======================= Grand Council Chronicle ======================= Issue #20 -- June 14, 1995 Contents of this issue: Bertram: Outsourcing Bearkiller: A Few Words of Encouragement Magnus: TI Gareth: Territoriality and other Subjects Alban: territoriality proposal (new); finances Caroline: Report of Proposal Votes 6/12 Alysoun: poll, address change, ed & pub. This is the Grand Council Chronicle, the proceedings of the Grand Council of the Known World, a body chartered to examine the structure of the Society for Creative Anachronism, Inc., and make recommendations of changes. The contents represent the opinions of the contributing authors, and do not necessarily represent the official policies of the SCA, Inc. ---------------------------------------- Sender: David Schroeder Subject: Re: Grand Council Chronicle #19 Hi folks! Good greetings from Bertram -- Re: Grand Council Chronicle #19 Arthur the Dented writes: > ---------------------------------------- > * Methods of the Corporation (tactics) > ** Outsourcing I have > experience with outsourcing. all of it bad. I've had quite a good bit of experience with outsourcing myself. Most of it good. > The dynamic of this seems to > be that AFTER they have the contract, an Management Service firms > interests are to maximize profit by giving minimum service AND that their > resources (rationaly) are allocated to their older and larger clients > first (the proven bread and butter by which they have sustained themselves > and who have their strongest commitment) ,and to the newer and smaller > clients (by REVENUE we're still small fish) last... Sounds like you've had some bad luck selecting firms. As I advised in my white paper on Outsourcing, we need to find a firm where _we_ will be one of their 2-4 biggest, most important clients. It is also a lot easier to get better service by making it clear we're not happy and will shift our business to another firm if they don't shape up. And, as best I can tell from the Institute of Association Management Companies, the SCA would not be a _small_ account for many of their member firms. > For this reason, and > because the REAL work we need done, (as opposed to the monumental waste of > effort which has been keeping it from being done well) is a pair of fairly > simple tasks, I'd recomend against outsourcing. We really can handle it > ourselves if we just get the burden of this top down hierarchy reporting > structure/paperwork first mentality off our backs... I don't neccessarily disagree. If we could wave a magic wand and decentralize the corporation tomorrow then we probably wouldn't need outsourcing. But it would be a lot easier _to_ reduce the power of the central bureaucracy if we were paying an outside firm for it (and therefore could be "hard" on them) rather than extending our near-infinite patience toward SCA-folk who are "trying their best..." The way I see it, Outsourcing cuts our bills and reduces our overhead AND our liabilities... What happens if there's an earthquake and a piece of ceiling in the Corporate Office falls on someone? We can avoid the liabilities of "owning" space by outsourcing. Doing it sooner, rather than later, can only help us save MORE money. > ---------------------------------- Dani of the Seven Wells wrote: > I am strongly in favor of investigating our outsourcing options, but I'd > suggest making the motion more concrete before putting it to a vote. If > the Board is simply asked to investigate outsourcing, it will probably > respond by pointing out that it voted to do so in January. > > At that time, AJ delegated the task to Brian Morman -- Treasurer of > Outlands and a member of AJ's finance committee -- and Brian has been > looking into outsourcing. He and Bertram recently became aware of each > other's efforts, and presumably they will be cooperating. For the record, I sent a friendly email message to Brian Morman, along with a copy of my white paper on Outsourcing, a few weeks ago. I haven't heard anything at all back from him. I'd love to cooperate. > --------------------------------- Many thanks, folks -- Bertram ---------------------------------------- [Forwarded by Justin; I thought people would want to see it.] >From LLUTHERFULTO@MSUVX1.MEMPHIS.EDU Thu Jun 8 03:39:28 1995 Subject: GC Chronicles Justin, I just wanted to tell you a couple of things. Feel free to quote me or not. I have been reading the GC Chronicles (all of them) and wanted to say I appreciate the work everyone has done to get the committee cranked up. I know it is hard work getting started and finding your way through areas that have not been approached before. Contrary to what a few people might think, I have a great deal of hope that ya'll may come up with ways to improve things. I don't care how mundane or radical the ideas are, just so they are good ideas. It is obvious to me that the SCA needs retooling. Some things work, some things don't. The hard part is finding the things that can be changed without injuring the membership and the basic heart of the organization (though defining the "heart" is probably an impossible task). My own suggestions, as an outsider, are: 1) Don't be timid about looking at all aspects of the SCA. 2) Don't let any one person or idea override the voices of others. I think this has been a problem in the past with the Board. 3) Don't hesitate to require assistance from the Board or look outside of your group. Inbreeding is not good. 4) Don't think for a minute that what your group does is not important. If your methods are sound and your product is of good quality it is going to be hard for anyone to ignore you. I guess that's it for the moment. You have my support, though my term on the BOD is up in October. However, afterwards, I hope to work a bit with the GC if I can find a member that will listen to me. Again, if I can assist in any way, let me know. John the Bearkiller/ John Fulton ---------------------------------------- Sender: Maghnuis@aol.com Subject: Re: GC TI? Does anyone else feel that the publication of Tournaments Illuminated eats up a disproportionate amount of the Corps Budget? It is obviously a beautiful publication...but has it expanded beyond its need? Someone who has easier access than I should post the annual budget for our information. Magnus Maguire ---------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 10 Jun 95 02:00:35 -0800 From: rgathercoal@foxmail.gfc.edu (Roy Gathercoal) Subject: GC--Response to Digest #19 Justin, sign me up for the membership thing. (If you really want a conservative!) Here is my response to #19. On Territoriality: I believe I understand Cariadoc's desire to decentralize, but I am a bit confused as to which level he proposes to decentralize. In #19 he says "I believe the correct solution . . .is local option." I would take this to mean that each local group would make decisions regarding their own situation. A solution such as this would indeed offer the greatest flexibility. Yet I am not sure that Cariadoc is proposing such a local solution, for his explanation seems to be saying that control would rest primarily with the kingdoms. This would more closely resemble our current situation--as of July of last year, kingdoms have been granted the authority to unilaterally change branch boundaries up to the principality level. In his comments regarding Hossein's suggestions, he seems to clearly favor the rights of kingdoms to make their own decisions about membership, and impose these decisions on the local groups within the kingdom. This could lead us to a different formulation of the question. We have been talking generally in terms of centralization/decentralization, but perhaps we should instead be speaking of four (or more) points on a continuum based on the locus of control: 1. A strong corporate structure, with all substantive decisions being made at the corporate level. Kingdoms and local branches would function merely as reporting and enforcing entities. 2. A strong kingdom structure, with the corporate structure primarily providing certain limited services that cannot be economically provided by the kingdoms. Kingdom structures would dominate in this model, so that there would be much deviation from kingdom to kingdom (in that no kingdom could impose a decision upon any other kingdom), but little deviation within each kingdom. The creation and destruction of local branches would be at the discretion of each kingdom, and any interkingdom disputes would be adjudicated in some sort of body representing all of the kingdoms. 3. A strong local branch structure, with the corporate structure simply providing certain limited services. If territorially based, kingdom structures would primarily be ceremonial. If there were to be any significant governance occuring at the kingdom level, then groups would be free to affiliate with any of several kingdoms (kingdoms would not be territorially based) so that real control would remain at the local level. Functioning as affiliations, kingdoms could set standards for accepting local branches, but these could be changed by the currently affiliated groups. 4. A strong member-based structure, with local branch, kingdom and corporate structures established to best serve the needs of the individual members. This model would require checks and balances among the branch, kingdom and corporate structures to ensure that the diverse and isolated membership continues to be well served. Important governance would occur either by written polling (as is currently done for barony-and-larger group changes) or after extensive and continuing consultation with the membership by a body selected from the membership and kept accountable to it. I have tried to pick points that would be workable, but as I reread these, I fear my bias toward the last comes through. I believe that this is the intent of our current structure, but that to some extent the accountability and to a great extent the communication to the membership has been neglected. Thus what we have now is more of a benevolent-autocracy-cut-off than it is a self-serving oligarchy or aristocracy. I would readily admit that we could build a viable Society around any point on this continuum, but I would also caution that each such Society would look very different--these are not trivial matters. On one minor point of disagreement with Cariadoc: I can see that the rules we have now, and the way things are now run are significantly better than they were fifteen years ago. I am glad we are no longer fighting in freon-tank helms and it is far less likely that someone with inadequate armor will be able to slip onto the field. I also suspect that it is far less likely that a kingdom's newsletter will completely disappear for one or more months and far less likely that a first time attendee at an event will be accosted by some loud drunk person. I will not, however, claim the implied reason (size) for I suspect that experience and organizational maturity have a lot more to do with our successes than does number of members or size of the budget. Kingdoms may be big enough to work out sensible rules, but many are not currently structured to do so. If we were to adopt a kingdom-based structure we would, for example, need to abandon "The Word of the Crown is Law" or impose greater requirements for entering Crown Lists. Some kingdoms have a tradition of relatively weak kingdom officers (seen as assistants to the Crown) and these kingdoms would need to develop some form of governance that is somewhat isolated from the whims of an incompetent administrator. While I agree that any one individual's chances to influence rule changes are better at the kingdom than at the society level, I would suggest that some isolation can be a good thing. I have seen many cases in which one particular person exercizes more influence on a kingdom officer than I think is healthy. I am intrigued by some of Cariadoc's arguments here, particularly in the importance of trying new rules and in the climate differences (though I would point out that in his own kingdom, there is a great deal of variability between Manitoba and Kentucky--let alone San Jose and Nome). I believe that these can be accomodated even with a strong corporate structure. After all, the Middle Kingdom did try out and accept combat archery and rapier combat, while operating within our current structure. I agree with his point that the power to accept a kingdom is too blunt to be an effective tool for detailed control. I would add that it is perhaps too blunt to be effective as any control. The control against an unruly (or dangerous) Crown is part of the myth of the SCA. As with most myths, it holds a great deal of truth and a lot of extensions on that truth. In fact, the limit on Crowns does not work nearly as well in those kingdoms with 6 (or 8) month reigns as in the kingdom with 4 month reigns. It does not work as well in those kingdoms with a lengthy time between Crown and Coronation (in that people can extend their "prep" time and hit the ground running). It does not work as well in kingdoms where there is no sanction against reigning multiple times as in those kingdoms where 3- and 4-time reigns are unusual. It also does not work as well in kingdoms in which large households are organized well enough to develop multiple Crown contenders, in that one household member can succeed another, thus doubling (or more) the necessary stall time. I would also protest that to rely on such an organizational control is undesireable, in that it intentionally places officers in the position of having to lie to the Crown, or at least to do less than to serve obediently, as is often required as part of the oath of service. We should not rely on malfunction as a safety valve. In response to Finnvarr's post: The necessary outsourcing information is not "essentially free." First, we cannot responsibly go to just one source for information--as much as we might like Bertram's organization, we have a responsibility to insure against the perils of single-sourcing. If I am shopping for home insurance, I should call more than one agent from more than one company. This is not because I don't trust this agent (or I wouldn't have called to begin with) but it is because I know that the insurance agent's priorities and loyalties are not my priorities and loyalties. Second, the value of any sort of information about outsourcing will depend to a large extent on the quality of the input. If we want something that we can count on (and if we are to use this information to make key decisions, we had better be able to count on it!) we need to ensure that our input is accurate and complete. This takes time. Any quality evaluation will take a great deal of time. It is an easy thing to volunteer someone else's time. I do not know what Renee's priorities are, and am unwilling to tell her that she should put off something else in order to do this--especially if I don't know what the something elses are. One of the perennial problems in the SCA has been the way we treat our employees. I would suggest that we talk to Renee' before we become too sure about what we want her to do--this is a matter of courtesy. Third, many of the administrative problems of the Society have been caused by lurching ahead into some project without a good clear big picture. If we invest Renee's time (which is in one perspective, our money) to do this survey, have a couple of outsourcing companies (or professional associations) spend time in doing their analyses, then decide in six months or a year that we are going to be offering some of these services through the kingdoms, and not offering other services at all, we will be guilty of the same kind of lurching ahead that has caused us problems before. Let's decide what the Society should look like, and what it should be doing, before we start trying to patch up what we are currently doing. Let's make sure we want something before we go shopping for it. In response to Finnvarr's questions about my "for instance." My question about children and elderly people was not intended to be about "being nicer." When I was kingdom seneschal, I also was the parent of a young child. It became apparent to me, through my own experience and the repeated complaints of parents, that the SCA was simply not for children. As I looked back, I saw that many families active in the SCA either dropped out when they had kids, or one of the parents became significantly less active until the kids became teenagers (some had squires or other household members function as babysitters). I also noticed how few teenagers were active at events, and how little of our new membership was due to "biological" increase--our own children were less interested in the SCA than were teenagers just joining. Further, it seemed to me that we were far less likely to keep new families with kids than single adults or couples. >From event to event, I had no idea what the children situation would be--one autocrat told me "parents ought to know better than to bring their kids to events." The fact is, no one has made any decisions, and so we don't know what to expect. This is an increasing, not a decreasing problem, and one I believe we should decide about, rather than simply let something happen. I did not intend to infer some great division between fighters and non-fighters. In my kingdom, there seems to be no greater division than anywhere else. But I would point out that currently, heavy rattan tournament fighting is one activity that is enshrined within our organizational structure. If we go to a kingdom-control model, it will become even more structurally important. This might be what we want. This might not be what we want. But it is now what we have. I think we would benefit by discussing not whether fighting is good or bad, or even valuable or not, but rather whether we intend for it to be at the core of our activities. If we decide that we do want an organization in which fighting is at the core, then we should say "this is the way it should be--the person who wants to be fully involved in this organization should plan on fighting." We perhaps might wish to say "fighting is one part of our recreation, but we value heraldry as much." Or we could say "fighting is important to us insofar as it works to historically recreate the tournaments of the Middle Ages." Again, I think this would be an important move and should come about as a result of a decision, not of a non-decision. I know that these are tough issues. There are probably more than 10,000 philosophies of the Society, just as there are 10,000 ideas of how things ought to be run. But these issues are important. If we do not have a clear idea of what we, as a Society, are about, what our reason for being is, then we cannot do a good job of designing a structure that will best serve our goals. Many values are already embedded in our rules and ways of doing things. Some of these, such as courtesy, tolerance and a respect for history are likely to survive scrutiny. Others, such as (fill in your favorite here) are likely to look stupid or even dangerous under such scrutiny. I think some group of people ought to be doing this looking. It is a necessary part of devising an organizational structure that will serve us well. Maybe we are not the group (in my model, this is the responsibility of the board) but we ought to at least say who should be responsible. In response to Kyle I would point out that as things currently stand, it may be tradition and custom in your kingdom that the Crown does not have much say over money, but that legally (per corpora) they cannot be effectively opposed if they choose to exercise a great deal of influence, as long as they are not writing checks out to themselves. In response to Fiacha I did not intend to step on toes, and apologize if that was the unintended effect (mine are intact). He writes: "Voting I would rather see us take lots of little steps now, voting on ------ things to make sure we have our ideas straight than see us wait until the council's charter is about to expire and vot then on some conglomeration of concepts that lots of us are misinterpreting." If given these two choices, I would agree. But I think there are more options. I would prefer, for example, to spend some time deciding on a general direction we wish to see the Society to travel (if not a destination), and then to decide on how to best get us there. The risk in starting with disconnected small steps is that we might wake up a few months down the road to discover that we have changed our minds about some of our first steps because they conflict with later steps. " Gareth sees the proposal as forcing members to be members of branches instead of members of the Society. And discusses some of the ramifications of such a change. This is not what I intended as I wrote the proposal and I invite Gareth to help me reword it to avoid making such an implication." I intended to say that the proposal either makes significant changes (such as moving membership to the branches) or is trying to fix something that doesn't need fixing (such as establishing a new way to "count" members in branches even though such counts are seldom used). Thus if it is the first, it is premature. If it is the second, it is something we can easily put off, since any decision we make will not have much of an impact. My problem is not with the wording of the proposal, but with whether we need it at this time. In response to Arthur's repost I think it is better to talk about levels than about entities. That is, I believe we will be better served by conceptualizing the corporate-level, kingdom-level and branch-level functions or officers than by conceiving these as separate (and potentially hostile) entities. If there are hostilities that can not be attributable to normal interpersonal misunderstandings, then something needs to be structurally changed, "for a house divided against itself cannot stand." Sorry if I misread your intent, here. I think that insurance and mailing lists are a relatively minor part of what the corporate-level should provide. It is certainly a minor part of what they currently do. I think that some have minimized the SCA into a provider of a few physical services. I believe this misses the heart of what we enjoy. It may be that we wish to move the responsibility for some of these functions to other entities, but we should not forget them. I react somewhat negatively to the idea of additional publications at the corporate-level. Seems to me we can't keep the ones we have adequately staffed and coming out on time (see Complete Anachronist). There are no "free lunches" as far as money raising goes--each additional money raising scheme we start will take a certain amount of our organizational energy and attention. We need to be careful that we don't start losing sight of why we are here. Renewed in service to you, Gareth ---------------------------------------- Sender: ALBAN@delphi.com Subject: territoriality proposal (new); finances territoriality: i just noticed that the territoriality discussion has focussed specifically on shires/baronies and households; it has not addressed at all other groups that are very active throughout the sca. therefore, i would like to submit this alternative proposal (from cariadoc and others): pre-a) the Board of Directors reserves the right to establish kingdoms, and to specify, after consultation with the prospective kingdom's officers and populace, and with the parent kingdom's officers and populace, the geographic location of the new kingdom. a) the kingdoms shall reserve unto themselves the power to establish official subsidiary groups, and the location, if any, of such groups. such groups include, but are not limited to, shires, baronies, principalities, universities, households, colleges of heralds, performing arts guilds, war colleges, etc. ad nauseam [note that this does not tie a group to a geographic locale. this means that, for example, a college of heralds could hold a kingdom-wide heraldic symposium without needing to find a shire/barony to "run the event"] b) no group need be official, unless it wishes to hold sca- sanctioned events. in such cases, it must either become an official group, or have an official group act as sponsor. [if you want to start a household, go ahead; but if the household wants to Hold An Event, it's gotta go through the chain of command. note also this is what, at least in calontir, incipient shires have to do; since they're still technically unofficial, whenever an i.s. wants to hold an event, it has to go through (usually) the nearest group with a bank account.] c) where a group may cross the boundaries of two or more kingdoms, and does not exist as a function of the SCA, Inc., its establishment shall be left up to the kingdoms involved. the establishment agreement for "landed groups" must make allowance for group members to decide which kingdom they wish to belong to, if necessary. [the last phrase needs work; treaties for, oh, the trans-kingdom order of the white scarf don't need to worry about which kingdom the members decide to be in, but shires and baronies do. why? newsletters, awards, fealty, which side to fight for....i also don't expect all that many trans-kingdom groups to form that aren't already around. the order of the white scarf, ummm, two households (dark horde and dark horde redux), ahh, any more? the "SCA, Inc." thing is to specifically exempt the Marshallate, the College of Arms, the Board of Directors....once the Congress and the Cabinet got started, there was no need for the states to get together and pass legislation to, oh, start the Department of Energy.] d) [insert here appropriate wording to suggest that, when a kingdom forms a group that shadows an SCA, Inc. group (e.g., a kingdom marshallate, or a college of heralds), the SCA's rules have precedence. i think such national rules should be minimal. each kingdom has a good idea of what the local laws regarding personal safety, legal liability, waivers, financial integrity, and so forth and so on are. The SCA should lay out nothing more than a skeletal, minimal framework, and let the kingdoms go from there. note that i don't go as far as cariadoc would prefer; i think there needs to be _some_ national framework or else trimaris will wind up being too different from the west, and the 13 kingdoms wind up being, well, the 13 kingdoms, and not the SCA. even the 50 states realize there needs to be some national laws....] i should note that there's been some discussion about how to decide whether a person belongs to one group or another. um, hey, guys? isn't this discussing "The Membership Issue"? please keep in mind that when you're coming up with ways to define local membership, you may also be deciding whether that person is/is not a member of the SCA. finnvar is puzzled about the whole territoriality thang. actually, two thirds of the way through it, so am i. (of course, it could be said that the territoriality issue is good practice for us; we should see what we can produce as a group on a minor issue before turning our attention to the Major Issues. think of The Great Territoriality Issue as training wheels.) so, let's get it over with, and start on The Big Topics (the things that caused the great crash of January '94): finances, and membership. on finances: i propose we get started on or after 19 june 1995 (that being when Lilies is over, and caroline will be back in her coordinator's role). i'd like to be on the finances sub- committee, and would suggest that it consider at least the following: 1) financing the sca, inc., and how to ensure the corporation's finances are open to the membership. 2) financing the kingdoms. 3) what services the corporation should provide members as part of membership, at cost, or at a small profit. (throughput) 4) what services the corporation can provide non-members (e.g. educational materials to highschool teachers), free, at cost, or with a profit. 5) what services presently provided by the corporation should be split off into self-sustaining organizations. (yes, this is financial: the college of arms, for example, is by-and-large self-supporting, and gets money from the SCA, Inc. for moving the files and not much else. (the stock clerk, maybe?)) 6) whether there should be educational grants for historical research, either to members (whatever they are) or to non- members, and the funding thereof. 7) how much corporate support of (inter)national publications there should be (and whether there should be corporate support; or, should publications be self-supporting). 8) size of the corporate staff, and physical location of the National Offices. (moving from milpitas to, oh, suburban kansas city may make financial sense, all things considered). some of the information the finance people need can come out of the stuff needed for the outsourcing bid. so, who gets such information, how do we copy it, and how much will it cost? alban, running down at last, and hoping this makes more sense than it seems to me. ---------------------------------------- Sender: "CAROL L SMITH" Subject: Report of Proposal Votes 6/12 Greetings from Caroline! As of Monday, 12 June, I have 12 votes on the outsourcing proposal and 11 votes on the territoriality proposal. A proposal needs 21 "yes" votes to pass, so send your votes if you want something to move forward! Votes are due to ME (clsmit@ccmail.monsanto.com/314-694-4655 and leave a message) by THIS FRIDAY. Thanks! Caroline clsmit@ccmail.monsanto.com ---------------------------------------- Sender: Carole.C.Roos.2@nd.edu (Carole Roos) Subject: GC: poll, address change, ed & pub. Greetings from Alysoun Since it is relevant to the discussion of membership starting up soon, would everyone please give a short opinion of TI in the next chronicle? This isn't a vote, just a canvass of opinion. Do you and most of the people you know find it interesting and/or useful? Please note a change of address. My new address is: Carole Roos 1730 Oak Park Dr. South Bend, IN 46617 Mail sent to my old address will be forwarded. I haven't received the org. chart yet but will send it out as soon as I get it. Since Cariadoc is the only one to comment on my education posting, I assume that others had the same difficulty with it. Of course the five point process is like a college adult ed. program--that is just how education works. The main point was establishing the Known World (the Society) as the learning environment and this should capture the essential element he says is missing. The "we" in the examples of the process stands for the Known World, not a subset of teachers as in a classroom setting. What I am trying to capture here is the fact that each person, by participating in the Known World, "teaches" as well as "learns". When people wear garb, they are teaching that garb is important. When they don't wear it, they are teaching the opposite. I can appreciate Arthur's frustration with the lack of response to his posting. Since many of us try to cover so much in a single posting, we may be overloading our fellow members. I suggest that when there is a lack of response we should break down the original posting into smaller elements and explain, one by one, the smaller parts more carefully. To tell the truth I didn't understand much of Arthur's posting the first time and I'm not clear on all of it even now. Arthur suggests two new services under mailing list (future): a medieval yellow pages and interest specific publications. Both would meet a member need, but I think he underestimates some of the problems involved. We might suggest that one of the TI issues each year have a larger merchant section at a special low rate. I would not say "free" and would hope that the merchants taking space would be those who could handle the potential market increase (not just anybody who has rented booth space at a certain number of events). Connecting people with a specific interest across the Known World is a very worthy objective. However finding reliable editors for such publications is not a "merely" sort of undertaking. TI might offer an annual listing of available interest-specific newletters so individuals can subscribe to them. (Midrealm has recently done this in the Pale.) This may increase the usefulness of TI, help meet the needs of specific interests, and provide a means of assessing the number and range of such newletters existing in the Known World without having to invest much administrative time/effort/money. ----------------------------------------