Re: What I was trying to say in the plenary last week

[Randy Bush <randy@psg.com>]

>> agree with your problem statement.  but could it not be more
>> simply, and less contentiously, solved by shifting dates left a
>> month or two?
> That might help, but my democratic instincts incline me towards
> publishing the list anyway.

your words underline to me what is the basic tension.  to make it a
contrast of extremes, is the purpose of the nomcom to hold an open
democratic election, or is it to create/modify/update a working
management team?

i don't think it is either of these extremes, but am inclined more
to the latter than the former.  there is a massive amount of work
to do, and people are never satisfied with the rate of progress.
so having reasonably well working teams is critical.

i do *not* mean this as an argument for incumbency, but rather for
how difficult and fragile it is to build and maintain engineering
and / or management teams.  and this is what i see is the real
underlying task of the nomcom.

venture capitalists look more at the team than the initial product
plan.  in their expensive experience, team formation is *the*
critical factor.  having played on those teams, i sure know why.
no, the ietf is not a commercial start-up.  but this does not mean
we should ignore the lessons from the successful ones.

as you know from having been on the inside of the i*, it is already
a difficult balance and occasionally the personal and social issues
can be almost paralytic or even destructive.  bright people are not
necessarily well-adjusted socially (present company excepted of
course:-).  i.e. the team building can be fragile given the current
conservative method.  so i am slow to convince that moving to a
seriously open candidate disclosure popularity contest is the best
course.

it's all about where in the middle we feel is most prudent to land.
as usual, since someone has to, i am speaking for the less popular
more conservative position.  thanks for listening.

randy, who does not expect to be here a year from now