSMF Advisory Board is set up for the OSMF Board to consult on important matters. It currently consists of Corporate Members (at Gold level and above) and Local Chapters. While a useful idea, it has in practice been utilized infrequently and has not had active discussion itself.

That's kind of by design; when it was set up, we didn't really look
forward to corporate members coming up with their own ideas on how we
should run things - they are more powerful than the OSMF anyway because
they (a) have the money and (b) can invest as much time as they want.

The advisory board was not created because we thought that we need
advice. They way it came to pass was this:

* We first introduced a flat corporate membership at £1000/year.
* Later we thought, we'd like to ask for more money from bigger
corporations, and hence wanted to go multi-tier (Bronze, Silver, Gold etc).
* Then someone said "but we need to OFFER more to the higher tiers, or
else nobody will sign up for them" (to this day, I do not agree with
that sentiment)
* Then we came up with more or less random benefits for the different
tiers, and we offered to Gold members "one half hour telephone call with
a board member per year" or something along those lines, to make them
feel heard
* Then the community was up in arms about this (what, corporations
getting privileged access to board members), and instead we created the
advisory board
* and in order to alleviate any fears that out of public view the
corporate members on the advisory board would go crazy with ideas, we
said we'll put local chapters on it too.

> Meanwhile, the Board has separately engaged some corporate members on topics, and it has been productive.

We could also disband the advisory board altogether and say "the board
has separately engaged some corporate members on topics, and it has been
productive, we plan to continue that and we saw we don't really need the
advisory board".

Or, keep the advisory board as the ceremonial body that it is now, just
there so that higher-paying corporate members get something for their money.

> We think the views of each group are somewhat distinct, and having seperate groups will make for more useful advising. 

Has the board *also* separately engaged local chapters, in the same way,
or is this another way of saying "we'd like to keep the corporate
members and ask them for advice, and we're not really interested in the
rest"?

> We'd continue the practice of reporting out on conversations in the monthly Board meeting minutes, for transparency and benefit of the broader community. 

That is an important part. If you want to close off the corporate
advisory board, and you don't want public reporting of what goes on
behind those walls, then you will need to make doubly sure that any
communication between the board of directors and the advisory board is
minuted and publicized. I.e. if I as a normal member cannot know who
says what inside the AB, at the very least I want to know exactly what
the board has asked of them, and exactly what came back, to avoid any
misunderstandings.

This will also reduce temptation by the board to use "lurkers support us
in email"-type arguments vis-a-vis the members. I don't want to hear
from the board "our corporate members want X therefore..." but instead I
want to hear from the corporate members that they want X. Otherwise it
is too easy to spin a story that supports whatever the board currently
wants.

> What do we call the groups? Corporate Advisory Board and Local Chapter Advisory Board?

My order of preference:

1. abolish them altogether
2. keep them as they are
3. keep the *name*, just give them two different mailing lists (i.e.
local chapters and corporates send someone to the advisory board -
doesn't say that all members of the advisory board need to meet in the
same venue)
4. keep the corporates on the "advisory board" and possibly nominate
additional persons whom you like the advice of (e.g. influencial people
from OSM's history), and reform the local chapter representatives into
something else (local chapter council maybe?).

Only if you *really* want a body that is not for general advice but
exlusively for advice from large corporate interests should you form a
"corporate advisory board", which I would then rename into something
like "Corporate Lobby" or "Corporate Representation of Interests" or
something, to make clear that this is not a generic body that advises
the OSMF, but a body that advises the OSMF in matters of interest to
corporate users.

> Currently only Gold and above are eligible, but we can see value in hearing from small- and medium-sized companies as well. We are considering making the Corporate Advisory Board open to Silver and Bronze, and possibly Supporter. 

It really depends on your vision. You said that you want to split out
the local chapters because their interests are different and it "makes
for better advice". Personally, being head of a small business and
Bronze member, I think my and my company's interests align more with
those of a typical local chapter than with e.g. Facebook. Hence,
according to your logic, including someone from my company would make
for "worse advice" because it would be like a step back to when you had
local chapters in there.

> The one complication here is that the Advisory Board is framed as a benefit to Gold Membership. To companies, how much is the Advisory Board a factor in choice of tier?

I really, really think that we should re-think this "benefit" concept of
corporate membership. Instead, our message should be that if you profit
more from OSM, you should give more (=buy a higher tier). Or maybe "if
you can afford more, pay more". This tit-for-tat model of "you get more
features if you buy a higher membership class" always struck me as odd.

Which does not necessarily mean that we need to open the advisory board
to everyone. On the contrary, perhaps even if you buy Gold you shouldn't
automatically get a seat? Perhaps seats on the advisory board should be
earned, not bought? And maybe, as you say further down, we want to
invite some people onto the AB who aren't even a member? Again, this
depends on what kind of advice you're looking for. If you're thinking
stuff like "cross-continent hiring practices" then it makes a lot of
sense to just ask the global companies and not the 5-person shop from
Karlsruhe, Germany or the esteemed former board chairperson ;)

> The OSMF Board can also choose to appoint individuals to the Advisory Board, to draw on particular expertise. In practice, we have never done this. The question arises as to where these individuals would sit. Join either of the Advisory Boards? Create a separate group? Or just talk to them individually as needed?

I think that before this can be decided, we'll need to figure out what
we want from the advisory board, and why the current setup is not
delivering what we want. The only thing you write is that if the
corporates were among themselves you think this would "make for better
advice". But you don't explain why you think that is the case.

I'm not sure it is, really; if you assume all current AB members to be
civil and constructive, then the OSMF board could possibly get *better*
advice from a diverse group discussing stuff, than from a homogenous
group. If you fear that there are uncivil and unconstructive people on
the AB, ways must be found to rectify that (even a gold member could
nominate someone who either by saying the wrong thing or by their sheer
presence stifles discussion and hence worsens the advice).

My suggestion is that the board answers these questions:

1. What do we want from the advisory board?
2. Are we getting what we want?
3. If not, do we know (or can we guess) why not?

And *then* we can discuss whether splitting up the advisory board makes
sense, and whom to allow on each of the resulting bodies.

Bye
Frederik


-- 
Frederik Ramm  ##  eMail frederik at remote.org  ##  N49°00'09" E008°23'33"