I am sorry if what I say is clumsy and does not come out the way I think.
I try to explain.
daniel_the_smith wrote:I'd like to note that I really don't understand the criticism from [EDIT: apparantly I misunderstood Joaz's post. Sorry!] and Bantari: why do you seem to expect me to be the source of ideas?
I am not really sure if 'expect' is the right word here.
I would say (and said, i think) - this is what I would like to see.
As to Why? Good question.
This goes to the reason for existence of bodies like the AGA Board. And again, this is not what is, or what I expect, but what I would like to see. And I would like to see the board working WITH the members, not pumping the members for ideas, then for volunteers, then for donations, then for... I am not saying that this is how I see it happening, only this is what I would like not to see.
For example - if I was in charge of a company. Sure, every now and then I can have a meeting with my employees and ask them for ideas, but I should give some direction in which these ideas should go, channel it from my wider perspective, maybe give a few staring points, stuff like that. More likely - I would put some goals and then ask for ideas on how to accomplish these goals.
And every now and then I should also have ideas of my own.
And I am not talking here to you personally, I think you are doing a great job. Its more the idea of things rather than any specific execution or behavior.
daniel_the_smith wrote:There's one of me and a ton of you. It would be arrogant of me to assume that I can come up with better ideas than all of you guys put together.
Agreed.
This is why I never said you should come up with ideas and then implement them without discussion or input.
Also - you are not really the entire board, so do not take it personally. I was not really addressing you but the situation as I see it.
As for you yourself... even if you are only one, there is still no reason you cannot come up with ideas. Each one of us is only one, and if we all thought like you, then nobody would ever have any ideas worth voicing. Or do you disagree.
Part of my point is that you, even though only one among equals, are a little more equal than many of us here... but only because of your proximity to what is going on in AGA. For this reason, I think your ideas might be at least as interesting as mine, possibly much more so. And things you propose, from your higher vantage point might be generally more appropriate and need than what I would say. Thus I would very much like to hear what ideas do YOU have.
Same goes for every board member, and for the board as a body.
daniel_the_smith wrote:@bantari, It may sound bad at first blush to say that the board is setting aside time to talk about priorities. But it is actually a good thing; if you don't schedule time to talk about your goals/priorities, it will never happen because little stuff will come up and crowd it out. There is no shortage of stuff the board could spend its meetings talking about; adding this discussion ahead of other things is an admission that it is more important than other things. If you think the AGA needs to sort out its priorities, this should make you happy. If it appalls you that the AGA currently has no coherent set of goals, then by all means, be appalled--but it makes no sense to simultaneously criticize us for trying to fix that...
I understand that.
My point was more about not having anything to say about it other than 'we will talk'.
For example - has there been last years priorities, have they been met, in what percentage, and most importantly - what needs to be carried over into this year's priorities?
I mean - all this will influence the ideas we might have and their possible acceptance and/or dismissal. Also - such information might give much more direction to any discussion here and avoid time wastage... for example, if there already is an idea carried over from last year to implement an AGA blog, people will think about specifics on how best to accomplish that rather than generics of 'lets have a blog'.
As it was stated, my impression was that AGA did not have any ideas, did not have any prior priorities, and there is nothing that needs to be carried over. There is no projects the board members have already set their heats on, which we can think over and come up with ideas of execution.
In short - in my opinion, AGA should be in a more advanced state than 'lets throw any general ideas in the wind and see what we like'.
There should be some past to draw from when thinking about such questions.
