[Gendispatch] draft-knodel-nomcom-gender-representation-00.txt

[Ted Hardie <[e-mail]>]

The Internet Society of Board of Trustees recently tackled a similar issue
to this, as we saw variable gender diversity across different board years,
and a generally low amount overall.  The situation is mildly different in
that the Trustee selection isn't random, but it is similar in that new
trustees are picked by three different groups in uncoordinated actions in
which no group knows the selection of any of the others in advance (and
thus does not know anything about their selections' gender, origin, or
similar characteristics).

Rather than putting in complicated rules to constrain the choices of the
constituencies, the Board decided to use its power of appointment to
increase the diversity of the board when warranted.  Currently, that means
when gender diversity has gone down.

A similar choice here might be to run the process as currently described
but continue to select an 11th volunteer if all the original 10 volunteers
identify as male.  That 11th volunteer would be the first one in the
ordered list who did not identify as male*.

The advantage of this approach is that in many years you don't need to do
anything to the process at all; in 3 of the past 4 years nothing additional
would have happened.  It is only when the random lot fails to produce the
minimum diversity that action is needed.  It is also relatively simple to
work out what to do to get the minimum diversity.

Just my own thoughts, of course,

Ted Hardie

*While the gender spectrum is not binary, the question here can be,
specifically:  "Do you identify as male?" If you are selecting to insure at
least one person has experience which differs from the male experience,
that's all you need to determine.