18 replies to this topic

[thefirstimmortal]

The Constitution reads in part
Article IV. -- Leadership Positions
· Section 2 -- Pro Bono
ImmInst leaders shall serve without remuneration. Reasonable and necessary expenses may be incurred.

And yet I see in our balance sheets that

Executive Director Pay: 484.67
Opening Balance April 1st
Executive Director Pay: 484.67
Opening Balance March 1st
Executive Director Pay: 484.67
Opening Balance February 1st
Executive Director Pay: 1000.90
Opening Balance December 1st =
Executive Director Pay: 483.67

These do not appear to be expenses. It appears to be pay, something our Constitution expressly forbids. In the leadership archives, Elrond warned you Aug 27, 2007 of this in a post titled " leadership clause, leaders will serve pro bono".

I'm not saying that the Executive Director isn't worth every penny of that fee, what I'm saying is that you can't do this. You have to change the Constitution, and drop the wording if you want leaders to have pay. Why do you all insist on ignoring the Constitution? What's the sense in having it if your not going to abide by it? It appears to be akin to a list of suggestions, something you'll follow if it suits you.

[thefirstimmortal]

I couldn't find any discussion on what the Treasure Chest is. Could someone tell me a little more about this? I'm just wondering.

TREASURE CHESTS REPORT
Kenneth Sills - Account Balance: 800.00
Bruce Klein - Account Balance: 800.00
Shane Greenup - Account Balance: 800.00
John Schloendorn - Account Balance: 800.00
Sebastian Sethe - Account Balance: 800.00
Richard Leis - Account Balance: 800.00

Total Treasure Chests Account Balance remaining: 4800.00

[thefirstimmortal]

Well, this has been explained to me. If I understand it correctly, I think this is a wonderful idea, this Treasure chest concept. What's troubling to me at this point is that 16 people, largely leaders and not one of you could have publically explianed this to me?

Who read my topic ??? (Total : 16) Mind , reason , Shannon , elrond , dnamechanic , Richard Leis , lightowl , Matthias , jaydfox , thughes , shepard , maestro949 , cnorwood , frankbuzin , niner , modelcadet ,

I couldn't find any discussion on what the Treasure Chest is. Could someone tell me a little more about this? I'm just wondering.

TREASURE CHESTS REPORT
Kenneth Sills - Account Balance: 800.00
Bruce Klein - Account Balance: 800.00
Shane Greenup - Account Balance: 800.00
John Schloendorn - Account Balance: 800.00
Sebastian Sethe - Account Balance: 800.00
Richard Leis - Account Balance: 800.00

Total Treasure Chests Account Balance remaining: 4800.00

[caliban]

Hello Bill

Firstly: Welcome back on board! Don't you ever dare die on us.

Now to your questions:

Leadership positions.
Leaders are defined by the consitution as Directors, Navigators, Advisor's and Spokespersons. All of these serve not only without financial renumeration but often without due recognition for their services. Thus on this occasion: thank you all for your service!
The "executive director" position is not one of leadership. The director has no voting rights on the board. Mind had to resign his seat when he took up the position. If you take a bit of time to follow the genesis of that position in the archives, you will see why it was established and what we are aiming to achieve with having a paid member of part-time staff, at least for a trial period.
In any event: no violation of the constitution.

Treasure chests.
These are for streamlining and expediting expenditure on small scale projects that benefit our mission. A measure to cut red tape. All of us on the board have thus far been remiss in not spending this money more proactively. Again there is more information in the archives here.

Lastly a question to you Bill:
You are a lifetime member. You are among friends. Do you really think its necessary to barge in, cry "VIOLATION" without any study of the background material, (which you yourself know you have to catch up on), drag our fairly confidential financial data out of the members forum, and to accuse people of obfuscation simply because they don't have the time to reply to you at lenght after first clicking on the topic?
I for one really appreciate someone to cast a critical eye over everything that goes on at Imminst, -one of the reasons I'm glad to have you back- but those exchanges will always be much more productive if conducted in a good-natured manner. Would you agree?

[Matthias]

discussion on what the Treasure Chest is. Could someone tell me a little more about this?

The concept is explained in this vote thread:
http://www.imminst.o...showtopic=20932

Here is a link to the preceding proposal:
http://www.imminst.o...showtopic=20545

[Shepard]

What's troubling to me at this point is that 16 people, largely leaders and not one of you could have publically explianed this to me?

Who read my topic ??? (Total : 16) Mind , reason , Shannon , elrond , dnamechanic , Richard Leis , lightowl , Matthias , jaydfox , thughes , shepard , maestro949 , cnorwood , frankbuzin , niner , modelcadet ,

Some people can check the board throughout the day, but only have time to comment on topics before/after work/class/whatever. I wouldn't assume you're being ignored just because people haven't commented yet. And, some were probably waiting for a person more familiar with the fine print of the situation to comment.

[thefirstimmortal]

Hello Bill

Firstly: Welcome back on board! Don't you ever dare die on us.

Thank You Caliban, I will be responding shortly. You'll excuse me while I prepare to at a big slice of humble pie

[thefirstimmortal]

Point accepted and taken for the moment Shepard. I will be posting an addition comment on this.

What's troubling to me at this point is that 16 people, largely leaders and not one of you could have publically explianed this to me?

Who read my topic ??? (Total : 16) Mind , reason , Shannon , elrond , dnamechanic , Richard Leis , lightowl , Matthias , jaydfox , thughes , shepard , maestro949 , cnorwood , frankbuzin , niner , modelcadet ,

Some people can check the board throughout the day, but only have time to comment on topics before/after work/class/whatever. I wouldn't assume you're being ignored just because people haven't commented yet. And, some were probably waiting for a person more familiar with the fine print of the situation to comment.

[thefirstimmortal]

Before I get my humble pie post, I want to comment on your post Shepard. You’re correct, in respect to this thread, that perhaps I didn’t allow enough time for responses to come in. But there seems to be a track record of simple request not being attended to. There is a stark difference on how leaders Nav, and adv ect respond now as compared to several years ago. It used to be, that when someone requested help on simple things like finding a post or thread, someone was always there to help. And in a timely fashion. We have far more leadership here now, but in general the site is less responsive.

Mind posted

The people who have freely "assembled" here at Imminst decided to have a Free Speech FORUM, how to display that forum, and how to moderate other forums. These things were all discussed among the members and mostly implemented through votes - therefore I do not see any ergregious violation of any freedoms. The decision to keep the FSF off the active topics list and non-googleable were not implemented by fiat. It was a group discussion.

I put out the request

Perhaps you could find that thread that got the Free Speech Forum bumped of the active topics list so that I might read it. And I would like to review these votes.

I waited patiently. OK, I assume that Mind is busy and I don’t necessarily think it’s up to him to take the time to support his argument by directing me to the actual votes. I mean, we do have Navigators ya know so I posted a more general request on the 13th.

OK Mind, I asked for the thread that got the Free Speech Forum Bumped. Anyone know where it exists, or do I have to read the entire site to find it?

Well, apparently no one helps with these requests anymore, so perhaps that’s just a new reality that I have to adjust to. But at any rate Shepard I have made several requests to find topics or threads. Most of these requests are still out there, and they go ignored. It’s hard to argue that someone is going to get them. I’m fairly confident that the request won’t get answered at all if they haven’t up to this point.

And while I was being somewhat facetious when I said “Anyone know where it exists, or do I have to read the entire site to find it?” At some point I just realized that if I wanted to find the material, that’s exactly what I was going to have to do. So I started right from the top of the site, which brings you to the Community forums where I got to the leadership archives. That’s how I stumbled across all of this.

Edited by thefirstimmortal, 14 July 2008 - 11:39 PM.

[Shepard]

I understand your point, but it really is a different place than a few years ago. While we have more people in leadership, I'm fairly sure that the average activity of each leader is down quite a bit. The site and its archives are much larger than they used to be, which makes it harder to locate any single thread that isn't in recent memory. Combine that with the sub-par search function and you get our current situation.

To kind of answer your current question, I'm not aware of the discussion that Mind is talking about. I have not been able to locate it. Does anyone know if this happened during the forum upgrade or before?

Edited by shepard, 15 July 2008 - 12:00 AM.

[thefirstimmortal]

Hello Caliban,

Prior to reading your post I was reviewing several threads. Like
http://www.imminst.o...ies-t19118.html

http://www.imminst.o...son-t18292.html

Last night upon reviewing the financial I discovered that we are paying Mind (Executive Director) money every month. I thought that against the constitution.

I found one thread on the topic started by Elrond. I considered his following arguments;
Elrond

I'm sorry, but a CEO, CM or whatever we call it is absolutely a part of imminst leadership.

I am simply arguing that we can't hire people for leadership positions. The constitution forbids it.

and thats what I call legal goobley gook just confusing enough to allow the sidestepping of rules. It is a practice we should avoid.

Remember the commerce clause? )

I somehow missed Lararus Long argument. I mean, I read it but at 2 in the morning, somehow it didn’t register.

Lazarus

Currently the only defined leadership positions are the Board of Directors, their Chair, the Treasurer, the Navigators, and Advisers.

Article IV. -- Leadership Positions
· Section 1 -- Leadership Positions
ImmInst shall be led by the Board of Directors, and other leaders as outlined in Bylaw C.
Bylaw C
Article VII. -- Definitions
·
o ImmInst Leaders - A Full Member who has been elected to a position of leadership by way of a vote. Leaders include Directors, Advisors, Navigators, and Spokespersons.
The constitution couldn’t be clearer; there is no defined leadership position “Executive Director”. I have followed the genesis of that position, and I am 100% in error on this one. There is no violation of the constitution in the instant case.

More to follow…

[thefirstimmortal]

Thank You Matthias, for taking the time to find that for me. Helps getting hard to find these days

discussion on what the Treasure Chest is. Could someone tell me a little more about this?

The concept is explained in this vote thread:
http://www.imminst.o...showtopic=20932

Here is a link to the preceding proposal:
http://www.imminst.o...showtopic=20545

[thefirstimmortal]

“…drag our fairly confidential financial data out of the members forum,”
Caliban, I am currently not a Navigator, I’m a simple member. I don’t have access to the private sections in this site. That I know of, everyplace I can go is available to everyone else. The information I posted was right there on the site for all to see. How can you call this “fairly confidential financial data” when everyone here can view it for themselves. Or am I missing something here.

[thefirstimmortal]

A few relevant quotes.

Minds own post

First, the title of the position:

CEO, ED, Project Leader/Content Manager, it makes no difference to me. Concerns were raised about ED and CEO because it seemd to imply a "leadership" position, and "leadership" positions are pro-bono according to the constitution. PL/CM is a semantic effort to imply non-leadership.

Jmorgan.

So you want to pay the new position a small sum and are struggling with the Institute's constitution with regard to who to call leaders and who you don't. An "Executive Officer" will certainly be considered by some to be a leader, perhaps even more so than Advisors actually. You may define the position as not being a leader, but the connection in people's minds will always be there. It is better to be cautious and define the language of the constitution so there is no room to question it later.

It certainly does imply “leadership”, although technically it is not. But I’m in good company, even Cnorwood was as confused as I and thought that Executive Director was a leadership position.

Cnorwood Quote

All complaints of actions by individuals in leadership should be PMed to the Executive Director, Chief Navigator, or another member of leadership to be worked out in a procedural fashion.

http://www.imminst.o...&...st&p=248103

[Shannon Vyff]

Hey, since my name was posted as having viewed this close to its initiation, I'd like to say that I did PM William about it at that time (about the technicality of Mind not being 'leadership". I also agreed that the wording in our constitution should be changed, I as well as many here, do consider Mind leadership. (I also addressed the Treasurer's Chests in the way Caliban did, pointed out there was info in leadership with discussions on these issues that would need to be shared, and said I was waiting to read others' opinions in the thread before I posted) I don't have time to address the matter right now as I wish, this will have to suffice--but I'll have some time later in the week to give proper attention.

[thefirstimmortal]

ops

Edited by thefirstimmortal, 20 July 2008 - 05:01 PM.

[Infernity]

Gawd I hate bureaucracy.

[forever freedom]

Gawd I hate bureaucracy.

Me too; i just can't read this stuff. Even if i had authority position here, i wouldn't care about all these little details.

Edited by sam988, 22 July 2008 - 12:47 AM.

[Prometheus]

Don't you ever dare die on us.

Help him get in the Cui trials.