27 Aug 2018

Minutes of a Special Joint Meeting of the Board of Directors and Advisory Board of NumFOCUS that was held to discuss selecting a new Board.

Participating: Jennifer Klay, Ralf Gommers, Andy Terrel, Didrik Pinte, Lorena Barba, Travis Oliphant, Jason Grout, Matt Greenwood, Stefan Karpinski, Brian Granger, Shahrokh Mortazai, Leah Silen.

Discussion Items

1. Selecting new Board members

Blog on new procedure: https://numfocus.org/blog/numfocus-to-hold-2018-elections-for-board-of-directors

Discussion on how to explain the election/selection process and how transparent to be (e.g. do we publish vote totals?). The suggestion to make clear it’s a selection, not an election, and therefore call the vote a “request for input” is made. This is agreed on as a recommendation to the Board.

After a discussion on process, this meeting will recommend 5 candidates to the Board, which will then have a formal approval of those candidates.

Criteria important for selecting new board members are discussed:

• diversity,
• candidates able to spend enough time,
• filling all officer roles, significant financial experience for the Treasurer,
• representation from NumFOCUS Europe,
• representation from sponsored projects,
• representation from PyData.

Five candidates are recommended to the Board. Additionally, one candidate is recommended for the Advisory Board.