I’ll provide an example of an occasion at which I did speak
up. At the 486th Meeting of
Council on 10 June 2013, a member motion was brought to council to “Reinstate constraints
on candidacy for President-Elect and Vice-President”. You can view the motion
and provisions of agenda item C-486.3.4 (pg 21 of 171) at http://www.peo.on.ca/index.php/ci_id/26114/la_id/1.htm The presented provisions existed prior to
2007 and were contained in legislation (O. Reg. 941). One of the provisions was to prevent the
Past-President from running again for any officer position for at least two
years. Another stated that no member be
eligible for election as President-Elect unless that member had served at least
two full years as a member of the Council prior to which the member would take
office as President-Elect. Similarly for
the position of Vice-President, the requirement would be for one full year on
council.
These provisions are reflected in the opinions expressed
during the membership survey. You can
view the survey results in the agenda of the 487th Meeting of
Council held 26 September 2013 http://www.peo.on.ca/index.php/ci_id/27094/la_id/1.htm
With respect to the period of time between the end of a president’s term and
eligibility to run again – 66% of respondents agreed that there should be a
period of time between the two (page 9 of 294).
There was also a question about a minimum service requirement on Council
before eligibility to run for President-Elect or Vice-President (pg 11 of 294) – 80% of members supported
this concept in the survey (pg 100 of 294).
So let’s go back to the motion in front of council. You can listen to the discussion of agenda
item 3.4 starting at minute 36:11 at http://www.peo.on.ca/index.php/ci_id/27183/la_id/1.htm
We decided to sever the motions to address the issues separately. The minutes around this can be viewed at minute
11255 through the following link starting on page 6 of 17 http://www.peo.on.ca/index.php/ci_id/27183/la_id/1.htm.
Council supported the motion regarding the minimum time between Past-President
and eligibility to run for President again.
Members have been quite vocal about this.
The second part, regarding terms on council prior to being eligible
to run for council was more thought provoking.
One of the early points that was
raised was that this would discount the significant accomplishments of several
of our accomplished presidents that had
no experience prior to their election to the position of president, for example
our current President Annette Bergeron.
Catherine Karakatsanis also had no prior experience on council and made
significant contributions. These two
women were elected by significant majorities – so I find the survey results
interesting in which 80% of members that participated in the survey prefer the
President-Elect to have experience on council.
During the discussion around the motion, I spent a few
moments thinking about the implications of the motions in front of us. In principle, I initially thought to myself that having executive with council experience was a good thing. But what about the profession as a whole? Being a women, the first thing that jumped
into my mind was “How many women would be eligible to run for president in 2014
if the second part of the motion carried?” Annette and I were the only two women on
council. Annette would not be eligible
to run yet since she would become the Past-President. So of the current council, I would be the
only eligible woman. Say we go back 5
years, how about all those women that served on council? Well, there only two other women that served
on council during that period – Diane Freeman and Catherine Karakatansis – and they
have moved on in their careers and would not likely run again for president. Hmmmm….
This is a significant burden to carry for any woman who was thinking of
running for council. You can hear my comments
at about minute 47:06.
The motion was defeated, but the issue has not gone away since
it was raised in the membership survey as something that members feel strongly
about. Council will need to address
again.
I’d like to know your thoughts on this, so please share.
Some comments from a reader:
ReplyDelete"I guess we have to ask what are the benefits to sitting on council? What additional insight does it offer? I think it provides the president an understanding of the commitment, how council is run and perhaps some insight into the engineers act. I think these are all items that can also be learned outside of council. If the individual has sat on boards etc, they will likely understand how council will run and the level of commitment required. If they are engaged engineers they will understand what has been happening at council and the act as well. Since we elect the "president-elect" and not the president. This provides the individual with a one year opportunity to learn the non-technical elements of the role through observation. Consequently, if the individual is intelligent and enthusiastic and a great speaker, then I don't see why it would have to be a mandatory requirement. If the 66% or 80% of engineers who responded to the survey feel this way, then they should use the power of their vote and not vote for someone lacking in experience on council.
Thanks for the opportunity to share!"