Stuart Ainsworth

It’s been over a week since my last post on this subject, and to be honest, I was hoping that I wasn’t going to have to write any more.  I felt like I had stated my position that the Nominations Committee for the PASS elections of 2010 had been faced with an unpopular decision, and we chose to take the high road of following the process we established before picking the slate.  Since then, I’ve had the peculiar experience of both being hailed as a hero (for making a public statement) and yet having my work deemed inferior (the decision we reached as a committee).  I’m hoping that I can clarify some things, and publically answer some questions that have been asked of me online and face-to-face.

Catching up…

If you haven’t been following along, or (like me) have missed a couple of really good postings on the issue, you may want to check out the list of postings at the Discussion page on http://elections.sqlpass.org.  I think it speaks volumes about our community that we worry about things like fairness and openness, and that the organization which is at the center of the controversy is hosting comments (both positive and negative).

The caveats: It’s all about me, really.

I should note that I’m making this post as an individual, not as a sanctioned representative of the Nominating Committee or PASS.  It’s all me, and these are my beliefs and my opinions.  I like to think that I hold myself to the highest standard possible, so there are some things that I’m going to frame in terms of my beliefs, even those beliefs may be more restrictive than what is legally or professionally required.

First, I believe that the Nominations Committee should be a “black box”; you define the standard by which decisions should be reached, the applicants to whom those decisions apply, and the decision makers before putting that in the box.  Whatever happens in the box, stays in the box.  I had earlier alluded to protecting the privacy of the applicants, but to be honest, the Committee should also protect the privacy of the members (in my opinion).  This was a volunteer gig, and even though many of the volunteers were sitting Board members, a few of us were not.  I know I said some things in those meetings about applicants that I don’t necessarily want broadcast, and according to the election procedure, my comments should be kept in committee; I believe that volunteers should have the right to express ideas in discussion that are unpopular, and those comments should not be used in a court of public opinion.   If I thought that Jack Corbett was an evil genius intent on destroying the world, I should have the right to use that to spark a discussion in committee without ruining my relationship with him (by the way, I don’t believe that; Jack is one of the sweetest guys I know).  

Second, I believe that no matter how unpopular the decision, groups that are composed of volunteers shouldn’t throw the committee under the bus when the work is done.   I SUPPORT THE RESULTS OF THE NOM COM.  Period.  This is not “circling the wagons” or “hiding behind the process”; this is a fundamental precept of my understanding of civilized discourse.   Seven people had an opportunity to discuss all of the applicants, and seven people reached a majority decision to promote five applicants to the slate.  I respect the work of my colleagues on the Nom Com, and I hope they feel the same way about me.

Third, we’ve all got to work together tomorrow.  The SQL Server community is large, but it’s still a small village in some ways, and I want to be careful in what I say because I want to engage in productive dialogue, and not destructive.  It was funny to see some of the tweets about the perceived “us-vs-them” (and I know those tweets were in jest), but the truth is, I respect a lot of people that I don’t always agree with.  Andy Leonard and I had some great discussions over the weekend at SQL Saturday 51, as did Andy Warren and I.  Lynda Rab hugged me.   Steve Jones and I have exchanged DM’s, and I’m hoping to sit down over a beer with him at some point.  I’ve also had several emails and phone calls from others with whom I disagree; I’m friends with people, and I hope that at the end of the day, we can walk away respecting each other even though we may have different ideas about how to solve the problem.  There’s no “them” in this discussion; we’re all us.

On to the issues…

Andy Leonard recently posted a great wrap-up about the process as he understands it; he does make some conjectures about the process which I think are incorrect, but for the most part, I think his analysis is insightful and a great read for people who can only observe from the outside.

Andy makes a great argument about process failures versus execution failures, and I can see his point. 

I left Farmville Virginia at 4:00 AM EDT Friday morning heading to SQL Saturday #51 in Nashville Tennessee. I thought about where I was going the night before, printed some basic instructions, pre-programmed a few addresses into my Garmin, and then drove roughly 550 miles in about 9 hours… this was my process. If I’d ended up in New York City instead of Nashville I could offer the excuse that I followed a process, but you would see right through that excuse, wouldn’t you? You’d say things like "That’s weak Andy". If you had a vested interest in meeting me in Nashville and I called emailed you from New York City to tell you I wasn’t in Nashville and that I was, in fact, even further from Nashville than I was at the beginning of following my process, you would be understandably put out.

It’s a great analogy, but it’s hinged on one troublesome precept: the Nom Com and the Board of Directors failed.  I don’t think we failed (and I know that statement’s about to open up a heap of trouble).   Did we (the Nom Com) arrive at an unpopular decision?  Yep.  Did the Board of Directors support that unpopular decision and ratify the slate?  Yep.   Is that a failure?  No.  If you’re assuming that Steve Jones deserves to be a candidate, then I can see how you want to blame somebody or something for reaching a different outcome than you desire.  But that’s not a failure; it was an unplanned outcome <G>.

Here’s my take on it: We (the Nom Com) had an agreement with PASS to find qualified candidates for the 2010 Board of Directors; to fulfill that agreement, we developed a process that we published and had explicitly approved by the BOD, and implicitly approved by the PASS membership (I don’t remember getting any feedback at all from the membership after making this post).  We used a template to evaluate written applications, and then interviews (more about the template below).  After all was said and down, it came down to an Yes/No/Abstain vote from each of the Nom Com members (as explained by Tom LaRock); Steve and Jack didn’t get enough votes to go on.  Did the Nom Com deliver a slate of qualified candidates?  Damn skippy; I believe that each and every one of the five individuals of the slate deserves an opportunity to be a Director.  Did we leave off candidates that were qualified according to public opinion? Obviously so.  Is that a failure?  I wouldn’t call it one; to rephrase Andy’s analogy, I think we made it to Nashville, but we left behind part of the slide deck.  Can we still go on?

What about the Numbers?

Both Andy Leonard and K. Brian Kelley provide some insight into the numbers from the templates used to rank the candidates.  Again, very well written and thoughtful posts that certainly raise some questions about why Steve (and to some degree, Jack, who is getting a very short shrift in this controversy) didn’t make the slate.  It’s understandable, because those templates are comfortable to look at for data-oriented geeks.  We like numbers, and we like it when numbers make sense.   It would be great if we had some sort of objective measurement by which to determine the qualifications of an applicant; unfortunately, the template ain’t it.

Brian’s analysis shows the holes in the theory that we had an objective measure by questioning how we (the Nom Com) arrived at those ratings; granted, his rankings are based on his personal knowledge of Steve Jones, and he’s a sample of 1, but it shows the subjectivity inherent in a ranking system.  Granted, the averages were supposed to ease some of the subjectivity (by reducing the emphasis on outliers), but 7 is still a small sample, so extreme differences among Nom Com members could have definitely impacted the outcome.  Furthermore,  the Nom Com was privy to information that was not public (the complete application and interview); our rankings were based on our perception of how well the candidate met the criteria using all information available to us, and most of that information came from the application and the interview.  Did I know about Steve’s black belt? No.  Did I know his son was on the Eagle Scouts?  Wasn’t on the application form.

Ultimately, the numbers were used as a guide to facilitate discussion; there was no cut-off point, and 7 interviewees were well within the maximum number of candidates for the Board (as defined by the bylaws; see the election process for more details).  It came down to a majority vote, and the majority of the committee felt that Steve and Jack were not ready at this time to be on the slate (for Jack, it was 0 yea’s, 6 no’s, and an abstention; for Steve, it was 1 yea, 5 no’s, and an abstention).  

The question of fitness.

Here’s a quote from Andy Leonard:

I know Steve. I believe he would be disruptive. I think he would challenge the status quo and defend the SQL Server Community with every ounce of his being. I believe he would start his two years of service on the Board more stubborn and obstinate than he would end it. Like every Board of Director member that’s taken time to share their experience, Steve would evolve. For some, that’s a problem. They cannot tolerate the disruptive-ness. I believe Steve was deemed "unFit" for the Board for this reason.  

I may be misreading this, but Andy seems to be accusing some members of the Nom Com and the Board of Directors of bias against disruption or discussion, and to that end I ask: Have you met Rick Bolesta?  Andy Warren?  Lynda Rab?   None of these folks would I consider to be peacekeepers; they’re all opinionated, strong-willed, intelligent, and fair people (and I can name others on the BoD).   To assume that we (the Nom Com) deliberately excluded an applicant because they met the same characteristics of many of the sitting BoD is illogical.

To be fair, I can see how Andy got there; Steve is not known for pulling punches when it comes to PASS, and I can see how it looks like “Steve was a bully, so I’m not going to let him play on my team”.   But, to linger on that assumes that the we (the Nom Com) are incapable of being professional when it comes handling criticism.  To pull another quote from Andy regarding the Nom Com:

You could argue that they did their job with the same zeal as the people who shrink-wrap CDs and DVDs. But understand they were told to protect us from another marketing executive. This isn’t a complaint about the NomCom – it’s constructive criticism. I believe members of the NomCom know the difference.

I, too, believe the Nom Com knows when criticism is constructive, and I think we factored that in to the definition of Fit.  But one’s ability to deliver constructive criticism is NOT the only component of that measure; we examined all nominee’s skills, experiences, and strength to derive that measure.  Granted, it was a subjective measure masked as objectivity, but it should not have been used as a bias against Steve (or any other candidate) because he’s a rabble-rouser.

Other bits and bytes…

After all of that is said is done, there’s still some lingering questions to be answered.  I’d been meaning to write a post about this, but obviously the controversy is outweighing the need to understand what happened in committee.  Let me briefly summarize some of the main points:

Would I have changed anything about the process?

Yes.  I think that the Nom Com qualification process needs to be standardized and used every year; that would alleviate some of the concerns as to why the quality of candidates differentiated so wildly from last year to now.   I think the template is a great idea, but the Board needs to define (in conjunction with the membership at large; stole that idea from Andy Warren) what constitutes a qualified candidate.  Those qualifications need to be simple and easy to understand, and allow for a broad range of candidates to qualify.

I also think the board needs to have more community members sitting on it, like others have suggested (I couldn’t find the reference, so if you were first to post this, sorry).  I do believe that a Nom Com is necessary for PASS, and I’m open to discussions about the role of that committee. 

Am I mad about the controversy?

There have been times over the last week that I have wanted to haul a few posters aside and have a discussion out in the parking lot (despite the fact that the last fight I was in was in 7th grade, and I lost because my lip got stapled to my braces).  I’ve gotten very good at relieving stress via Wii Boxing.   I think the criticism that hurt most was from people whom I respect and they posted something without thinking about the people involved in the process; most I have forgiven (and talked it out).  Others will take a while before they gain my trust back.

I also HATE that 5 talented individuals that did make the slate (and 1 who did not) are being marginalized because of the outcry over Steve.  We’ve got to move on, and soon, or we’re going to miss out an opportunity to understand the next set of Directors.

Would I serve on the Nom Com again?

Hell, yes.   I plan to serve until I get the chance to deny Paul Randall a seat on the board (j/k).   To be honest, I’m very proud of my service, and I hope to do again.  I realize it’s not the easiest job in the world, but nothing important is.

If you Tweet or follow Steve Jones’ blog, you’ve already gotten the news that Steve will not be on the slate for the Board of Directors this year.  It was a tough decision for the Nominations Committee to make, but I wanted to address some of the controversy before it boils over.  I do, however, have a few caveats:

• As a member of the Nomination Committee, I can not (and will not) go into details about why we reached the decision we did; I want to be transparent, but I also want to protect the sanctity of the application process.   I think the interview process should be private between the applicant and the Committee in order to allow applicants to express themselves freely without excessive public scrutiny, and;
• I don’t want to start, or be dragged into, a PASS-versus-Steve discussion.  I sat on the committee, and I was involved in the discussions behind the slate, and it’s painful for me to read comments like “The NomCom should be ashamed of themselves”, or we were “supposed to act professional”.   It’s very tempting for me to dive into the fray with both fists swinging, but to do so would either negate my first principle (I might say something I shouldn’t), or prove the previous commenter correct (I would be ashamed of myself for stooping to that level). 

So, how do I talk about this without talking about it?  I guess I’ll start with what my intent for this post it; I can’t discuss how or why we reached a decision about Steve (that’s not fair to him), but I do want to defend the professionalism and integrity of the Nominations Committee.

Just to restate the process for those of you playing at home:

1. The Nominations Committee (NomCom) of PASS is charged with overseeing the applications process for building a slate of nominees for the Board of Directors.  The NomCom is supposed to recommend the best candidates from those willing to run.
2. The NomCom evaluated applicants initially on their applications, and identified 7 out of 9 applicants that we wanted to interview.
3. The NomCom interviewed those applicants, and had several discussions of those interviews.
4. The NomCom proposed a slate of candidates for the Board to approve, and the sitting Board of Directors had the option to approve or modify the proposed slate.  They chose to approve it as it stood.

Steve obviously made the first cut on his application because we interviewed him.  Since he didn’t make the slate, you can probably surmise that something happened during the interview phase for a significant portion of the NomCom to not recommend him.  What’s being overlooked in the current controversy is that several other interviewees DID make the slate.

That’s important; we applied the same rigor and professionalism in interviewing all of the candidates that we did to Steve,  In fact, I can honestly say that we discussed Steve Jones MORE than any other candidate because we were all a little surprised at our own decision.  We knew it was going to be unpopular with the community, and we knew that there were going to be questions about how we could exclude such a great guy like Steve (and to be clear, I do think Steve is a great guy; he’s a great asset to the community and to PASS). 

What could we have done?  Should we have proposed a candidate simply because he’s a popular choice?  Should we have given him a do-over in the interview?  Neither of those choices seemed professional or appropriate, and so I stand behind the decision to be consistent with all candidates, and I hope that most of you would have to come to the same decision if you were in my seat.  If not, I’d hope that you understand that it was my desire to be professional and to have integrity that led me to this decision.

Not much new to report on the PASS 2010 Nominations process this week (http://elections.sqlpass.org).  We’ve interviewed 5 of the 7 remaining applicants, and overall, it looks like we’re going to have a great slate for selecting candidates this year.  Unfortunately, I had to miss a couple of the interviews due to a faulty merge-and-purge process at work, but the ones I did sit in on were very impressive.

I promise that I’ll write a more in-depth post after the interviews are done, but I don’t want to skew the remaining interviews.  Hang in there.

I’m in a bit of a sticky wicket here; as a blogger, I feel obligated to share what’s going on with the Nomination Committee for the 2010 PASS elections, but as a member of that committee, I feel obligated to not say too much too soon.  However, I have seen some of the buzz on twitter regarding applicants that have been selected to continue moving forward and those that were encouraged to try again next year.

All I can really say at this time that we have looked at all of the applications that we’ve received and have decided to move forward with interviewing 7 of the 9 applicants.  An official announcement is forthcoming about how we came to our decision to move forward with those 7, but I did want to share a piece of information that is guiding the process of selecting candidates for the board.

PASS is a volunteer organization that serves the SQL Server community, and although the goal of PASS is to be a resource for everyone who works with SQL Server, there are lots of members of the community that have a limited history of involvement with PASS.  In other words, there are several community leaders (speakers, authors, bloggers) that don’t have hands-on volunteer experience with PASS (i.e., working as a chapter leader or a committee member); while these community leaders are great assets to the community (and PASS),  I was concerned that they didn’t have enough exposure to the organization to lead it.  This was a hard choice to make, because you could look at an application and see that the applicant had a real heart for leadership and support within the SQL Server community, but compared to other applicants, they just didn’t have the same experience with PASS.

Of course, that’s easy to rectify, and there’s always another opportunity to run for election next year.  I’m excited about the applicants that are lined up to be interviewed over the next two weeks (and I’ll probably refrain from commenting until after those interviews are done).  I’m also learning a lot about how PASS committees work, and I hope to continue helping out in the future.

Be sure to check out http://elections.sqlpass.org for the official news.   Good luck to the rest of the applicants; regardless of what happens during the interviews, I am positive we will have a great slate of candidates to choose from during this year’s election.

In case you missed it, the call for nominations for the PASS Board of Directors went out yesterday; there are 3 seats that need to be filled this year, and PASS is trying to be very open about the nomination and electoral process this year.  I thought I would post a couple of links here (in case you missed them), as well as my brief perspective on parts of the process.

General Information

First, there’s the general home page for the 2010 Elections: http://elections.sqlpass.org  Not much to day, but here’s where you can find answers to a lot of your questions about the application and nomination process, and it will continue to be updated as candidates are chosen.  Of special interest to most people is the section labeled “How Does It Work?”; in one short paragraph (copied below), the nominations procedure is well-summarized:

The elections process starts with the nomination application.  Applicants are screened and ranked by the Nominations Committee.  The top applicants are invited back for an interview.  They are then again ranked by the Nominations Committee, which presents an election slate to the Board of Directors for review.  The top interviewees become the official candidates when the Board of Directors approves the election slate.

Additional links going into greater detail are also in this section, including a timeline and an in-depth walkthrough of the 2010 elections procedure.

So you think you have what it takes?

On the right side of the page are a couple of links; one for the actual application (APPLY NOW), and one for What does it take to be a Director?  The latter is probably THE most important link on this page in terms of transparency because it lays out the general guidelines for choosing a candidate from the small pile of applications we (the Nominations Committee) hope to receive.  Be sure that you spend some time on this information (if you’re interested in applying), but realize that much of it is describing the IDEAL candidate, which may or may not exist in the real world.   Think of it like you would any job interview; your skills may be a perfect fit for most of the criteria, but you’re probably going to have some weak spots as well.   However, other candidates will have the same limitations; the Nominations Committee is looking for people that are generally qualified to perform the job needed, and we will be picking the best candidates from the list of applicants.

How many applicants will make the slate?  PASS bylaws require that the slate be made up of (n+1) candidates, where n equals the number of Board seats available.  There may also be no more than (n*3) candidates, so for this election with 3 Board seats available,  we (the NomCom) hope to present between 4 and 9 candidates for election.   However, if we do not receive enough viable applicants to move forward with filling all 3 seats, the Chair of the Nominations Committee has the right to present a smaller slate and leave seats open; this is NOT an ideal situation, so please APPLY NOW if you are generally capable of being a Director.

Who is the Nominations Committee?

The NomCom for 2010 is:

Wayne Snyder (Chair)
Thomas LaRock
Rick Heiges
Rick Bolesta
Judy Christianson
Denise McInerney
Stu Ainsworth

Brief bios can be found here.