Re: [73attendees] Attendance by country

Yes, as I said YMMV. And, I'm not suggesting IETF be entirely
indifferent to the fact that we have lives outside of work as I think in
general, the schedule does accomodate folks in that the rotation of WGs
in scheduling the Friday afternoon sessions. It seems to be fair in that
I've never seen the same WG end up in that slot for two consecutive
meeting. And, in RAI, it's most often been the WG I chair that gets that
slot every other Friday. 

Also, taking us back to the idea that no decisions reflect WG consensus
until they are agreed on the ML, folks missing a Friday session
occasionally should not have a huge impact on their ability to influence
the WG.  And, the same can be said for folks that sometimes participate
remotely. As I recall, we had that discussion in the past around folks
ability to participate in the proposed Big Interim. 

And, yes, we are all volunteers and certainly can agree that none of us
are likely compensated for the amount of volunteer work we take on in
IETF. I just don't personally view it to be this huge personal sacrifice
to miss a full weekend (part of the day on a Saturday of travel and
always a full Sunday with part of another Saturday - on average) 3x a
year to be that big of a deal.  And, many people take the opportunity to
bring their families (and significant others and friends) to the summer
meetings, which are often in very "nice to visit" locations. So, that
added benefit in my experience well makes up for the fact that we spend
two weekends  
a year away from families. 

 Again, YMMV, but since I was raised a military brat and was without a
father for the majority of my life -  I don't think you can make a
general statement at all about the impact on kids in terms of whether a
father was in the household (or a mother for that matter) based on how
much time they spent away from their families. I had 6 siblings and
indeed the experience likely had far more of a positive impact than
negative on me as I was independent from an early age and cared for my
younger siblings - and the household overall - I'm the OCD neat freak in
the family - for over half my time growing up. I don't think anyone in
IETF is an expert on family dynamics and it might actually be a good
idea for such a professional to attend an IETF as research shows that we
do bring our family dynamics and experiences into the workplace and how
we interact with colleagues. So, if we could improve how we work
together in IETF that might just have an impact on how we interact with
our families ;)  Also, given the technologies that we all have played a
part in developing, we are certainly far better able to keep in touch
with our families than anyone ever has been able to in the past :)

I'll now go back to summarizing WG status so that my WG can make some
progess outside the WG meetings, which is really how things should work
overall.  And, I'll hand out gen-art assignments tonite for next week's
telechat, with the IESG being a prime example that alot of IETF work
really does happen outside the meetings on a regular basis via audio
conference and folks reading and evaluating docs outside the f2f
meetings. 

Best Regards,
Mary. 

________________________________

From: hallam@gmail.com [mailto:hallam@gmail.com] 
Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 12:27 PM
To: Barnes, Mary (RICH2:AR00); Phillip Hallam-Baker; DRAGE, Keith
(Keith); 73attendees@ietf.org
Subject: Re: RE: [73attendees] Attendance by country

Most of the single parent folk I know actually have an easier time of it
since they are sharing custody of the children with another party who is
anxious for as much contact with them as possible. Dumping the kids on
the ex for a week is usually an available option. 

Also the age of the children is rather significant as is the effect that
dad being away has on their behavior. 

I don't think that the IETF should be entirely indifferent to the
personal lives of participants as you appear to suggest. Most IETF
participants can find alternative jobs even in a down economy - although
the crisis of the past few months is something of an exception. But I
really don't want to be placing volunteers with a choice between
participation and their job unnecessarily. And I suspect that those of
us who are full time corporate representatives are a minority in any
case. And even if that were not the case, we are not recognized as such
in IETF process. 

If we are going to argue for making meeting times on the assumption that
this is a job then we should carry that assumption over to other areas.
If we are going to continue to be a volunteer organization then we
should encourage widespread participation by chosing meeting times than
minimize impact on personal life as much as possible. It is not going to
be possible to satisfy everyone everytime. But I don't see why the fact
that some people are going to chose to travel on the weekend should
oblige everyone else to. Or the fact that you have to get up for a 6am
flight in SFO to make it back to Europe the same day argues for holding
meetings on the Friday. 

On Dec 4, 2008 11:29am, Mary Barnes <mary.barnes@nortel.com> wrote: 
> 
> Again, 
> 
> a YMMV issue.  Having spent 14 years in a both parent's working
household 
> (and now being in a single parent household), this is still not such a

> significant issue. In my experience, it's actually a bigger issue in a
household 
> where the mother is a SAHM because they rarely get a break.  And, yes,
I 
> know this is a controversial point. When I was at Telecom '99, which
required 
> more than two full weekends away, the guys were fussing as 
> the SAHM wives back home were complaining about all the 
> family issues without the Dad home for support and they were really 
> taken aback when I told them that the job that the moms were doing was
far more 
> stressful than anything we were dealing with on a daily basis,
particularly 
> when you consider most of us have opportunities of enjoying at least
one nice 
> meal and we usually have someone that makes our beds daily, etc.
There is 
> research that shows that the stress levels of mothers (determined by
both 
> questionnaires and blood tests of hormones impacted by stress) is
equivalent to 
> that of a soldier on the front lines of a war.