[Foundation-l] governance

Wed Apr 11 14:19:47 UTC 2007

On 4/11/07, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:

>
> When we discussed the boundaries of each role in Florida a month ago,
> I did not see anyone stand up and say: "But this is really a Board
> function!" on issues of operations. There was a clear and shared
> understanding of what the function of the Board of Trustees is. Some
> Board members may wish to be involved in certain discussions, or help
> bring about partnerships; there is nothing wrong with that, but unless
> the Board is acting as a group, they are indeed under the direction of
> the ED. That also is understood. Again, it would be wrong to judge the
> views of the Board from implementations and processes that are
> understood to be temporary.

Perhaps you misconstrued something in Florences posting, or perhaps I
did. My sense of Florences suggestion was that in the most clear terms
the board would set hard and fast parameters of allowable means and
ends to be acheived to the ED or CEO or whatever. I missed where
Florence said anything about the board being under direction of the
ED/CEO.

>
> The distinction between means and ends, which is made in this document
> and which we haven't discussed before, is a useful test to apply.

Again, I may be misreading either you or Florence, but to me "test to
apply" reads like quite a watered down formulation of what our chair
was suggesting. To me it read like applying a restrictive approach to
means, and a prescriptive to ends was in the Carter system not
intended to be a "test" but rather the overarching framework.

--
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen, ~ [[User:Cimon Avaro]]