Tools / methods for board elections

[fortean]

Folks,

the Foundation that lies at the - er - foundation of our Chapter has entered its third year.  Given that our Statutes dictate that members that enter their third year step down (though not all at once, if you don't mind..) our Chapter will organise its first elections. We are currently in the process of informing our registrees. In januari 2019, the registrees will have a chance to vote.

However - the question is HOW.  We would like to give as many of our registrees as possible the chance to vote and hence prefer some kind of on-line voting system. We can roll our own, but that takes time and effort that probably would be better spent organising our Next Big Event

So, dear Chapter leaders: how do you organise your elections? What software (either on-line, in the cloud or otherwise) do you use? Which procedures?

[rslade]

> fortean (Contributor II) posted a new topic in Chapters on 10-01-2018 01:49 PM

>   However - the question is HOW.  We would like to give as many of
> our registrees as possible the chance to vote and hence prefer some kind of
> on-line voting system. We can roll our own, but that takes time and effort that
> probably would be better spent organising our Next Big Event   So, dear
> Chapter leaders: how do you organise your elections? What software (either
> on-line, in the cloud or otherwise) do you use? Which procedures?

We have an AGM every year. Somewhat in advance, the people in the working
group (those that we can interest, anyway) throw around ideas about who we need
to replace. At the AGM we say who we suggest. If nobody arranges a coup-de-
SIG, that's who next year's executive is.

At one time we tried to work out what we wanted to do about email voting, but
then we realized that nobody was interested.

(We have about 3-400 members altogether, although the ISC2 chapter is smaller.
We get about 20 - 80 members out to meetings, even the AGM. We have a
disucssion mailing list, and a Slack group ...)

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[fortean]

Thanks for the reply, @rslade 🙂

In our case there are TWO entities to consider: a Chapter, and a Foundation that supports the Chapter. There are some differences - dictated by Dutch Law. We try to minimize these differences, but in situations like elections, they are important.

In practice, the Foundation's Statutes dictate the MINIMAL requirements. Then there are The Bylaws -  in our case actually a legal document created by the Foundation and part of that Foundation's rules and regulations (in Dutch: Huishoudelijk Reglement, roughly "rules of the house"). So, the idea is that we have a legal document (Statutes) that dictates what is minimally required according to Dutch Law, on top of that we have "Bylaws" which contain a superset of requirements, as dictated by (ISC)². Might the two collide, Dutch Law prevails.

Our Bylaws state that each member of the Board that has fulfilled that position for 2 years or more needs to step down in the third year.  No more  then 3 board members may step down in the same year and only ONE of them of the Executive Board (President, Treasurer and Secretary). Given that we all started in the same year (2016), we formally all have to step down at the same time, but that would conflict with the Bylaws. To resolve this, we have drafted a Roster, and we have agreed to step down according to that Roster, which also means that some members will have to stay on for another year (sometimes two). These members are automatically re-elected by the Board to ensure that we have contingency.

Now, what happens is as follows:

• first, an announcement is made who(m) are stepping down this year. This also dictates which functions will become vacant and for which functions our registrees can apply.
• Then the Board appoints a fall-back board, which will be put in function if somehow the election process does not return a functional board, i.e. if no candidates apply or when votes tie.
• Then we ask candidates to apply. If a Board member that has to step down wishes to continue his/her function, he or she also has to apply. The list is presented on our website, including motivations.
• Then, finally, we organise elections, and the positions that were vacant are filled. Or so we hope.
• If the election process does not result in a functional board, the fall-back board is appointed.

 So, we have a pretty good idea of the surrounding procedures, but the question remains: how to organise the election itself?

[rslade]

> fortean (Contributor II) mentioned you in a post! Join the conversation below:

>   In practice, the
> Foundation's Statutes dictate the MINIMUM requirements. Then there are The
> Bylaws -  in our case actually a legal document created by the Foundation and
> part of that Foundation's rules and regulations (in Dutch: Huishoudelijk
> Reglement, roughly "rules of the house"). So, the idea is that we have a legal
> document (Statutes) that dictates what is minimally required according to Dutch
> Law, on top of that we have "Bylaws" which contain a superset of requirements,
> as dictated by (ISC)². Might the two collide, Dutch Law prevails.

I'm going back to researching the security implications of quantum computing.
It's simpler ...

🙂

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[fortean]

🙂 not sure if it's simpler, but it sure isn't regulated by Laws and Laywers..

[rslade]

> fortean (Contributor II) posted a new reply in Chapters on 10-02-2018 12:09 PM

> 🙂 not sure if it's simpler, but it sure isn't regulated by Laws and Laywers..

Quantum law--what a concept ...

"Until we let him out of jail, he's both guilty and not-guilty, at the same time ..."

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