Thank you for reading and the thoughts. Changing to direct election would require changing the bylaws, which would be a major undertaking.



An interesting thought.



Agreed. The recent slowness has been caused by there not being a secretary to put the minutes together.

You've taken minutes before? Do you have one free night per month? If you have any interest in this at all let me know, I will owe you the beverage of your choice (or an equivalent amount of BTC ).



I can imagine... it's why I ran last year in the first place.

I agree with what you are saying and will probably have more to say in response later.

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That which can be destroyed by the truth should be.
--
My (sadly neglected, but not forgotten) project: http://dailyjoseki.com

I have hesitated to comment on this thread for a variety of reasons. First, I have great respect for all three candidates running in the Eastern Region - the region Feng Yun is running in. Second, since I am currently Chairman of Policy and Governance (although I have had no conversations with the President - Select on him keeping me in that position) I would not want my comments contrued to be official in any way. My Committee looks into issues when asked, we do not offer opinions when we are not.

But since this thread has touched upon the issue of conflict of issue, and some of the other arguments touch upon the way the AGA runs itself, I would like to offer some thoughts and history, coming from the person who headed the group that created the current system, but ones that are unofficial.

Note that this will be a long post - and if you find all this detail uninteresting, not only are you a person who has my respect, but you personify the core issue of running this volunteer organization. Many of us care passionately about this game, but it is a game, a game we want to play, and while we care inordinately about it - we care about playing it, many/most do not want to invest the time and energy to run an organization.

This disconnect has become more pronounced with the arrival of the internet. Before IGS, sure, I really do not want to run the AGA or run my local chapter - but someone has to, and if someone won't, then I cannot play go, and I really want to play go, so I volunteer. But now, if there is no club, there is IGS, KGS etc - I can still play.

In the old days, running a national organization was difficult with no money and small membership. The AGA was run by a self selecting Board of Directors, many of whom, for sensible convenience and because of willingness, lived in NY or at least the East. I believe these leaders did a fine job, and made every effort to spread go throughout the country, but it was only natural that folks in other parts of the country began to resent that all the power resided in NY, and it is undeniably healthy for our leadership to be more geographically diverse.

Three things mandated and caused the system to be changed. First, technology made it so much easier to work together over vast distances. Second, American Go became more than just an East Coast thing - go was spreading, and not just on the coasts. Thirdly, ING funding meant there was some real money to do some things, and folks wanted a say on how that was handled.

We went through a period where we elected a President, and appointed regional Presidents, but the ultimate power still resided with a self selecting Board. Ultimately, the membership, or at least the membership that cared, wanted to elect the Board.

A lot of hard work went into the current system. Quite frankly, I was opposed to many of the changes, but I firmly believe that the system we have in place is a great one in theory, even if it has yet to fulfill what I consider its promise. Extensive discussions were held and the conclusion was clear: If the AGA is going to continue to thrive into the future we must continue to organize on a grass roots level, that while the internet was increasingly becoming our best breeding ground for go players, AGA chapters and tournaments were both the best things the AGA can provide and best way to gather those players into members, particularly the active members that can run this organization, Congresses etc.

So we elect regional directors based on our Chapters. The brilliant Rick Mott added a weighting mechanism that allows the smallest of clubs, doing the hard lonely work to have a say and not be swamped by the larger ones. Regional Directors have and should keep in touch with these Chapter leaders and represent those concerns. We also have an at large Director directly elected by the individual members. For those who suggest all Directors be elected that way I offer this comment, referencing the nature of Go Players I mention above. Most of us just want to play. Chapter leaders are more inclined to care about governance issues, to have interacted with the AGA and to know the people involved. Statistics will show that virtually all chapter heads vote, and these votes represent a majority of members in their regions. Voting turnout for the direct election is much lower.

Again, in theory, we have a great system. In practice, there are some problems and disputes. One is a philosophical one which has yet to be resolved. One of the early proponents of this system called the directors "The Magnificent Seven". I preferred "The Seven Wise Men" (forgive the sexism). My view is that we need to create an effective and efficient orgainization under the President that runs this organization, day to day, month to month and almost year to year. My view of the Board is that the Seven act more as a Supreme Court - overlooking the President's efforts and making sure we are on the right track and formulating long term goals. While I recognized it would take a while for the balance to get where I would like it - we seem to be definitly still in "The Magnificent Seven" mode of development - "Magnificent" implying a far more active role in day to day affairs than I would prefer. This is somewhat understandable - with many of our best and most passionate people running for the Board, they naturally have their fingers in the cake.

But regardless of whether the Board is Wise or Magnificent, it is the final say for what is done in this organization. And so, Policy and Governance did make recomendations regarding this issue. I wish I still had the report. We laid out specific examples of potential conflicts and gave opinions on the situation. While some of the scenarios where unanimous, many were split.

We were concerned about the AGA being independant, and free from outside or personal interest. Independance is important, and not irrelevant, the ING Foundation had charitably sought to impose a rule set on us in the past, and we deftly negotiated an agreement that gave us great benifit and maintained our independance. Similarly, today we are receiving substantial outside interest and help from Korea, with our new pro system, but our indepencance must be maintained.

We recomended that no one should be a member of the AGA Board of Directors if they were a member of another national go organization. We also recomended that no one who made their primarily living as go player should be allowed to run for Board of Directors. Note, we were not rejecting the valued experience, aid, help or efforts of anyone - this experience and expertise could be well employed by the President within his/her administration. It was simply an expression that the top level of our organization be free from outside influence or personal gain.

Votes were split on other scenarios, but my recollection was that the majority would have prohibited, for example, Chuck Robbins from running because he was one of the owners of Slate and Shell (note: no longer). There was even some feeling that a business interest as minor as our own Daniel Smith's Joseki program should prohibit his candidacy.

These recomendations were soundly rejected by the Board - in favor of the, in my opinion, vague conflict of interest provision we have now. And let me say, LOUDLY, given my remarks above, that Chuck Robbins has been BEYOND careful in abstaining from any votes and discussions involving AGA - Vendor issues. Similarly, I am unaware, nor do I necessarily believe, that Daniel Smith has or would do anything inappropriate.

However, the problem remains. Under the current policy, a conflicted person has to recognize their own conflict and act upon it. There is really no guidance as to the nature of conflicts, nor any mechanism to enforce compliance. Furthermore, to get Machiavellian, there is absolutely nothing to prohibit a conflicted person from proplerly abstaining, but swapping votes on other issues to pursue the conflict.

Now I recognize that some may and did, see these concerns as paranoid delusions, but I felt at the time that it was important to inform the Board about these concerns, even the ones I thought were pretty out there. And so, I inform this group.

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My days of not taking you seriously are certainly coming to a middle

I was catching up on the recent posts (and theres been a lot since i last checked!) and was going to say this but you beat me to it. Well played sir, well played.

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Decisions are made by those who show up.
and possibly those willing to attend secret meetings in ancient basements

Sadly, I don't think I've done anything for my website since getting elected to the board. (I haven't even updated the security certificate which has expired or will soon.) I never really saw it as a money making endeavor, so that some might see it as a problem honestly didn't occur to me. Anyway, I haven't--and won't--do anything for it that I'd be unable to if nobody knew who I was...

Anyway, it is always good to hear your perspective.

_________________
That which can be destroyed by the truth should be.
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My (sadly neglected, but not forgotten) project: http://dailyjoseki.com

Thank you all for the history and the thoughts. Conflict of interest is a problem. But if an organization starts to concern too much about it, it is a sign of unhealthiness. Why? It means the organization relies so much on the "goodness" of its directors, likely due to the lack of transparency. In my opinion, we should look more on the "alignment of interests" --- who would benefit if Go flourishes in US? and who has most stake in it? On the other hand, we should improve the transparency of the organization, having fixed rules upfront (no making up rules on the spot). It is OK for a Slate and Shell owner to participate in decision making, as long as all the purchase of equipments are made public. It is OK for a professional Go player to seat on the board, as long as he (or she) does not invent reasons to exclude people from playing.

I was holding off on posting since I have only minimal dogs in this fight (I'm an AGA member, but I can't say I know enough about all of the related issues to make a relevant comment in either direction on them). One thing I am familiar with those is organizations like this, and I do understand why in my (apparently never coming off as quite as humble as I claim it to be) opinion, the idea of "transparency" is a joke. The reason you have conflicts around a term like "transparency" are as follows:

You have an <authority group> who says "Hey, we have <issue> we should talk about!" Then you have that talk about it at <poorly attended meeting>, then you have the summary of <poorly attended meeting> put into <section of newsletter that is only read by the sort of people who would attend poorly attended meeting> and one of the major discussion points at <poorly attended meeting> revolves around <old event that everyone in poorly attended meeting went to, but most of the larger organization didn't go to>. The details of <old event> are omitted for efficiency because everyone discussing it knows what we are talking about, and afterall, anyone who wasn't at <old event> could read about it in <publicly available archives of newsletter>. Let's also please keep in mind that after all these discussions <authority group> is still bound by <by-laws that even fewer people ever cared to read>. So after <discussion no one wanted to participate in> at <meeting no one bothered showing up at> was rehashed in <newsletter no one ever reads>, some poor soul even goes through the trouble of summarizing it in <website no one visits>, and we are left with a large population of people who doesn't understand why we are following the exact procedure stipulated in <by laws they still haven't bothered reading>.

The end result is that many claim there is no transparency on <issue>. While it is unfortunate that people come in late to the game, or are otherwise disinclined to do the legwork required to have a complete background on <issue>, the <organization> doesn't have the payroll to keep a full time instructor on staff to educate every member who suddenly feels disenfranchised. The <authority group> on the other hand has a hard time feeling responsible, after all, the history that led up to the event could found through publicly available materials. Any member could learn it so long as they know the right questions to ask and right places to look.

Admittedly this is my experience from large (non-AGA) organization, as always your mileage may vary....

Mef, you nailed it! PERFECT.

I would LOVE it if we could somehow sticky this reply with the subject "lack of transparency" in the AGA forum.

Alternately, perhaps a bot could monitor threads for the phrase "Lack of transparency" and repost this answer in its entirety.

This forum has many active members of AGA leadership, board members past & present, as well as large numbers of active volunteers. They're available and answer questions on the regular. And still, every few weeks we hear "there's no transparency!"

Show up, people! Are you at the general assembly this year? No? Why not?

(seigenblues posted that from the AGA general assembly, while it was in progress...)

_________________
That which can be destroyed by the truth should be.
--
My (sadly neglected, but not forgotten) project: http://dailyjoseki.com

Can we have a general summary of what the discussions were like at the AGM and board meeting? What's the state of the union, so to speak?

I got there late -- even later than I wanted after I found out I was late, because they moved the meeting -- and even if somebody said "Washburn", my head heard "Ware" and I went to the wrong place. (edit: oh, and I missed the board meeting entirely because I was game recording)

Since I got there late, I never saw a published agenda, though I heard about it from somewhere.

-- Big changing of the guard. Allan's out, Andy's in. Lot's of other musical chairs.

-- Next year in Tacoma! Yay!

-- Then the next year we're all becoming Canadian.

-- A couple new agenda items (maybe I shouldn't say "new", as they were on the list as I understand). I don't remember all the specifics, but at least one item got a little heated and defensive when last year's congress shortfalls were brought up.

And I'm sorry, but I have to agree with Feng Yun on this one... if we already knew this topic was going to be on the agenda, we should've been a little better prepared to talk about it.

And then again -- I may just not know all the various details and particulars still.

-- Some other topics about memberships and chapters, and I apologize for being quite fuzzy on the details.

Daniel was taking the official notes, though he may not be allowed to publish them just yet (and I'm actually a little confused as to why that is)


And then to tie this all in with what Mef wrote a couple of posts above (because its sorta related to part of the discussion at the general assembly)... while I agree that what he wrote is true most of the time, I think we have to admit that there are times when, and more often than we'd like, the transparency is still lacking and its like pulling teeth trying to get information out of people who are in the know, if we get any information at all.

In general, minutes are considered on-the-record statements of policy positions, are records of factual information, and can be legally binding (if e.g. a properly constituted board introduces a motion, debates it, amends it, and then passes as amended). Thus minutes from one meeting need to be officially finalized (they are sometimes taken verbatim and need to be shortened, or taken in some kind of shorthand and need to be lengthened) and then approved at the next meeting, so that the statements, facts, and records of business transacted are correct. That is time-consuming enough, but some associations get into a negative dynamic where people are petty about the minutes (wanting to airbrush what they say and so on), which can turn minutes from a minor headache to major headache. (I have no idea if either of these play a role in the AGA, just explaining why you can rarely release minutes until after a subsequent meeting.)

Yes, I took the minutes at the general assembly. I'm not sure what the procedure is for releasing them. My guess is draft minutes will be posted to the chapters list at some point. I know the last minutes were approved before this meeting.

They need a little cleanup, but are not too bad. I wrote with the level of detail you've all come to expect from board minutes (despite the fact that I don't think that level of detail belongs in minutes and ought to be communicated in other ways, but I digress). Listening, paraphrasing, and typing at full speed for three and a half hours was quite stressful.

_________________
That which can be destroyed by the truth should be.
--
My (sadly neglected, but not forgotten) project: http://dailyjoseki.com

My feeling is that given that the meeting was public, anyone should be allowed to release notes about the meeting, as long as they don't advertise their notes as official approved minutes.

On the topic of board meeting and AGM, I'm less interested in the retrospective griping as I am about forward-looking items. Can we get a general summary of discussions about future plans, priorities and programs?

Daniel's notes will have the details but I'd say in general with the recognition that there is an almost all-new Board (5 out of 7 members) coming in September and a new President, the specifics of most forward-looking items were deferred. The overall tone was upbeat and fairly optimistic about the future. Nice slide show of the facilities in Tacoma and some of the local sites, and quite a bit of enthusiasm over the likely prospect of having it in Vancouver the following year jointly with the CGA. It was a great Congress and lots of fun!

- gurujeet

Now that the smoke has cleared, the election results are:

Western: Steven Burrall 55% (21 votes); Chris Kirschner 36% (14); Jeff Horn 7% (3).
Eastern: Gurujeet Khalsa 74% (32); Feng Yun 16% (7); Thomas Hsiang (withdrew) 6% (3);
Central: Robert Barber 58% (14); Lisa Scott 41% (10);
At-Large: Zhiyuan [Edward] Zhang 34% (85); Chuck Robbins 29% (74); Jie Li 26% (65); Abstain 8% (20); Other (At-Large): Roy Laird 2 votes, Feng Yun 1 vote, Bob Bacon 1 vote.

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