Nominating Committee Timeline

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Last updated: Nov 11, 2022 by Christine Di Bella

The Nominating Committee Chair is the immediate past chair of the Governance Board and will begin the process of identifying members to serve on the Nominating Committee no later than November. The membership of the Nominating Committee will be approved by the Governance Board no later than the 3rd Quarter Governance Board Meeting. The Nominating Committee will begin its work in early March and conclude it by the second week in June.

November-January

  • The immediate past chair of the Governance Board serves as Chair of the Nominating Committee
    • According to the Bylaws, the immediate past chair of the Governance Board serves as the Chair of the Nominating Committee.
    • The Nominating Committee Chair reviews the responsibilities associated with the role in preparation for managing the Nominating Committee and nominations and election processes.
    • Nominating Committee Chair consults with Program Manager and others as needed to develop a roster of nominees for appointment to the Nominating Committee.
      • The Nominating Committee consists of 11 members according to the Bylaws (art. V, sec. 2):
        • Chair of the Governance Board or Board member designee.
        • Chair and Vice-Chair of the Technical Advisory Council
        • Chair and Vice-Chair of the User Advisory Council
        • Five at large members, each representing one of the ArchivesSpace membership levels
        • ArchivesSpace Program Manager, ex officio 
      • Nominating Committee Chair reviews roster of nominees for the Nominating Committee with Governance Board Chair and presents the roster to the Governance Board via email or  at 3rd Quarter Governance Board Meeting.

March

  • March: Governance Board, TAC, and UAC vacancies are identified.
    • Program Manager reviews with the chairs and vice-chairs of the Governance Board, TAC, and UAC any vacancies that will need to be filled due to term expirations, resignations, or other events.
      • Governance Board members approaching the end of their first term should be asked whether they wish to stand for election for a second term. If so, they are automatically placed on the ballot, leaving the Nominating Committee the responsibility of recommending only one nominee to run against the incumbent. If the incumbent does not wish to run for reelection or has reached the end of her or his second term, the Nominating Committee will need to recommend two new nominees for the ballot to fill the vacancy. Note that only Member Representatives for the five Member Levels are elected; all other Governance Board members are defined according to their roles in the Bylaws.
      • Due to the Bylaws change in 2021 that extended terms to three years, TAC and UAC members approaching the end of their first term will usually renew only if they will be serving in a leadership position. In these circumstances they should be asked whether they wish to be reappointed. If so, the Nominating Committee will normally recommend their reappointment unless the chair of the respective Council indicates that there have been issues with the member's performance. If the incumbent does not wish to be reappointed, the Nominating Committee will need to recommend a nominee to be appointed to fill the vacancy (TAC and UAC members are appointed; only Member Representatives to the Governance Board are elected by their constituents).
    • Appointments to the Governance Board, TAC, and UAC are tied to individuals, not organizations, which is to say that an incumbent's appointment may not be transferred to another staff in her or his organization. If an incumbent is not eligible or does not wish to be considered for reelection or reappointment, the vacancy must be filled through the Nominations process.
  • 3rd Quarter Governance Board Meeting: Nominating Committee members are appointed or reviewed (if appointed previously via email).
    • Board Chair proposes slate of nominees for Nominating Committee appointments for discussion and approval.
    • Nominating Committee Chair informs Nominating Committee appointees of their appointments:
    • Nominating Committee Chair schedules initial conference call/virtual meeting with Nominating Committee members for late March. Chair convenes additional calls/meetings with Committee members as needed through May, keeping in touch with members between meetings via email. The ArchivesSpace Program Manager can supply Zoom connection information that can be used for all Nominating Committee meetings.

April

  • 1st week of April: Nominating Committee posts calls for nominations .
    • Nominating Committee reviews, revises as needed, and posts calls for nominations to fill any vacancies on the Governance Board, TAC, and UAC.
    • Guidelines for Nominating Committee Chair:
      • Select a submission deadline for nominations towards the end of April, generally the last Friday.
      • Aim to post the calls for nominations sometime during the first week of April (avoid April Fool's Day).
      • As noted in the templates, the calls for nominations should be posted to the ArchivesSpace User Group mailing list and Member Representatives mailing list. LYRASIS staff can provide assistance with posting privileges and postings.
  •  2nd to 4th weeks of April: Nominating Committee solicits nominations.
    • While waiting for the general membership to submit nominations in response to the calls posted to the mailing lists, Nominating Committee members should also confer on possible nominees to fill required vacancies and contact those whom they think would make candidates to solicit their interest. Since the general calls for nominations may not yield a sufficient number of sufficiently qualified nominees, it is vitally important that the Nominating Committee take an active role in identifying qualified candidates and encouraging them to consider accepting nomination on behalf of the Committee.
      • When identifying possible candidates, Nominating Committee members should consider a range of criteria, including geographic and institutional diversity, but should focus primarily on the candidates' relevant knowledge and experience.
      • Candidates for Governance Board vacancies must be current employees of organizations that belong to the corresponding membership level.
      • Candidates for TAC and UAC should represent a variety of institutional sizes and types, but the Bylaws do not require such representation according to any specific numbers.
      • Candidates for UAC must be current employees of a member organization.
      • Candidates for TAC do not have to be employed by a member organization. They may be, for example, employees of a Registered Service Provider, employees of a non-member institution that has implemented ArchivesSpace, or individuals or with interest and experience in supporting community-based software development efforts.
      • The Nominating Committee Chair should maintain a list of possible candidates and work with Committee members to determine which Committee member should be designated to contact each candidate. When contacting candidates, the Committee member should explain very clearly that at this stage, the Committee is only seeking interested and qualified nominees. That is, an invitation from the Committee to consider accepting a nomination does not guarantee that the candidate will be ultimately selected to stand for election or receive an appointment. The Committee member should explain that the Committee will make recommendations to the Governance Board for nominations once all nominations have been received and confirmed.
    • Last day of April:  Nominations call closes
    • As nominations and self-nominations are received in response to the general calls, the Nominating Committee Chair or designee should contact each of the nominees to confirm that their nomination has been received and to request them to supply any additional information that may help the Committee evaluate the nomination (this contact provides a good opportunity to remind nominees that the Committee will be convening to select and recommend a final list of nominees to the Governance Board for approval for election or appointment).
      • Nominees for Governance Board vacancies should be requested to supply draft candidate statements, noting that nominees who are selected to appear on the ballot will have an opportunity to revise and finalize their candidate statements for the ballot. They can be sent copies of previous ballots as models for candidate statements. (Note that beginning with the 2018 election season, candidates will be asked to explicitly address governance and budgetary responsibilities and experience in their candidate statements.)
      • Nominees to UAC and TAC should be asked to identify the sub-teams they are most interested in serving on.
      • The Committee should verify that all nominees for Governance Board vacancies are currently employed by a member institution of the level corresponding to the vacancy for which they are nominated.
      • The Committee should verify that all nominees for UAC vacancies are currently employed by a member institution.
    • The Nominating Committee Chair schedules at least two conference call/virtual meetings of the Committee for May, including an initial, long meeting very soon after the deadline for nominations closes.

May

  • Early May: Nominating Committee confirms nominees.
    • As soon as the deadline for the calls for nominations has passed, the Program Manager works with the Nominating Committee Chair to compile a complete list of all nominees, including nominees submitted in response to the general calls, self-nominations, and nominations solicited by Committee invitation. The list should be grouped by nominations for each vacancy. The list may be maintained on a restricted page of the wiki or otherwise secure and restricted shared folder, such as GoogleDrive or Dropbox.
    • The Nominating Committee Chair convenes a Committee meeting to review all nominations and begin the process of prioritizing nominees to fill available vacancies according to a set of criteria that the Committee develops, but which should emphasize the nominees' relevant qualifications and experience to fulfill the responsibilities associated with the vacancy as well as diversity of institutional type, size, and location.
      • For Governance Board vacancies, the Committee must identify two (and only two) candidates to stand for election for each vacant Member Representative level.
      • For TAC and UAC vacancies, the Committee must identify one (and only one) candidate to fill each vacancy.
      • The Committee should also prioritize a list of alternates for each vacancy in case the Governance Board should decline to approve a proposed candidate or in case a candidate decides to withdraw.
  • Mid to Late May:Nominating Committee submits nominee recommendations to Governance Board for approval.
    • The Nominating Committee Chair sends a message to Governance Board members listing the nominees the Committee has proposed to stand for election for any Governance Board Member Representative vacancies or for appointment to TAC or UAC. The message should include an attachment that includes draft candidate statements for Board candidates and summary information about TAC and UAC nominees. It should also include statistics on the numbers of nominations that were received for each vacancy. The message should ask Governance Board members to signal their approval or disapproval of the nominees by a specific deadline. If any nominees are not approved by the Governance Board, the Nominating Committee Chair should request the Board to consider approving the alternates it has identified.
    • Once a slate of nominees for all vacancies has been approved by the Governance Board, the Nominating Committee Chair should coordinate contacting all nominees accordingly:

June

  • No later than the 15th of June: Governance Board elections conducted.
    • The Nominating Committee Chair works with the ArchivesSpace Program Manager to create and test an online ballot for all member representative vacancies on the Governance Board.
    • The Nominating Committee Chair posts general announcements about the Governance Board elections to the general ArchivesSpace mailing lists.
    • The Nominating Committee Chair sends messages containing ballot links to official representatives of member institutions belonging to each of the membership levels for which vacancies exists and ballots have been created. The ArchivesSpace Program Manager  will supply the list of email addresses to which each ballot should be sent. The Nominating Committee Chair should send periodic reminders to ensure maximum participation in the voting process.
  • Late June: Governance Board election results and TAC / UAC appointments announced.

July

  • July: Nominating Committee debriefs on nominations process.
    • The Nominating Committee Chair debriefs on the nominations process with members of the Nominating Committee and Governance Board.
    • The Nominating Committee Chair updates this Nominating Committee space of the ArchivesSpace wiki to reflect any changes or improvements to the process that result from the debriefing. The Nominating Committee Chair also creates a new section in Nominating Committee Archives section of the space and add files as appropriate.