Hello folks,

Lately I’ve experienced, as I suspect a number of you have experienced, a variety of comments and criticisms of our new Code of Conduct.  Initially, I responded to these by listening politely and uttering a few generic platitudes about loyalty, honor, and good governance.

Yesterday I was at a symposium put on by the Harvard Wireless Club, W1AF.  It was an outstanding event, with speakers such as Dr. Paul Horowitz, a/k/a Mr. SETI, and our own Tom Gallagher.  The attendees were an articulate, educated, and intellectual bunch of hams, more so than is usually the case at your average hamfest.  During the course of the event, several of the attendees buttonholed me to talk about the Code of Conduct, and their concerns about it.  This time I paid better attention.  I should have done so much earlier. 

First, let me say that the vast bulk of the Code is excellent.  Outstanding, in fact, and I whole-heartedly support it.  In fact, all of it is outstanding.  The problem is that there are a few bits that to me seem inappropriate for a membership organization such as ours.  I suspect (more than suspect) that these snuck in because we started with existing Codes of Conduct as models without taking into account the difference between a membership organization such as ours, and an organization with a closed board.  I believe we can resolve this easily, with a few tweaks.  But before I make suggestions, let me describe a somewhat analogous situation that may illustrate the issue.

 

When election day comes along, I cruise down to my polling place, get my ballot (we still use paper here in Chelmsford, MA) and retire to a booth where I fill out the ballot in private.  I then take the ballot and insert it, face down, into a counting machine.  Nothing on the ballot indicated that it is mine.  No one knows how I voted except me.  I cannot be.  And so, a senator gets elected.

Now my senator goes to Washington.  She stands up on the floor of the senate, states her case, beats up on some hapless republican senator from a coal state, and, when it comes time to vote, places her vote.  All of this is public.  It has to be if there is to be any accountability, if there is to be any chance for me to determine if she is doing a good job, and to decide if I’m going to vote for her again.  I’m not privy to the conversations that go on in the Senate cloak room (how many of you remember what a “cloak room” is?)  but when the formal debate and vote come up, it is public knowledge.  If I’m enough of a masochist, I can watch it on Cspan.

Furthermore, my senator can go on a road trip, stand up on a stump somewhere, and roundly criticize the same hapless republican senator from a coal state, along with the policies he has supported and which the Senate has enacted.

-----------------------------

The ARRL Board is not the US Senate.  But it is also not an organization with a self-perpetuating board and a private or semi-private agenda.  Insofar as the form of an organization like ours is reflected in the conduct policies it promulgates, we need to position ourselves somewhere in between.

 

I would suggest the following:

 

Section 6.c, concerning disclosure of votes, needs a major change.  We could do one of two things

Either of these should work.  Option b) gives the Board an out in those very rare situations (I can’t think of many) in which some privacy is warranted.

 

We need to find a way in which a Director can be publicly opposed to a Board action in a respectful way.  Respecting the final decision of the Board must not be equated with agreeing with that decision.  While I would agree that Directors should not undermine decisions of the Board (Code of Conduct, 8.d), we must not forbid a Director from expressing opposition to it.  Some people are reading section 8 of the code to say just that.  It is unclear to me what the real intention is of section 8 in this regard, and I suspect that different members of the Board, and certainly of our membership, have differing and conflicting views.  One way to clear this up, I hope, would be to add a section 8.g:

g. Nothing in this Code of Conduct shall be interpreted so as to forbid a Director from respectfully and publicly expressing opposition to or criticism of an action of the Board, providing that he or she does not hinder its implementation

A few more notes.  Tom, NY2RF, and I sat for most of an hour basking in the late afternoon sun at table in Harvard Yard (it don’t get much better than that!!)   He pointed out to me that our current Code of Conduct is firmly and soundly based on other similar Codes.  He named several examples.  Of course, he is correct.  I would ask, however, how many of these other Codes are in effect for membership organizations with elected boards such as ours?  One good example to investigate might be the IEEE.  I have not yet found their Board Code of Conduct.  Does anyone know if they have one?  And are there other similar organizations we might look to?

Jay and Chris, any thoughts?  I believe you were the drafters of the Code of Conduct.  Do these suggested changes align with your ideas?