Slating - yea or nay?
 

This was touched on in the "what would you change" thread but I didn't want to hijack it since it is an awesome thread. :) Several people said they would change their way of doing elections/slating.

When I was in school people let the nom comm know what they were interested in, the nom comm made their picks and presented them, we had nominations from the floor and then voted on each office. That was the old way. I've looked at our procedure now and honestly, I think the College of Cardinals has it easier when they pick the Pope!

I know some people cannot discuss this at all, so without getting into more detail than you feel comfy with, do you like your GLO's way of elections/slating or not?

our exec council slates who they think will do the best job, then opens up the floor for nominations.

Without going into too much detail, I don't think that the slating committee is always completely representative of the chapter. But the CONCEPT of slating is a good idea, much better than just nominating all willy-nilly.

Nope, I don't think it's a good idea....our slate passed with one person in a job that people didn't want her in but we all know how much of a pin it is to go through individual postions so we passed it anyway... (although I don't think anyone else wanted the postion anyway)

I do not like our slating process at all. We aren't even suppose to tell people what we would like to be. Of course with all girls there is always talk.

I *Pretty* much like our election process... but I think I'd like some qualifications placed on certain positions

Here are the positives of slating:

1. Helps NM's know who may be good for a position if they don't know the older women well enough to vote on their own.

2. Encourages girls to run who may be too shy to otherwise.

I'll come back to the negatives later.

I like the slating system. We do it the same way you did/do, 33girl, but we also let the membership have input before we do slate. I was head of Nominations Committee this past year and it was a great experience. And I'd like to think that we did a pretty good job because there was only like 3 positions that ended up differently than we slated people.

Slating System
 

Actually, if your organization using Robert's Rules of Order as it is parlimentary authority, Slating is what you do.

Robert's Rules indicates slating through a nominating committee is the preferred manner to achieve the highest possible individual to perform a position.

After a slate has been presented, then nomination by petition or from the floor is called for, in order to have a "contested" election.

In my experience, 99.999999% of the time, you are fortunate to have a full slate, let alone a contested election.

huh?
 

Do you mean as far as getting people to run??? :eek:

Re: huh?
 

yes

This can be the case in chapters where holding office may require a girl to live in the house beyond her ordinary obligation.

Bumping because I wanted to know what role (if any) advisors play in slating potential officers? I didn't want to make any assumptions based on recent posts I've read.

The benefits of having a Nominating Committee put forth a complete slate of candidates, is that you are assured that you do, in fact, have a complete slate.

Ideally, the NomCom should be a small group who should look at all possible candidates (ie, all who are eligable in the group) and decide who they think would be best for the org, AND check to ensure that the proposed candidate is willing to run.

Keep in mind that that is the ideal. The NomCom is not omnipoten. There may be other good candidates out there they are just no aware of. And there is always the issue that the NomCom may NOT select the right people, but fall victim to an 'old boys' network attitude.

As noted, once the NomCom reports the slate, nominations from the floor (ie the whole group) should be allowed. This ensure that other candidates who do want to run, who may have been overlooked by the NomCom, can be considered. One of the worse things your org can do is deny this and just elect the whole slate as a group, as if the NomCom is the group that picks your new officers and the group just 'approves' this.


Also, if your group uses Robert's Rules of Order, Newly Revised as their parliamentary authority, you are not IN ANYWAY required to use a NomCom. An organization is always free to do things the way they want. RONR is always below your Bylaws and Special Rules of Order. (I'm a parliamentarian, btw)

When I was the CCA, I also advised the Nominating Committee. I would usually not give personal input on the individual who was being discussed for a certain position unless I had worked with her in a previous advisory role, but I would say what the responsibilities of the various officer positions were and (IME) what type of personality would be a good fit for that position. The Nominating Chair and her committee always made the final decision and they generally did a good job matching women to officer positions, even if it wasn't always the one they were "running" for.

An adviser is required to be present at all NomCom meetings.

As a chapter advisor, I'd agree on this, tho my chapter doesn't use a NomCom.

Also, I advise that atleast one advisor be present during elections, and would be a good choice to be a teller for the elections, to ensure fairness.

Our chapter has a NomCom that does slating...the Elections chair lets us know who they've slated prior to voting and discussion, because those running for that office aren't allowed in the room during that time.

I don't think that AOII's process for slating is secret...just the discussions entailed. We divide our members into groups according to class (in school not AOII...so a new initiate with 90 class hours would be grouped with the Juniors not the freshman,etc.) Each of these groups produce a slate of nominees. These slates go to the Nominating committee which looks at the class slates and any interest letters submitted by members to determine the official slate. Often we can't use the slate because women are nominated for more than one office and nominations from the floor must be entertained. It usually works out well. All the advisers do in this process is count votes and make sure that the rules are followed.

Eh. I find that slating often involves the sacrificial lamb - if you like everyone slated except for ONE person, who you know will do a terrible job, you still pass the slate because no one wants to be there for hours and hours because of one position. Then you end up with someone who is NOT suited for their position..and nothing you can do about it.

I agree with this. What I dont agree with is the fact that if a person's name is already on the slate somewhere, they can't be nominated for something else. IE: suzy is slated for programs, but the floor wants to nominate her for treasurer. You would think that if Suzy didnt mind being nominated for treasurer, she could be scratched from programs and nominated for treasurer instead...but, of course not.

I think this rule creates alot of Ross Perot-like syndrome situations....Ladies who are clearly leaders in the chapter, nowhere on the slate because they were holding out for a nomination to A particular office, rather than volunteering (or, accepting a nomination) for something else just to be on the slate in the first place, with the possibility of being re-nominated for a different position.

For my chapter, all members interested in an EC position submit applications to the nominating committee, who read the apps and conduct interviews. From that, they create the slate. If the slate as a whole doesn't pass, any girl who submitted an app can run from the floor. Someone who was on the slate and isn't elected to the position can run for a lower position (for example, if the slated president doesn't win, she can run for secretary, but the slated secretary can't run from the floor for president).

I found it to be pretty effective, once we got the hang of it on our own. Our advisers were involved until last year, but our chapter was chartered in 2005.

Our chapter is like lilzetakitten's and I like slate. When selecting a the slate committee, you know you are putting the chapter's future in these women's hands and they usually pick the right women for the positions. Though every year slate never gets passed on the first try, its funny how we end up having 4 hour elections and maybe only 1 person has changed.

I think it make sense to have a slate committee who overviews all the applications and then conducts interviews, rather than the whole chapter, so it doesn't end up being a popularity contest.

I think a lot of it also depends on the size of the chapter. If you have 150 people, slating is the way to go. If you have 30 people, all of whom know each other and each person's skills pretty well, the amount of work and preparation can be a little ridiculous.

When I was an active, we had a nominating committee plus nominations from the floor. To this day there is one sister who doesn't speak to me because I won "her" office.

Now, we have a very different system, which includes interviews with the Advisors. It works SO much better, there isn't as much friction, and the officers seem so much more together.

WIthout saying too much, the slate (put together by the women graduating) must be approved by the local advisors and the province advisor. Additionally, an advisor must be present at the slating meeting and elections. Each woman in the chapter has the opportunity to complete a "straw ballot" (how she would slate for each office) which the seniors consider in making the slate, along with letters of interest from chapter members. Nominations are also taken from the floor, and a sister may accept even if she is on the senior slate in another position.

I think the slating/nomination process works well for our women.

Wow, I'm mixed on this. I've seen the slating process go both ways. One thing I didn't like was how slating can discourage women from campaigning... in the good sense. In my chapter, it was kind of taboo to openly say that you wanted an exec position, so people would have a tendancy to talk about who they think might be a good choice, and then there's a wave of sentiment that makes a person practically the officer-elect before nom comm or slating.

Some positions require a lot of thought and planning, and I think it'd be useful to know which women actually have ideas and a vision for their time in that office. Sometimes a woman is thrown into a "runner-up" position because nom comm feels they should throw her a bone when she didn't get another position she really wanted.

i think it would depend on the size of the group involved

my chapter never had more than 35 people total, so it wouldn't work, if you wanted something for just three people to decide that

Now there are chapters that take about 35 pledges every year/semester, so I would even know how they would begin to do anything as far as voting is concerned.

We're a 150 member chapter and do all voting with only nominations from the floor. You can talk to people who have had the position before and hope they nominate you or just ask someone to nominate you, but don't nominate yourself or you'll get laughed at and lose.

We have a round to talk about how would do the best job and why while the people running are out of the room, then we vote. Always seems to work out well.

cool

that's actually pretty much what we did

In terms of us, the advisors make sure the process is run according to the procedures and they approve the slate.

We have a somewhat slating style.
We all openly say what position we would like to have, primarily and secondary (if there is a second choice).
In our experience, if people get what they want, they will be more enthusiastic about doing that position. They want it for a reason, maybe they have great ideas. Maybe they are taking the job with the least work involved, because they don't want to work very much. Are you going to tell him/her that they have to take one with more work, and risk having no work done for that position?

So, if someone is uncontested in a position, they automatically get it, basically.
We have strict requirements of who can run which position however.

Finance needs to have a university math course under his belt.
President, Secretary, Finance and Vice President all need to have a course in Human Resources.
And etc.
Plus, some usual (not always usual), President and Vice President cannot be freshmen, or sophomore, must be at least Juniors. Same with Recruitment Chair.

Etc etc