[ogb-discuss] OpenSolaris processes

[Garrett D'Amore]

Alan Coopersmith wrote:
> Garrett D'Amore wrote:
>   
>> And indeed, the one good thing about Sun here is that it already has a
>> history of allowing employees to speak their minds, at least internally,
>> in ways that may be unpopular with the senior management.
>>     
>
> *Internally* is much different than out here where it can be picked up
> and reported within minutes on the Register, Slashdot or CNet and used
> by Sun's competitors to spread FUD.
>
>   
>> What I do hope that Sun understands is that the OGB is a
>> community-elected body, and is answerable (in their OGB duties) to the
>> community.  
>>     
>
> Sun management has been clear recently that while they expect us to
> represent the community, we don't get to take off our Sun employee
> hats when the OGB meeting starts and take actions that are not in
> the best interest of our employer, so need to try to find ways to
> advance the community without hurting Sun - which in many cases is
> reasonable for a community that is still incredibly dependent on Sun's
> resources.
>
> Fortunately, none of us have fallen off that tightrope yet to find out
> if there's a net below or not, but we're all walking it very very carefully.
>
> To be clear - I'm not saying this to complain or publicly shame Sun in any
> way, just to make sure that any Sun employee who plans to run for the OGB in
> a few months goes into it with their eyes open to the reality, since I
> know I was naive here when I was elected.
>   

This is good information.  My manager recently reminded me that Sun 
requires (as part of our employment contract and standards of business 
conduct) employees serving on external boards to notify Sun... and in 
cases where the board's activities overlap with Sun's interests, I think 
Sun's permission may be required to serve, and disciplinary action up to 
and including termination of employment could result.  There is a 
process by which Sun can request employees to represent it on external 
boards, as well.

This strongly suggests to me that it is impossible for any Sun candidate 
to remain truly unbiased, no matter how much he or she might want to.  
Therefore, I would encourage folks contemplating the next election to 
consider:

    1) Sun employees should be considered to represent Sun's interests.

    2) The only exception to this would be if Sun granted a candidate 
some kind of blanket indemnification.  (I.e. an explicit relaxation of 
Sun's interests.)  Such an indemnification would need to come from an 
executive management at Sun.

    3) Given the above, I think Sun needs to consider paying those it 
wishes to see on the board to perform this work.

    4) We desperately need to have more non-Sun community members on the 
board.

Given all this, I do not anticipate running myself, unless one of the 
following occurs:

    a) The waiver mentioned in #2 is granted to me, to act on my own 
without recourse to Sun if I were to vote in a way contrary to Sun's 
interests.
    b) I am asked by my management to run (and potentially serve) as 
part of my official job capacity.  In which case I will expect to be 
paid for my time, and I will be explicit in stating that I'm serving as 
part of my Sun duties.

At the end of the day, I still believe Sun's interests and the 
community's interests are quite closely aligned.  So having Sun 
employees serve on the board seems quite reasonable to me.  But I think 
we need to understand that it may be impossible for Sun employees to act 
impartially.  I find this unfortunate, but not entirely unreasonable.

So those of you in the community, now is your chance.  I suspect that 
the next OGB will have far less Sun representation on it, so your odds 
of getting elected now are much higher if you don't have a @sun.com 
e-mail address.  I look forward to seeing position statements from 
candidates in the coming future. :-)

    -- Garrett

PS: I do hope that there will still be *some* Sun representation on the 
board, I just think it should be explicitly called out for what it is.

PPS: I wonder if we should consider an amendment to limit the number of 
people who can serve with a given alignment.  (I.e. not more than 49% of 
the OGB should be made up of people working for a single employer?)