Meeting #2

Post date: Sep 29, 2015 3:59:7 PM

Meeting Notes from the Ad-Hoc Venue Chair Autonomy Committee (AVCAC)

September 28, 2015 (7:40 to 9:20); 25 Center Avenue, Morristown, New Jersey

Present: Barrett Wilson (Chair); Mike Agranoff, Chris Riemer (Scribe) and Elizabeth Lachowicz

Absent: Jay Wilensky

Introduction

Barrett kicked off what would be a relatively unstructured conversation by expressing his hope that the committee could come up with some kind of work product that could be presented for the Board's consideration.

He doesn't think our mandate is to formulate policy, exactly, but does think we should do more than just talk. Not everyone agreed. Chris felt that some of the Venue-Board conflicts we've seen over the years are really personality conflicts, and would need to be addressed accordingly. Even if we could come up with some clever new by-law, it wouldn't keep clashes like this from happening in the future.

That led Elizabeth to ask what we really hope to achieve.

On Budgets

Barrett feels we should recommend that the four customer-facing venues be asked to submit a budget to the Board, not as an approval document but as a way to communicate what they're doing and what they plan to do in the weeks and months ahead. It needn't be complicated or detailed, and we wouldn't hold anyone's feet to the fire about it. But having each chair go through a budgeting exercise would demonstrate a commitment to transparency and open communication.

There was general agreement here, although initially Barrett felt that the Minstrel and Swingin' Tern should be exempt from this requirement, since for them it might actually be a lot of work. Elizabeth wasn't that keen on the idea of budgeting, fearing that it will encourage those with a micro-management mindset to question every line item. But she felt it should be all or none, though, and Mike didn't object. But he also felt that it would be more of a make-work activity for the Minstrel. This year, he's doing much better than he would have predicted ten months ago, and he wouldn't want to be held to his 2015 numbers for 2016. So he's willing to go along for the good of the cause, but doesn't think a Minstrel budget would add much value.

Barrett also worried that the presentation of a budget might lead other Board members to question a venue's working assumptions, and used the Minstrel's door price as an example. He knows there are some who think Mike should raise the Minstrel door to $10, something that would benefit the Folk Project's coffers overall. Mike knows the day of the $10 door will come, but he doesn't think we're there yet. And he feels that if the Board were to order him to raise the door price contrary to his own judgment, he would feel compelled to resign. Chris and Elizabeth agreed that "doing the math" for a venue is really the chair's core responsibility. How much do I pay and how much do I charge? And Chris felt that if the Board decided it needed an extra $2,000 in annual revenue, it certainly shouldn't try to squeeze all of it out of a single activity. All present agreed that pricing should remain a venue-level decision.

Chris added that if we had budgets in place, they could be incorporated in QuickBooks Online. There are percent-of-budget style reports that could tell us how we were doing through the year. It might be a good practice, if only to let the whole group be a little more foward-looking, instead of being surprised at how our financials had fallen in the two years prior to 2015.

Oversight, Considered

Mike feels that on the whole, the Board should be less reluctant to step in when there are problems of some kind.

We've all been through scenarios where a Director has dropped the ball on something, and generally we prefer to avert our eyes and hope for the best. Which is perhaps understandable, given that everyone is a volunteer and few of us are professional "managers." However, when the performance of a single director leads to financial or operational problems for the group as a whole, we have to do something about it. And the consensus was that this is probably a presidential responsibility. It should always start gently with some mentoring or coaching, but if problems persist, the president may need to ask for a person's resignation.

Mike suggested that one of our recommendations might be to make this kind of presidential intervention more explicit. That is, make it clear to all that if any individual were aware of such problems, they should bring it to the president's attention sooner rather than later. He also suggested that if a venue wanted to do something "significantly different," the board should get involved.

A number of examples were discussed at this point. There was a general agreement that Director performance has been a recurring but only occasional problem in terms of board efficiency. And no real sense that we would be any better at resolving such problems in the future than we have been in the past.

Looking Forward

Chris recalled a science fiction story (the details of which he's forgotten) in which a utopian society was governed by only two laws: "Thou shall not annoy thy neighbor," and "Thou shall not be too easily annoyed." He's thinking we might model our final work product on something like that: a few simple statements that would express what we already know to be the proper practice. Venue chairs should strive for transparency, other board members should advise appropriately and avoid the urge to nitpick. "Define nitpick!" said Mike, getting the biggest laugh of the evening.

Elizabeth liked the idea was worried that any attempt to codify these concepts would be seen as rules to live by, implying that the Board has control over the venues. To her, it's really a matter of "playing nice," and is more a vision/mission kind of thing than a rules and regulation kind of thing. Chris agreed to take a shot at drafting something. He's thinking in terms of Principles (like timeliness, which would be a principle that applies to every position) as well as Tools (like budgets, which would help us deliver on the principles). Elizabeth would also like to see more work on the job descripitions, emphasizing the importance of working together. What we need is a kind of working agreement that will help all of us get our jobs done and have fun doing them.

Elizabeth's other caveat is that we shouldn't rely too much on financials as an organizational metric.The Board's overall health includes a financial vector of course, but it also includes intangibles like community engagement, personal growth and social connection. Barrett recalled something Jay said at the first meeting, fearing that we risked losing something important if we tried to be too business-like.

Closing

The committee agreed that the next step would be to let Chris develop a set of working principles, which could be refined through email. So there's a good chance that this will be the last face-to-face meeting of this committe. The goal is to have our recommended Rules of Engagement ready for board review in January 2016.