2015 Committee Nominations [Closed - Check for Updated Candidates]

edited in General
Hi Guys!

We're starting the committee nominations process for 2015. This year there are just 3 positions up for grabs:
1. Chair
2. Treasurer
3. Community Liaison (CPT or JHB)

Some of the committee members can probably better explain in this thread what each position involves, but essentially (as I understand it), chair is what Nick currently does and treasurer involves managing the money. I'm presuming the community liaison will be the person who communicates from Nick to the forums for JHB and CPT respectively etc.

Nominate here: Google Form

You can nominate yourself.
You can nominate as many people as you like.
You can nominate one person for multiple positions (you will need to fill in the form multiple times).
You do not need to be a forum member to nominate.
You will need to be a paying member of the society to vote (not sure if you need to be a paying member to nominate, but will confirm this later). I think the details for payment will be made available soon.

Read this thread for more about the MGSA community going forward: http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3177/mgsa-going-forward

The person nominated will need to receive a second nomination and then will also need to accept the nomination. I will contact them directly in this regard before posting the short list.

Voting will happen at the AGM.

Positions:
Chairmain - Nominal leader of the committee. Answering emails to the association and meeting business and government to grow the association
Treasurer - In charge of bank account (both chairman and treasurer are signatories on the account). Paying invoices for events, charities & merchandise. Collecting bank statements for tax filing
CPT Community Liaison - Manage CPT meetups (organise venues etc) and liaise with Chair
JHB Community Liaison - Manage JHB meetups (organise venues etc) and liaise with Chair

Current Nominations
These are the individuals who have been nominated, seconded and accepted to run for that particular position. You do not need to nominate them again.
- Nicholas Hall, Chair
- Dave Russell, Chair
- Dave Russell, Treasurer
- Leon van Niekerk, Treasurer
- Julian Pritchard, Treasuer
- Luke Lamothe, JHB Community Liaison
- Paul Potgeiter, JHB Community Liaison
- Megan Hughes, CPT Community Liaison

Declined Nominations
These are the individuals who have been nominated, seconded and declined to run for that particular position. You do not need to nominate them again.
- Andre Odendaal (Fengol) - Treasurer
- Matt Benic - Various
- Shaz Strauss (Shazfaeryl) - Treasurer
- Ben Myres - Various
- Steven Tu, JHB Community Liaison
- Gavin Hayler, CPT Community Liaison
- Peter Cardwell-Gardner, CPT Community Liaison
- Cukia Kimani, JHB Community Liaison
- Julian Pritchard, JHB Community Liaison
- Francois van Niekerk, CPT Community Liaison

Comments

  • There's actually a community liaison position for both JHB and Cape Town. Basically, as soon as there's a regular meetup around a stable physical community, that community needs a liaison.
    Thanked by 1mattbenic
  • I'll update the form to reflect the options.
  • edited
    Hi Everyone. I just want to say I'm stepping down from committee work after this AGM to focus on family (my wife is busy finishing our latest release) and work, so I'm not going to accept any potential nomination.

    It's been hard and rewarding work being MGSA's treasurer since the community's inception and I'm sure greater people will lead the association forward.
  • @Fengol Thanks for all your hard work so far, and good luck for the upcoming crunch for your latest release :D
  • Hey guys, I wanna nominate people but I don't really know which position, should I spam the same nomination in all positions that might fit (so person A for treasurer, then again for Joburg member) or just do it once for a position and leave it at that?
  • I don't see why someone can't be nominated for multiple positions?
  • Well it's more a case of I don't know where people I wanna nominate should go, so I wanted to do a general nomination. Also less clicking if I don't have to multi-positional nominate the same people :)
  • @Tuism - It's important to consider what the role entails before nominating. Perhaps ask that person what they'd be up for.
  • @Fengol - Do you think you could outline all the things that you did as treasurer because - as I understand it - it involves a fair bit more than banking but I'm not exactly sure what?
    Thanked by 1mattbenic
  • edited
    Okay, just a heads up - looking at the nominations rolling in I would like to suggest that perhaps people take some time to actually think who they want for the position. If you're not sure who would do well in that position, perhaps approach those people first and chat to them? People shouldn't be surprised to be nominated and it saves time if you ask them first if they even want to run.

    Seeing 1 person nominate 10 different people for a committee of only 4 people total seems like a sign of massive confusion or simply throwing all the names in the jar and seeing which one comes out tops. That's not an ideal way to elect the best committee for the community.
    Thanked by 1Tuism
  • Could we get clarification of the duties for the positions? That would help with nominations.

    I'm mostly wondering who'll do the whole Twitter, Facebook, etc?
    Thanked by 1Tuism
  • I've updated the OP with a brief job description for Chairman and Treasurer
  • I second a fuller description of duties and expectations, I suspect the list will grow too as time goes on, but it's nice to see a bit of a baseline from people who's gone before.
  • Hi all.

    I will not be accepting any nominations to the committee. As such, I will be stepping down from the committee and all roles at MGSA (social media; running meetups etc.).
    Thanked by 3Karuji Tuism damousey
  • Updated the OP. Also, thanks @Bensonance for everything you have done (and been doing) for MGSA :)

    This does leave a question of whether anyone would be able to step up to run the social media accounts for MGSA (it's a fairly big responsibility and also incredibly important for MGSA - but Ben can tell you more about that) and the JHB meetups?
    Thanked by 2Bensonance damousey
  • ^5 @Bensonance :D!

    Thanks for all the excellent work you did :3

    I'm now quite upset that I'll no longer be able to giggle at spelling mistakes, or wrong months, at the community meetups :<

    @dammit: the current format of the JHB meetup is: grab food at MS and do some socializing before the meet. Start meet at 7 with intros, and news. Have a talk by our monthly guest speaker(s), playtesters come to the front and pitch their games, go off and play test games.
  • @Karuji - That's rad, though I'm not sure why you're telling me how the meetups are run?
  • Was hoping that by sharing what I can about the meet it would get people talking about the roles they have filled, and get you the information you have been looking for ;)
  • edited
    There's not much I can say about being treasurer; it's the smallest part of what I do for MGSA. Literally, I check in on the bank balance and make sure the account doesn't go dominate from ill-use by popping in R100 every now and then; and when I get an invoice for something like rAge, EGE or t-shirts, I log into the bank and pay it.

    As a committee member I attend the Skype meetings we have (about once a quarter) which are normally about an up-coming event and I volunteer my time/money/soul to get something done for that.

    It's not part of my treasurer duties, but I also am the web admin. I used to patch the forum theme and upgrade the framework from time-to-time and I had started a separate site to plan the new changes. The development has been passed to the capable @Nitrogen and any volunteer can take over that job. The next important change is moving the domain to a local ISP.

    In terms of time commitment, I've been able to do everything after hours and only on occasion (like once or twice around rAge) popped out from work to do MGSA for an hour or 2.
  • Just so people know, I have been in touch with a couple of the nominees via PMs who have not responded as of yet or who are still taking the time to consider whether they would like to run for the positions in question.
  • edited
    Karuji said:
    Was hoping that by sharing what I can about the meet it would get people talking about the roles they have filled, and get you the information you have been looking for ;)
    :P The information I'm looking for is who will volunteer to run the meetups or the social media accounts.

    If you want to list the kind of things involved in running the meetup - this might include mentioning something like setting up the thread each month, confirming venues, creating the slides if necessary, collating recent industry news/announcements, getting people to be in and out of the venue as appropriate for the venue itself (if you have a time you need to be out by), ensuring speakers stay within their time limits and so on :)

  • I don't mind running the meetups if needed. I've done so a couple of times in the past. And like I said I chipped in hoping to get the people to offer up what they've been doing, and thanks to @Fengol for sharing :)

    Though I spoke to Ben last night, and he's answer was basically: what he does right now won't be the responsibility of whoever becomes the JHB Liaison, which I think highlights that we lack a definitive answer on what the duties for the liaison will be.

    With regards to my own nominations: I love the people in the JHB community, and I really want to do what I can to help them grow, but I also love this community and organization as a whole. I believe that I should do whatever I can to help it grow.

    With that in mind I would like to decline the nomination for JHB Liaison since I could do more work as Treasurer if elected.
    Thanked by 3dammit Tuism damousey
  • Will the nominees be doing a post on who they are/why they should be voted in?
  • mattbenic said:
    Will the nominees be doing a post on who they are/why they should be voted in?
    I think that's the plan :) just want to get the nominations finalised first
    Thanked by 1mattbenic
  • I'd like to raise four issues with the current process of the upcoming elections.

    1. We currently lack a formal definition of what the Liaisons will be doing. I know that positions on MGSA are malleable and people often fill many roles, but a kind of base expectations would be good so that it can help people understand what they would be voting for.

    2. It is currently stated in the OP that you need to me a paying member of the association/society in order to vote, but there is currently no way to pay, or a method of verifying students so they can pay at their appropriate fee. I believe this needs to be addressed quite urgently as the elections are within two weeks.

    3. We currently do not have a definitive date for the AGM. Judging that it is currently stated as being the last week of June I am guessing that it is going to happen during the CT meetup, but even if that is the case we still need to organize a venue for the JHB community, and other places to connect into and see what's going on. Time to prepare is needed.

    4. This is a bit of a mix of 2&3 but if the meet is run during the CT meetup and votes are done as they were last time, how are we to account for members voting from outside JHB and CT?
    Thanked by 2Bensonance damousey
  • edited
    Oh, on that, I believe this was raised at the last AGM too - we really should not have a voting system of raising hands and counting votes in the same room. It creates a situation where people obviously influence each other's decision and sway votes.

    We can have an AGM and an online thing to count votes, or blind ballots, or whatever. But what it was was... Not a fair voting system.

    Not that I have had any qualms about the outcomes, but if we're trying to formalise, we better formalise properly.
    Thanked by 1Riocide
  • So I've made some nominations that are not appearing on the list? I've made them twice now, have you received my nominations?
  • @Squidcor: each nominee has been nominated and seconded, since the nomination process is blind this means that essentialy that each person has been nominated for that position twice.

    So either the person has only been nominated only by you, which is insufficient, or they have been nominated and are still deciding if they wish to run, and won't be shown as such until they have replied.

    Going by my experience here as a nominee @dammit has been super on the ball with all my interactions with the process, so I'm rather certain it's one of the two events I outlined above.

    @Tuism, yeah that as well. Raised that after the last election, and kinda felt like it was covered by point 4 where I was saying it makes it so that only places on video chat can vote, which is rather derp. Guess I should have been a bit more explicit with that point.
  • Squidcor said:
    So I've made some nominations that are not appearing on the list? I've made them twice now, have you received my nominations?
    :) Yes. I'm still waiting for a few people to decide if they will take positions. But it's totally cool to ask if I've received the nominations - though any duplicates are just counted as a single nomination.

    I have to agree that I would like more definitions on roles here too. I would also like to possibly understand more about why the decision was made to make the committee so much smaller. Personally, I believe we need a larger committee for the various roles that need to be handled and I don't think that the forums should be somehow separated from the community/committee.

    I have no idea what's going on with payments etc for the committee. I have just volunteered to get this process going. I will probably also volunteer to handle the voting system, which I agree should be anonymous and (personally) I think it should be digital so that everyone can vote. There is no reason to have it location based.
  • Karuji said:
    @Squidcor: each nominee has been nominated and seconded, since the nomination process is blind this means that essentialy that each person has been nominated for that position twice.
    Cool. Just making sure nothing was broken :)

  • Side point I don't see addressed anywhere: I think it makes sense that only the Cape Town members vote for their liaison, and similarly with Joburg, but for the Chair and Treasurer everyone votes. Is this what will happen?

    In terms of committee numbers, I suspect the idea is that the committee does not actually do all the work itself, but is a fairly stable group of experienced people that helps delegate and manage tasks, perhaps through sub-commmittees.

    If I had to take an educated guess what a community liaison's responsibilities would be:

    - Organising the local meetups
    - Running the local meetups
    - Organising less frequent events like GGJ
    - Meeting with interested parties if the Chair is unable to
    - Potentially run or help run the social media side of things
    - Other stuff all committee members do, like attending regular meetings
    Thanked by 2dammit damousey
  • Community Liaison should also be involved in associated level responsibilities, such as:

    -Attending committee meetings to voice input and vote on issues / directions that MGSA takes
    -Bring up issues / concerns / ideas that your local community raises with the committee
    -Represent MGSA at meetings in your city / area with governmental / industry / educational representatives to advance game development in South Africa when necessary
    -Help organise MGSA participation at local industry events (ie. rAge / EGE / etc.)
    Thanked by 2damousey garethf
  • edited
    We really have to figure out the process for the on-the-day part of this, what can I do to help?
    Karuji said:

    With that in mind I would like to decline the nomination for JHB Liaison since I could do more work as Treasurer if elected.
    I think the current process doesn't allow for this sentiment to be carried through, personally, I agree that @Karuji would be well suited to treasurer, but if that's not the way this plays out (especially since there's still so much ambiguity about the actual vote process) then I'd definitely like him to still be in play for another role. Is that the way this could work?

    Additionally, possibly outside of the committee election itself, we should talk about the other roles that could be met by other volunteers. Web admin, social media and meet up organization ( if it ends up not falling within community liason duties now) are the ones that this discussion have already highlighted. How do we structure this accountability?
  • I've emailed Nick about the concerns raised here (as well as my own personal concerns). Hopefully we'll get some feedback soon.
  • Okay, so I'm closing the nominations tonight. Those who have still not decided about whether to accept their nominations or not still have until the actual AGM/voting period to make their decision. I mean, you could make the decision afterwards, but we cannot rectroactively vote someone into the committee, so that seems a bit pointless.

    On a note, I'm still waiting for feedback from Nick and so there's a chance that other positions or a change of information is going to be had. In which case I will reopen the nominations etc.
    Thanked by 1Bensonance
  • I have some feedback from Nick - but gmail is really being iffy with me lately so I'll share that when I can actually log in.
    Thanked by 1damousey
  • Would love to see some kinda organigram (or facebook) with all MGSA members or regulars or something.
    Thanked by 1Riocide
  • Any update on what's happening here? :)
  • I've posted the email I received here: http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3177/mgsa-going-forward#latest as I thought it was a more appropriate thread.

    As to what's happening with the AGM, payments and voting, we're still waiting on the current committee to get that going and give us a heads up. @Bensonance - you're closer to the committee than I am, so you might have more insight?
  • Andre was working on a plan on how we where going to organize the payments and membership. I'll follow up with him and see what needs to happen.
  • @LexAquillia - What's the progress on this?
  • @LexAquillia - What's the progress on this? We are nearly a year behind on this...
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