Re: [office] Coordination Call Attendance

[robert_weir@us.ibm.com]

"Dennis E. Hamilton" <dennis.hamilton@acm.org> wrote on 09/29/2008 
09:43:28 AM:


> Michael and Robert,
> 
> I notice that the membership and voting membership of OASIS TCs is 
rather
> fluid.
> 

Membership is more fluid than voting membership.  Any OASIS member can 
join as a TC member or remove themselves as a member at will.  Just click 
a button and it happens.  Voting membership, however, is obtained (and 
lost) in accordance with well-defined rules.  However the attendance 
tracking tool we use is not ideal.  Although it will track how many voting 
members attended a particular meeting (for quorum requirements) it does 
not determine who is a voting member.  Chairs need to do this 
determination manually.  Also, although it records who was in attendance 
at a given meeting it only tallies the total number of voting members.  It 
does not break it down further.

> In the minutes, it would be valuable to know
> 
> 1. Which attendees were voting members at the start of the meeting (with 
an
> asterisk or other indicator).
> 
> 2. Which voting members were absent from the meeting, whether on leave, 
etc.
> 
> I find this valuable, as a newcomer, to understand how the quorum is
> composed and also to know, at each occasion, who the voting members are,
> whether attending or not.
> 

Do you know that you can get this information for the current instant by 
looking at the roster page for the ODF TC:  
http://www.oasis-open.org/apps/org/workgroup/office/members/roster.php

This info will be as accurate as the last time a Chair updated it. 
Typically I update when preparing the minutes.

> This is also moderately useful historically, since otherwise it is not 
clear
> in minutes of past meetings how the body was constituted at that time. 
(It
> also has a parliamentary function around reconsideration, although I 
don't
> expect that to be of much concern.)
> 

In practice, we have three kinds of votes:

1) For questions for which OASIS process or TC standing rules require a 
vote, but which the Chair believes consensus exists, I will typically call 
for unanimous consent.  If there are no objections raised, the motion is 
approved.  If objections are raised, we discuss and if consensus is not 
reached, we have a roll call vote.  I'd say 90% of formal questions are 
decided this way.

2) Robert's Rules calls for a voice vote on most questions -- calling the 
ayes and nays.  In practice, on a phone call this is in general impossible 
for a chair to judge.  Different phone lines have different volumes, and I 
cannot determine membership voting rights on a voice call.  So any 
non-consensus question on a call we come down to a roll-call vote where I 
would read off the list of all eligible voting TC members in attendance. 
Such a vote would be recorded in the minutes with the names and voting 
positions of those who voted.

3) For some questions, typically the most serious or controversial 
questions, we can set up an electronic ballot.  This runs for 1 week and 
allows only eligible voters to vote.  The votes for these electronic 
ballots, since they do not occur in a meeting, are not in the minutes. But 
they are recorded here:  
http://www.oasis-open.org/apps/org/workgroup/office/ballots.php

So, I think that in practice, we already record the votes in all 
non-consensus questions.  I'm not sure whether there is any advantage to 
doing this for all votes.  But it is certainly your right, as a member, to 
request, for any particular question, a roll-call vote in accordance with 
Robert's Rules.  A motion to have a roll-call vote requires majority 
approval.

> I know this involves more work in preparing minutes, even though the
> information is known at the time of the call and is consulted as part of
> determining the quorum.
> 
>  - Dennis