Re: [105attendees] Plenary & RSE - Maximize Value of Discussion

[Ted Lemon <[e-mail]>]

Jason, the problem is that it doesn’t feel from the perspective of an onlooker that there has been honest discussion about what went wrong.   I don’t mean that anybody is lying—I just mean that there doesn’t seem to have been a lot of introspection, and so the answers that we’ve heard don’t actually explain how this happened.

The problem with that is not that we need to find a scapegoat or blame someone for what happened, but rather that if this reflection has not happened—and it seems very, very clear at the moment that it has not—then there is no chance that any process moving forward can actually succeed.   I mean sure, we’ll hire a new RSE, but since we don’t know why we lost the current RSE, we don’t know that the new RSE will not be in the same situation as the previous one. 

And since we don’t know what actually led to the RSE being micromanaged, we don’t know if we agree with whatever agenda the folks micromanaging her had in doing so.   We don’t even know if this was intentional.   We really have no idea how this went so badly wrong.

So yes, it would be great to talk about how to move forward, but part of “how to move forward” is getting clarity on exactly what it is that our leadership and community want.   We can’t just skip that step.