On 6 February 2013 13:11, fabian@unpopular.org.uk wrote:
Hi Tom,
I think it is more a matter of what standards "we" (as the membership) should expect from a) the board and b) WMUK the firm (which is undoubtedly what it is).
I value you your contributions because you are always pushing "us" (the membership, the board and the staff, i.e. the firm as a whole) to raise our standards. Often what you propose is quite practicable, if it wasn't for the other activities the organisation is doing. It is Jon's job to organise those priorities. You may disagree with how he goes about that, as no doubt we all shall from time to time. However, I am not sure how helpful it is to question his good faith, short of supplying pretty clear evidence to support what your saying.
To be clear, I was using the plural "you". I suspect it is more the board rather than Jon that are stalling.
You have drawn certain conclusions from previous experience, but I do not think that is anyway indicative of any lack of good faith. From my own experience of dealing with the office - and indeed as reflected on the list - one problem seems to be we have all been over-ambitious about what we want to achieve. This has lead to the office becoming very hectic, with a certain amount of over work. With current plans to recruit more staff, this should lead a situation when WMUK (the firm) can more closely realise the sort of standards which you advocate.
Being overambitious is certainly a problem, but given that I wrote a long blog post explaining why the chapter needed to cut down its plan for this year so there would be time to give all the governance problems the time they need, I'm not going to accept that as an excuse for anything. They should have taken my advice and it is their fault they didn't.
I don't think that is relevant to this, however. Publishing the report will take about 2 minutes.
Please don't hold back from raising these issues and advocating more exacting standards - just be a bit more understanding if they are not always met.
If mistakes are made despite everyone trying very hard to do things right, then I am very understanding. Not publishing the report isn't a mistake, though. It is a concious decision, and an incorrect one.