A 100.000 foot perspective on "what is the problem"

[John C Klensin]

Harald,

I agree with your partitioning.   I don't think I agree with
your characterization of the possible solution spaces, but
appreciate your including that.  Perhaps a real discussion on
the solution spaces should wait for another time, but let me
suggest one problem that is not on your list (but which the list
identifies) and four things people might start thinking about in
background:

Problem: The IETF is not doing a good enough job of what is
often known as "leadership development".  This has been
mentioned in the discussions, but only in passing.  Some of
that, in our environment, is probably "clue dissemination".  It
goes into your first partition, but is important given your
characterization of the solution space, since, if effective, it
adds to the total number of clueful people in the works and
hence helps with scaling... none of the other items seem to.

(i) Stretching out or rearranging the meeting schedules so that
WGs get considerably more face time is not "clueful people do
more work".  It is a suggestion about changing the dynamics so
that people can work less frantically and more effectively
(probably allowing more cycles for leadership development too).
And considerably longer slots would also facilitate more
discussion and brainstorming on a more relaxed schedule, rather
than requiring unpleasant and heavy-handed techniques to keep
things on schedule and not drifting from over-full agendas due
to short slots.   I'm still unconvinced that the idea is a good
one on balance, but that is another matter.

(ii) Similarly, I don't think "cut the number of WGs"
necessarily involves "reduce the size of the IETF".  In fact,
that is one of the weaknesses of that proposal: if it
significantly reduces our effective size (measured, if you will,
in "clueful people"), then it probably won't work.  I'd prefer
to think of it as a mechanism for focusing our efforts --both
IESG efforts and community efforts -- more on things we consider
important, are good at, and can actually accomplish.  I have no
delusions that forcing a new set of hard decisions into the
process involves "rules that are simpler to manage to": instead,
the model substitutes a very hard decision -- whether to start a
new WG or continue some others -- many smaller ones, some of
which can be left to default.  That isn't always a good
tradeoff, but it often is.  And the category doesn't seem to be
on your list.

(iii) I heard several comments in Atlanta, and before then, to
the effect that the IESG was not doing a good enough job
communicating decisions and policies to the community and not
doing a good enough job consulting with the community on
proposed policy changes.  I don't know whether that is "problem"
or "solution" in your characterization, but I can't find it in
the list you circulated.

(iv) Finally, I've observed, and others observed in Atlanta,
that there are some areas in which the IESG has extended its
workload beyond anything required or expected in our procedures.
"Stop doing that and cut back to necessary/ required tasks only"
does not always require getting someone else to do the work, it
may just require understanding that some work doesn't need doing
(or that work is being done elsewhere already and the IESG is
duplicating it).

regards,
    john

--On Wednesday, 11 December, 2002 08:44 +0100 Harald Tveit
Alvestrand <harald@alvestrand.no> wrote:

> After a month or so of debate since Atlanta, we might actually
> be closer to crystallizing out a few core problems than we
> were then, even though it might not seem so from the number of
> fixes suggested....
>...