Nominating Committee Workshop
 Wednesday, 13 February 2008 ICANN meeting
 New Delhi, India
 
 >>HAGEN HULTZSCH:   I think we should get started in order to save time.
 The intention of this is to make you familiar with the nomination process, and to encourage others to participate in the nominating process by providing stakeholder interest, which is our mechanism.
 And I will go very fast through what the status is, and then give you the opportunity to ask me questions and also ask my colleagues of the Nominating Committee.  Some of them are here.  I see Caroline over there.  She is doing e-mails on her phone.  A few minutes ago, I saw some others, but they have disappeared somewhere.
 The composition of the Nominating Committee is, as you can see from the bylaws if you would look into it -- it's very well specified.  It's coming from the different organizations.
 It's working?
 It's coming from the different organizations in the Internet community.  And the Nominating Committee is an independent organization.
 It is not reporting to the board.  It is not reporting to the president.  It is not reporting to any of the constituencies.  So the intention of this ICANN global democratic process is to have an entity to find, in the Internet community, the right people for the different jobs the Nominating Committee should cover.
 The members of that Nominating Committee in that sense don't act on behalf of ICANN.
 They act more on behalf of the Internet community overall, and cover, in that sense, a broad global interest of the public.
 They have no personal commitments, now more members of the Nominating Committee come in.  They have no, let's say, conflicts to carry.
 The organizations, they allow them -- The organization allowing them to participate supports the Internet, let's say, business and overall.
 And some individuals could it even independent because they are retired, like myself.
 The members of the Nominating Committee commit to the code of ethics, which they actually sign when they start their work.  That's what we did, first thing, in Los Angeles.
 And they also confirm that they either have no conflict of interest, or if they have it, they make it public and known by the colleagues on the Nominating Committee.
 The members of the Nominating Committee also confirm and sign that they regard any confidential issues in full confidentiality.
 Confidential issues are let's say information regarding the individuals being discussed in the Nominating Committee or by references or other, let's say, private conversations.
 Confidential is not the process how the Nominating Committee works.
 The process should be as open and as transparent to everybody.  That is one of the reasons why we recently communicated in the newsletter about the things the Nominating Committee has done.
 But again, everything which is related to an individual, as a person's qualifications, et cetera, is strictly confidential, and even signed by the members of the Nominating Committee to be treated as such.
 The committee, as I said, is independent, operates in parallel to other organizations, selecting individuals for the different bodies of ICANN, being the board and the three councils:  ALAC, GNSO and ccNSO.
 So one of the peculiarities or the specialties is that, again say it, the Nominating Committee is kind of independent of the other bodies of ICANN.
 It has 21 members this year.  The members come from the constituencies, the Supporting Organizations, the advisory committees, and they are -- there are two board appointees.  One is the chair, which is myself, and another one from the academic community.  Or he is representing the academic communities.
 What is the status?  We first met after the last ICANN meeting in Los Angeles 2 and 3 November last year, myself, Wolfgang Kleinwächter, who is my co-chair.  Due to the bylaws, I have the duty or right to appoint an associate chair.  And George Sadowsky, who was chair of the Nominating Committee for three years who is now the advisor to the chair.  That is how the bylaws name him.
 And Patrick Jones, who is sitting over there next to the president, he is supporting us in our work, the Nominating Committee work, supplied by staff.
 He is treating all personal information as confidential, as the other members of the Nominating Committee.
 Since its first meeting in Los Angeles, the Nominating Committee has done its work by conference calls.  We have, since Los Angeles, I think we have done three or four conference calls, just proceeding in our way, how to operate.  And there's also a special system to record information and to handle communication between Nominating Committee members, even at the time when we are in telephone conference.  That is a significant contribution to the efficiency of the committee.
 The work we have to do this year is to choose two members of the board, to board directors, and there are some requirements.
 The composition of the board requires that minimum one, maximum five members of the board come from one of the ICANN reasons.  North America, South America, Europe, APAC.
 In this year, since one of the board members from Africa is leaving when this term ends, we have to find somebody from the board from Africa, while the other is independent regarding regions.
 On the other hand, we should consider that Russia, so far, is underrepresented in ICANN.  So far, we did not have Russian delegates on the board and the council, so we should consider whether we find some.
 That is a concern, but that is not a mandatory requirement.
 ALAC needs two new members, one must be from Europe, one must be from North America due to the bylaws of the at-large advisory council.
 We also must find a member for the GNSO council and another one for  ccNSO Council.
 So that's the job would he have to do.
 So far, we have a whole bunch of already existing statements of interest which I will explain in a few seconds.
 The process to handle this has started by 15 December.  It will end by 15 April, which doesn't mean that everybody should wait until 15 April to supply a statement of interest.
 This year's Nominating Committee has done something new, which had not been done in the past, except a couple of years ago.  We have selected Ray & Brendtson, it's a global human resource -- or a human resource recording company, to do the assessment of those statement-of-interest providers whom the Nominating Committee in the first round regard as qualified for the jobs they are interested.
 That's a new thing, and hopefully will contribute significantly to the efficiency of the Nominating Committee work.  Also to take some workload of the members of the Nominating Committee.  Because reading, like last year, 100 statements -- or nearly 100 -- 91, I think it was -- is a very heavy job, and those people who are working on the Nominating Committee devote a significant amount of their free time to this very important piece of work, as I see it, of the Internet community.
 The final selections of the Nominating Committee will have to be made after the next ICANN meeting in Paris at the allocated time between 27 and 29 June.
 The following due diligence process will take a little time in July and through probably mid-August.  And then the selections will be announced by mid-September to the individuals, and the appointees will be seated at the board meeting in the end of the to-be-announced meeting in Africa at the end of this year, probably November.
 Status:  So far, we have 35 statements of interest.  Ten from North America, eight from Europe, and eight from APAC, five from Africa, and four from Latin America/Caribbean, which means South America.
 One of the reasons why we have this workshop is, as I said in the beginning, to encourage you and others to provide more than the existing 35 statements of interest.
 I know of a few people who are working on them, on their statement of interest.
 One of them said to me, "Well, I have time, until 15th April, so don't hurry me.  I can wait until then."
 That is not very polite to the members of the Nominating Committee because between 15 April and 15 May, we have to do all this evaluation, prioritization, including the assessment by the outside assessor.
 So we would prefer to have done a significant portion of that work before that time.
 So if you have -- if yourself, also those who are connected in the network and others, are considering to provide the statement of interest, please do it now so that we, the members of the Nominating Committee, can stretch our work over time rather than having to sit for weekends and late hours to do our work in the short time frame between 15 April and let's say mid-May.
 Information is available on the Web page nomcom.icann.org.  On some browsers you have to type HTTP colon slash slash ahead of it because the browser would not take NomCom.
 You also find the fliers in different languages on that Web page.  And again, statements should be supplied soon.  The sooner the better.  Latest, by 15 April.
 Now, before concluding, I would like to say a few words why it's so important that these, let's say, volunteer jobs are covered by us, the members of this global Internet community.
 This ICANN is a very special organization.  It is not a government organization.  It is not a business organization.  It is not, let's say, a private organization from individuals.
 It is really a multistakeholder organization, and it's a kind of experiment which now runs with lots of success, increasing success, for ten years.  And we, this Internet community, need to contribute to make this success grow and to find out how we can do things even better.
 Most of the meetings in this environment are discussion, disputes on how to approach difficult tasks in the right way, better.
 We have had this very important IDN discussion, we have this very important DNS discussion, where we try to find out, try to develop ways to handle new things in our upcoming Internet community.
 And who of us would have considered to think that the issues around Web 2.0 would change the world as much as they have already changed when we started ICANN ten years ago?
 Those of you who remember that time would have called themselves crazy if they would have said this is what's going to come.
 And we in this ICANN world and the surrounding, the Supporting Organizations, have managed to handle this different evolutionary task I think in a most accurate way.
 And ICANN focusing on integrity of the Internet, on stability of the Internet, and on security of the Internet, so far was, I would say, most successful in fulfilling this rather complex task, with I don't know how many megabytes shipped around the world.  Maybe the president has the exact number.  But it's terabytes of data.  And ten years ago, we wouldn't even have dared to think that it would be probably petabytes that are shipped around.  
 So I would really like to encourage those present in this room and on the network to continue to participate and support this organization by providing their interest to help run this complex task in one of the bodies, the board and the three councils.  And also another thing which I would like to add.  For me, these four bodies have equal -- let's say equal importance.
 It's not -- I should not say -- we could not say the board is more important than the ALAC or the GNSO is more important than the ccNSO.
 The structure is done in a way that each segment is of equal importance.
 I would like to add one word.  For example, ALAC, which is representing myself as an individual, and all of us as an individual, while ccNSO is representing those organizations who are providing the country-specific top-level domains, and the GNSO are, let's say, supporting the global organizations.  ALAC needs to develop mechanisms how they could better present to us, the individuals, that they actually are representing the people of the Internet, which is actually a most important experiment, how we can do this.
 And that's why I believe we should have support by showing your statement of interest for taking a job in ALAC.
 And one final thing.  I have heard from somebody here that the person said to me, "I am still considering whether I should provide a statement of interest.  I may not be elected.  I may not be chosen."
 Actually, that could be the case.  But I think from a true understanding of our democratic process, we should have the enthusiasm that we apply for this, we accept the invitation to send the statement of interest, even though we know the probability may be one-tenth because there may be ten other candidates of equal qualification.
 This organization only lives and takes its strength from those who want to contribute.  And in case they are not chosen, they also contribute and apply themselves, make themselves available next time.
 So that's what I wanted to say, to generate enthusiasm.
 Now I am open to your questions.
 Also, if somebody on the network has questions, we have ways to get the question to the floor here.
 Mr. Markovski.  I congratulate you on your green shirt.  That's a real new thing here.
 >>VENI MARKOVSKI:   Thank you, India.
 India Air, I mean, which lost my luggage so that I had to buy new shirt, new pants and other stuff.
 This is a deal between Air India and the local industries.  They lose your luggage so that you invest in the country.  It's part of the....
 >>HAGEN HULTZSCH:   That's very expensive for India, you know.
 >>VENI MARKOVSKI:   Every time there is a report by the NomCom chair, and George Sadowsky is here, and he is alert and awake and wondering what I am going to say.
 So every time there is a report by the NomCom chair, I use the opportunity to publicly and on the record state that the people who apply should also consider very seriously the amount of time that the board takes.
 Some couple of years ago it was about 50% of a working day, four hours a day.
 Vint Cerf, then the chair of the board, used to say it's not correct.  It's 25%.  And then after a short talk with him, we figured out that his working day is actually 16 hours, so 25% is still four hours a day.
 So people who apply should not consider this like a fancy work -- not even work or a job, but a fancy thing that we travel around the world and are greeted and celebrities and so it's fun.
 It's actually a pretty complicated work.  When they put statements of interest, they should consider seriously whether they are capable of performing the duties of the members of the board.
 It's not actually only right; it's obligations and a lot of work, lots of e-mails.  And my recommendation for the people who want to apply is to talk to you and to the other members of the NomCom to figure out what exactly is required from them.  Because you can't really tell from the announcement on the NomCom page.
 >>HAGEN HULTZSCH:   Thank you, Veni, for addressing this.  That's a sensitive issue of workload.
 The information -- the NomCom page has, for each job, a job description.  And in this job description there is also, let's say, an estimated -- that's a requirement regarding time.
 For the board, for example, it says it needs 24 hours a week for the work to be done.
 When this 24 hours were calculated, I was still on the board.  I found the number was relatively high, and Veni has just explained that Vint has said it's only one-quarter but he had a longer workday.
 I also found that it's not taking 50% of my time.  Maybe also because of workday, but also maybe because of work organization and efficiency.
 And that is actually one thing which I would like to emphasize.
 Serving on a council or a board in ICANN is a great training session, a great training opportunity.
 All of you who are sitting here would confirm that, having participated in either a council or the board, have learned to do that kind of job in a way that they never could do in another place on this globe.
 Getting the international experience and also to manage to get the workload of 24 hours done in 12 hours, which I believe I succeeded to do, because I always say it's 12 hours.  And everybody is different.  But this is -- that's an additional benefit by contributing to the council.
 Thank you, Veni, for addressing the time requirements.  It is not only time; it's also experience.  You have to communicate in English.  You have to occasionally battle with the president if he has different opinions and so on.
 So I would encourage just to look onto the Web page and see what the job description says.
 Mr. President.
 >>PAUL TWOMEY:   Thank you, Mr. President.  Perhaps I can make a comment as the longest standing member of the board, only by accident, but at the moment I'm the longest standing member of the board.
 I have to say what I have seen for time issues for ICANN people on the board is that it has varied according to interest, it's varied according to the degree to which people wish to discuss particular items, and it has varied according to the issues in front of the organizations itself.
 I know one board member at the moment probably dedicated less than an hour a day and he's fairly active.  I know other people who dedicate more the sort of business-time board, several days a month, as well as the meeting times.
 And I think it depends partly upon their skills and what they're contributing to the board.  So while I don't dispute some of the things that Veni has said, I think my experience has been it varies a lot according to the person and the sort of skills and interest they bring to that discussion.
 May I ask you a clarifying question?
 You put in your presentation the role of Ray and Brendt something or other.  You said they were assessing.
 Can you clarify for me that the decision as to who is appointed firmly sits with the Nominating Committee?
 >>HAGEN HULTZSCH:   (Not on mike).
 >>PAUL TWOMEY:   Can you verify that the position that is firmly sit sits with the Nominating Committee.  It disputes the word assessing, but it may not be clear to people what you mean by assessing.
 >>HAGEN HULTZSCH:   This point was discussed in all detail in the Nominating Committee.
 "Assessing" means not deciding, just assessing, referring to the job description being on the Web pages, and information available about ICANN in general.
 So last Friday, I myself, with my associate chair -- unfortunately, the co-chair couldn't make it because of a travel situation -- we had a long session with the two representatives of Ray and Brendtson who were chosen by a normal procurement process under your direction, describing the needs, and then having -- I don't recall the actual number, but we had seven offerings from global recruiting companies.  We had three in the inner, that's a final selection, and we chose one who seemed to your procurement organization and us the best choice.
 And "assessment" means assessment, but not deciding.
 >>PAUL TWOMEY:   Right.  And so my understanding from what you've said is that their role is to take all of the applications received and, in a uniform manner, be able to write a first-round assessment of the applicant that the committee can then receive in a uniform manner for their consideration in terms of appointment.  Is that right?
 >>HAGEN HULTZSCH:   Yeah.  Thank you.  I should have explained that better, apparently.  Thank you for --
 The mechanism we do it, the SOIs will be provided.  We, the Nominating Committee, make a subset or may make a subset of these SOIs, give them to the assessor.  The assessor assesses the individuals specified in the SOIs, comes back with their assessment, and we, the Nominating Committee, read their assessment and come to final conclusions, thus shrinking the potential candidates to, let's say, priority numbers.
 So that's the way how we do it.  And it is a modification, an addition to how it was done in the past.
 >>THOMAS NARTEN:   This is Thomas Narten here.  I just had sort of a side conversation with Veni, and he encouraged me to come up here.
 What I wanted to say is that I think to confirm what Paul said, the amount of time that an individual board member spends really varies a lot depending on their interest and so forth.  And the other thing I would also say is that I think in the -- at least certainly in the three years that I've been on the board and even since Veni has left, I think the efficiency of the board has gone up and I think the amount of work that we have to do has gone down.  And this is due to improvements from staff in the way we operate and so forth.  I don't want people to be scared away by a huge amount of work.  It's not really that way.
 >>HAGEN HULTZSCH:   Thank you, Tom.  I think that's very helpful.
 Again, I had a discussion with one of the chairs -- it's not only the board; it's also the councils where we need a lot of time commitment.  When I discussed with one of the chairs this afternoon, he said -- and I justed what kind of qualification, experience, would you have a finance person, a I.P. version 6 person, or a communications person, and so forth.
 He said the experience is not so important.  It is important that the individual commits to get work done.  And work done is that we have to get decisions made and to move himself into the ability to contribute to these decisions in the best way we can do it.
 So this is, again -- the commitment is the important issue.  And, again, it depends how somebody can organize and how the group in itself is organized.  Maybe GNSO is faster, needs less workload by the individual than ccNSO because they are differently structured.  And as you mentioned, maybe the board has changed its way that 24 hours is way off, that the 12 hours I was mentioning are, let's say, more adequate.
 Other questions?
 This is the chance.
 It also is the chance that you really find people who are willing to contribute to this organization by sending in their statement of interest.
 By the way, the way how it's done, it's -- the form is available on the Web.  It's completed and then sent to an e-mail address, which is NomCom@icann.org.  Is this correct?
 NomCom2008@icann.org.  And that's all you have to do.
 And then the remaining part is kind of automatic.
 You also provide a couple of references, people whom you know and who know you and could give a reference to the Nominating Committee on yourself.
 Patrick, what did I forget to say?  Patrick is satisfied with what I have said, so I think we can adjourn this meeting.
 Thank you for coming -- oh, no, it's not adjourned.
 >>BRUCE TONKIN:   I have one more question for you.
 What feedback do you give to people that nominate and are not successful?  In other words, what's the follow-up?
 >>HAGEN HULTZSCH:   They will receive a letter of the chairman of the Nominating Committee thanking them for their contribution and trying to explain to them that even though they may have been highly qualified, that since there were fortunately more than just one individual, that the criteria has, let's say, has selected somebody else not because of qualification, but for, let's say, a majority of other reasons in the decision process.
 For example, let's take the example -- it would not be in the letter, but the board would want to have a finance specialist as the next incoming board member, it's a top priority.  And we have somebody with high qualifications as a finance specialist.  Then all of a sudden all the other candidates who are telecommunications, who are legal, who are government relations -- what else do we have? -- even though they would be high in qualification, they would drop just because the board at that time needs somebody with this finance requirement.
 Or if, in ALAC, we need a candidate from Europe and from North America, if somebody highly qualified would state -- would mention in his statement of interest that she/he would be interested to work in ALAC, we would have to say, unfortunately, your statement of interest could not be accepted, because you come from, at this time, the wrong region.  But, in all cases, I, the chairman, would encourage you to provide your statement of interest again next year, because the opportunities will come up again.
 Is this a good answer?  Is this what you are asking for?
 >>BRUCE TONKIN:   I would say that the positions the Nominating Committee is filling is perhaps a small number of the overall positions that the organization needs in terms of the different activities going on.
 So it would be probably useful, just as a talent pool, let's say, for example, you only had one slot available on the GNSO Council, but there are ten working groups going on at a particular time in the GNSO Council, and you say, well, this person is an expert on IDN issues, and we have an IDN working group.  We'd love for them to participate in that IDN working group, even though we don't have a seat for them on the council at this time.
 But I just am sort of concerned that you put a lot of effort into getting all these people in and you select a small number of them and then just send a letter saying, "You're unsuccessful."  It might be better maybe, in cooperation with perhaps the council or the board, depending on the type of person, to be able to say what other things have we got on at the moment where that person could contribute.
 >>HAGEN HULTZSCH:   Thank you, Bruce.  This is, actually, a very important part.  And I should have thought of it in my, let's say, spontaneous draft of this letter.
 Yes, the hint to the other groups in the organization who are not this formal as the three councils and the board could also be used as this kind of training and experience-gathering for, let's say, the following year, potentially, if they would be interested again.  I fully agree with you.
 Thank you.
 And that should be part of that letter which we would send to those people who are not chosen.
 Now adjourn?
 Desiree, may I adjourn?  No, I cannot adjourn.
 Desiree is also a member of the Nominating Committee.
 >> Desiree Miloshevic:  I think it would be useful to say that the deadline for the nominations is April 15th.
 >>HAGEN HULTZSCH:   Yes, I did say that.  It was even written to the wall.  Not because I have thought of it; because Patrick thought of it.
 Let's adjourn and let's go for -- enjoy somewhere a good evening.  And tomorrow morning we meet again at -- was a 9:00 -- 8:45 or something like this tomorrow morning.
 Enjoy.
 [ Applause ]