On 19/11/14 at 11:55 +0100, Stefano Zacchiroli wrote: > On Wed, Nov 19, 2014 at 10:13:45AM +0100, Lucas Nussbaum wrote: > > Now, let's assume that I'm a member of the TC, not among the two most > > senior members, and that I feel a bit exhausted about that, not really > > motivated, and not really up to the task anymore. Ideally, I should be > > encouraged to resign. > > With the 'strictly 2' schema, I have an additional incentive NOT to > > resign: if I resign, I cause 3 renewals instead of 2, which might weaken > > the TC a bit too much. > > This is true only insofar a temporary reduction in CTTE membership > actually weakens the CTTE. I don't think that's the case. Formally, the > Constitution suggests ranges in which the CTTE is somehow considered to > be properly functional; outside those ranges, there is no quality > judgement associate to CTTE size. More generally in management terms, > larger boards are not necessarily "better" than smaller ones (in fact, > in the specific case of efficiency, size is usually considered to be > _negatively_ correlated with it, due to the communication overhead). > > But more importantly, we are talking here about *temporary* reductions > in CTTE size, with a time window that might be as small as 0. The CTTE > and the DPL will know in advance that expiries are upcoming, and can > plan new appointments accordingly, potentially doing appointments as > early as January 2nd. If it is known that someone will step in (no > matter whether you know who that person will be or not), then the > negative incentive you mention disappears. This is true only if you use the number of members as the measure for the "strength" of the TC. But if instead, you consider the sum of the experience of all members, more turnover due to resignations at a given point will have a greater impact. Of course, the TC will likely be mostly resilient to that. But if we can avoid that, I think we should. > > With the '2-R' schema, I have an additional incentive to resign: if I > > resign, I 'save' someone else more senior than me from getting expired. > > (And given I'm not so active anymore, instead of weakening the TC further, > > my resignation might even reinforce the TC). > > It seems to me that you've an underlying assumption here that > resignation of inactive members are more important than resignation of > senior members. For me they are exactly on the same level, so I don't > see why one should be technically favored over the other. Oh yes, sure. I don't care very much about the seniority of members, as long as they are able to do their job with the level of quality required by the role. So, yes, I think that the replacement of inactive, demotivated or no longer suited members is much more important than to the replacement of the more senior members. > (It is worth noting here that I'm thinking about this master in fully > abstract terms, I do not have any specific present, past, or future > members of the CTTE in mind. Same here. > Nor I know offhand the current seniority ranking.) Well, I can't say that, given I did the research to do the stats in <[🔎] 20141119103725.GB9825@xanadu.blop.info> > > The '2-R' schema could even result in an internal TC discussion: "OK, > > the Project wants us to change two members. Are there people that feel > > like resigning now? Or should we just fallback to the default of expiring > > the two most senior members?" > > I think that if this happened, it would be very healthy for the TC. > > I agree that this would most certainly happen. But my judgement on it is > that it would be a *bad* thing, not a good one. In fact, I would see > that as a tactical behavior on the part of the CTTE to work around an > agreed upon judgement on the fact that turn-over is good, and that > remaining in charge too long is bad. Note that I agree that turn-over is good. I also generally agree that remaining in charge too long is bad. However: - I think that what is "too long" might depend on individual factors - I don't think that 4 years is a reasonable value for "too long". Lucas
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