From: jms@carat.arizona.edu (A virtually vegetal non-entity)
Newsgroups: comp.org.decus
Subject: Re: EXECUTION of DECUS Standards
Date: 17 Dec 92 18:33:00 GMT
 <16DEC199215294682@carat.arizona.edu> <1992Dec16.235647.4684@spcvxb.spc.edu>
Reply-To: jms@Arizona.EDU
Distribution: usa,local
Organization: University of Arizona MIS Department - Mosaic Group
X-Lunar-Date: 6 days, 7 hours, 27 minutes since the full moon
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.50A

You're droning.  If you have to dance around for 175 lines to refute a 4
paragraph message, you're droning.  Take it from someone who has to fit
2000 words into a 1000 word box for a living.  Tighten your prose and fix
your grammar; your response will be more convincing.  But on to the fight:

My syllogism:
	DECUS members are interested in product set X.
	DECUS high-level leadership is not interested in product set X.
	Ergo, DECUS high-level leadership does not share the interests of DECUS
	members.  

Your response:
	DECUS leadership has both high-level and low-level, and that the 
	low-level folks do, in fact, consume product set X.
	DECUS high-level leadership does, in fact, keep in touch by eating 
	lunch with attendees, etc. 
	Ergo, DECUS leadership at all levels shares the interests of DECUS 
	members.

DECUS low-level leadership (hmmm, that's me!) has little or no
decision-making impact on the society.  MC+Board holds the checkbook, and
effectively makes all decisions which regard to programs moving forward,
or moving backwards.  

What you call "leadership" is not composed of leaders, but of the workers
who produce the true products of the society.  In fact, there is a
specific, mandated dichotomy between those-who-lead and those-who-produce,
where the Society has made a very strong effort to keep those-who-produce
producing, and shielded from the difficulties of running the society, while
those-who-lead are busy leading, and have little or no time to produce.  As
always, the higher you go, the less you have to do with real products.  

Let's introduce a real distinction here.  We have DECUS
leaders-who-make-decisions, which number in the small tens, perhaps as much
as 100.  And we have leaders-who-make-products, which comprise the rest of
the pro-forma leadership.  

These people make the decisions on how DECUS will be run, and they do it
without any consultation with the rest of leadership, and they do it
without sharing the interests of the Society.   Your examples are, to be kind,
ludicrous.  This reminds me of George Bush and his tour of supermarkets,
where he was amazed by the bar-code scanner.  It sounds like the beknighted
deigning to come down to where the little people are and listen to their
problems.  

The fact that you don't even see my point makes it all the more telling.  

Here's a proposal on DECUS Leadership: The moment someone is willing to
give up active participation in a national Symposium is the moment that
this person no longer shares the same interests as the active membership. 

What you're suggesting is that the highest levels of leadership are akin to
professional politicians.  Being a president, senator, or governor is a
full-time job.  We trust these people to understand our needs and desires.  

Resorting to standard USENET tactics, I quote from the original thread:
>> Jeff, here's a challenge: "survey" the MC (after all, research is the new
>> methodology) and get a list of sessions they attended.  Or gave.  Then,
>> let's see who's out of touch with whom.
> 
>Answered above - and keep in mind again my original point related to the 1000 
>and not the 20 being discussed here.

I respond: NOT!  Look, several of the members of the BOD are good friends,
but let me point this out: 5 of them are consultants.  2 are manangers.  1,
I don't know.  Is this representative of the DECUS membership? 

I return to my original statement: you may make a value judgement on your
own as to whether having leadership [sic] separate from membership is good
or bad.  But you cannot argue that the leadership, the decision-making part
of DECUS, is in touch with and shares the interests of the membership of
the Society.

Joel Snyder - DECUS Volunteer & part-time leader | jms@Arizona.EDU
DECUS is for folks who have penises and for folks who do not.  Come join us!