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ICANN Nominating Committee's Frequently Asked Questions for 2012
These FAQs will be updated and supplemented. Please check back often.
Introduced as part of the 2002 ICANN reform process, the Nominating Committee (NomCom) is responsible for selecting accomplished persons to serve in key leadership positions within the ICANN structure; including eight ICANN Board Members and for other selections as are set forth in the Bylaws. (See Bylaws Article VII, Section 1.)
Currently, these 'other selections' are for the GNSO Council, the ccNSO Council, and the At Large Advisory Committee (ALAC).
In making its selections, the NomCom has explicit responsibilities in support of ICANN's Core Values in Article I, Section 2.4 of the Bylaws:
Seeking and supporting broad, informed participation reflecting the functional, geographic, and cultural diversity of the Internet at all levels of policy development and decision-making.
The NomCom functions independently from the ICANN Board, Supporting Organizations, and Advisory Committees. NomCom's selections are final.
ICANN Board of Directors:
Three seats, with terms through the conclusion of the ICANN 2015 Annual Meeting.
GNSO Council:
One seat, with a term through the conclusion of the ICANN 2014 Annual Meeting.
ALAC:
Two seats (European and North American regions), with terms through the conclusion of the ICANN 2014 Annual Meeting.
ccNSO Council:
One seat, with a term through the conclusion of the ICANN 2015 Annual Meeting.
A central rationale for using a Nominating Committee (NomCom) to select a portion of the ICANN leadership bodies is to balance the other community-based selection of Directors and Council and Committee members with a selection of those who will place the broad public interest ahead of any particular interests, and who are nevertheless knowledgeable about ICANN, its communities and responsibilities.
To achieve this broad public-interest orientation, the membership of the NomCom is drawn from across the ICANN and global Internet communities, on the theory that a NomCom consisting of delegates of widely varying backgrounds and interests will, by the imperative of consensus, be able to produce slates of outstanding, highly-qualified, well-respected, and diverse nominees.
NomCom members, although chosen from various constituencies within ICANN, act only on behalf of the interests of the global Internet community, and within the scope of the ICANN mission and responsibilities assigned to it by the ICANN Bylaws. They carry no personal commitments to particular individuals, organizations, or commercial objectives. Thus, although appointed by Supporting Organizations and other ICANN bodies, NomCom members act as individuals and are not accountable to their appointing constituencies. NomCom members are, however, accountable for adherence to the Bylaws and for compliance with the rules and procedures established by the NomCom.
Article VII, Section 2 of the ICANN Bylaws provides that the Nominating Committee shall be composed of the following persons:
Article VII, Section 4 of the Bylaws states that Delegates to the ICANN Nominating Committee shall be:
The NomCom works via group decision, through the development of consensus by delegates and liaisons from all constituencies. Criterion 4 addresses how the person selected is expected to behave, not who employs him/her. Those involved in selecting delegates and liaisons may judge that the only way for a delegate or liaison to achieve the desired independence is by restricting employment/consultant status, but that restriction is not required by ICANN. The NomCom takes very seriously its responsibilities to require NomCom members to disclose actual and perceived conflicts of interest. See the posted 2012 Code of Conduct and the Charge to the Subcommittee on Conflicts of Interest at http://www.icann.org/en/committees/board-governance/coi
NomCom members are expected to:
Given the recruitment nature of NomCom's work, it will be particularly helpful if members have extensive personal networks of contacts from outside, and within ICANN, that will support effective recruiting. Furthermore it will be valuable for such delegates to also be prepared to develop cross-constituency understanding to build consensus.
The selections are sent to the ICANN Secretary. The ICANN Secretary issues a Secretary's Notice making the formal announcement of the Nominating Committee's selections.
No, the ICANN Bylaws have no requirement in this regard. Appointed delegates and liaisons must meet only the criteria listed in the Bylaws. See also the responses to Questions 4 and 5, above.
The Nominating Committee held a face-to-face meeting at the ICANN Public Meeting in Dakar, Senegal, 28-29 October 2011. It expects to hold a face-to-face meeting 29 June 2012 – 1 July 2012 in Prague, Czech Republic. No other face-to-face meetings of the NomCom are planned at this time. Many NomCom members are regular attendees of ICANN Public Meetings and will participate in the San Jose, Costa Rica meeting in March 2012.
No, this is not a criterion listed in the ICANN Bylaws. However, please note that NomCom relies on group decision-making and building consensus to accomplish its work. Ideally, all delegates and liaisons would be able to attend such meetings.
The Nominating Committee budget is agreed on an annual basis. Typically NomCom holds two face-to-face meetings, typically in conjunction with an ICANN Public Meeting, and a selection meeting in conjunction with the second face-to-face meeting. ICANN provides travel and accommodation expenses to enable NomCom members to participate in these meetings.
NomCom members are expected to be able to allot adequate time to read all materials and participate in regular conference calls. Additionally, NomCom members are expected to actively engage in individual recruitment activities, which may take variable amounts of time. NomCom members are expected to bring with them extensive personal networks from which to recruit highly qualified candidates--last year each NomCom member was expected to generate a minimum of five Statements of Interest. See also the response to Question 4 above.
Yes. The Code of Conduct committed to by the 2012 NomCom can be found on the NomCom webpage.
The work of previous Nominating Committees is documented and can be found linked from the current committee webpage at http://nomcom.icann.org/. Further questions can be directed to nomcom2012@icann.org.
Under NomCom's Code of Conduct, all Recommendations and Statements of Interest are treated as confidential.
The Nominating Committee encourages, but does not require, persons submitting a Recommendation to contact the person recommended to inform him or her of the recommendation, the position(s) for which the person is recommended, and the reason for the recommendation.
Recommendations are sought for the purpose of broadening the candidate pool. Only those individuals who have submitted a complete Statement of Interest will be considered Candidates for selection. How many recommendations a Candidate may have received, or who may have recommended a Candidate, are not influential factors in the selection process.
The Nominating Committee encourages, but does not require, persons submitting a Recommendation to contact the person recommended to inform him or her of the recommendation, the position(s) for which the person is recommended, and the reason for the recommendation.
If you are interested in serving but unsure of which role would be best suited to your qualifications, please see the descriptions of the various positions available in the "Leadership Positions" document [http://nomcom.icann.org/positions-2012.htm]
If no information is supplied in response to one or more of the *required* items in your Statement of Interest, you will not be considered a Candidate for Selection. To be considered, complete Statements of Interest must be filed no later than 2 April 2012 (23:59 UTC).
In the course of its review and evaluation of submitted Statements of Interest, the Nominating Committee (NomCom) may find that it needs clarification or amplification of the content of your submission. In that case, the NomCom will attempt to reach you to obtain additional information.
The limited time available for this process means that potential Candidates are best served by carefully preparing their Statements of Interest, ensuring that they are complete, and submitting them as soon as possible.
Recommendations can be made by anyone. The Nominating Committee has imposed no restrictions as to who can make recommendations.
All that is required is the name and e-mail address of the person recommended and your name and e-mail address.
Nominating Committee (NomCom) Staff Support will acknowledge receipt of the Recommendation and encourage the Recommender to liaise with the potential candidate to encourage him/her to submit a Statement of Interest. The NomCom Staff Support will also contact the potential candidate(s) directly to tell them they have been recommended and to provide them with the instructions for submitting the Statement of Interest.
The NomCom encourages those submitting a Recommendation to contact the person recommended, to inform him or her of the recommendation, the position(s) for which the person is recommended, and the reason for the recommendation.
Yes. Since the Nominating Committee (NomCom) is charged with filling multiple positions which have varying roles within ICANN, you might well know more than one individual worthy of your Recommendation.
The NomCom places great emphasis on developing a Candidate pool of high quality. We are much less concerned about the size of the Candidate pool provided it is large enough to offer multiple well-qualified Candidates for each position.
Therefore we urge you to think deeply about who you feel would be most suitable to serve and then submit only those names to the NomCom.
No. For you to be considered by the Nominating Committee (NomCom) as a Candidate, you only need to ensure that you have answered all the required items in the Statement of Interest. Your Statement of Interest must be received by the NomCom no later than 23:59 UTC on 2 April 2012 in order for you to receive full consideration.
No, Recommendations do not influence the priority of individual candidacies, but they are important for the success of the Nominating Committee (NomCom) Candidate recruiting process.
The NomCom is using Recommendations to enhance the Candidate pool from which we will make our selections. As you know, we are seeking those individuals who have demonstrated the maturity, experience, knowledge and skills to handle the tasks and make the judgments involved in fulfilling the roles of Board Directors, Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) Council Members, Country Code Names Supporting Organization (ccNSO) Council members and At-Large Advisory Committee (ALAC) members,
Those who provide Recommendations to the NomCom strengthen our recruiting outreach, encourage potential candidates to participate, and address cultural and professional differences in perceptions about appropriate ways to participate in a candidate search process.
Therefore, we ask those who make Recommendations to actively encourage the individuals they have recommended to submit a Statement of Interest. Only those individuals who submit a completed Statement of Interest will be considered by the NomCom.
Yes. A resume or curriculum vitae (CV) should be attached to Statement of Interest when submitted.
We ask that you carefully consider all the required items in your Statement of Interest and provide your answers to all of them, in English.
Insofar as the information requested in the Statement of Interest is already documented in your resume/CV, you are welcome to copy those parts of your resume/CV into your Statement of Interest at the appropriate places in the Statement.
Your Statement of Interest must be received by the Nominating Committee no later than 23:59 UTC on 2 April 2012 in order for you to receive full consideration. We encourage you to submit a completed Statement of Interest as early as possible.
The ICANN Board, the GNSO Council, the ALAC, and the ccNSO Council, each in its own way, plays a leadership role in ICANN's significant but focused set of responsibilities with respect to the global Internet's stable and secure operation.
Those who serve in these positions will work with accomplished colleagues from around the globe. They will address intriguing technical coordination problems and related policy development challenges with diverse functional, cultural, and geographic dimensions. They will gain valuable insights and experience from working across these boundaries of knowledge, responsibility, and perspective.
Those selected by the Nominating Committee (NomCom) to serve in these positions will gain the satisfaction of making a valuable public service contribution. Placing the broad public interest ahead of any particular interests, they will help ensure the stability and security of this valuable global resource for critically important societal functions.
They will be challenged to use their knowledge, experience, and open-mindedness to develop creative responses to the dilemmas that arise when diverse needs of Internet users, technical possibilities and limitations of the Internet's unique identifier systems, and challenges and opportunities of the competitive business environment interact with each other and with evolving laws and governmental policies.
The agenda for the next two to three years includes an array of interesting and important matters, both technical (such as security, Internationalized Domain Names, and IPv6), and organizational (such as the New gTLD Program, evolution of relationships with the Regional Internet Registries, the country-code top-level domain registries, the root server operators, and the development of the Regional At-Large Organizations.)
No, as long as you are able both to work well and communicate well in written and spoken English. There is no requirement that English must be your first language.
The Nominating Committee welcomes and encourages participation from all members from wider Internet community, from all over the world. There is no reason, therefore, to expect that your first language is English.
GNSO Council members, ALAC members, and ccNSO Council members shall receive no compensation for their services in these positions.
Travel to the ICANN face-to-face meetings will be reimbursed for those GNSO Council members, ccNSO Council members, and ALAC members that were selected and appointed through the Nominating Committee process.
ICANN's work benefits from an enormous amount of volunteered effort on the part of many individuals who serve without compensation. These contributions are respected and appreciated.
ICANN Directors may choose to be paid for their services in accordance with the resolution passed by the Board on 8 December 2011:
Resolved (2011.12.08.16), the Board approves the recommendation from the Independent Valuation Expert (as that term is defined in §53.4958-1(d)(4)(iii)(C) of the IRS Regulations), made in its Report or Reasoned Written Opinion, (as that term is defined in §53.4958-1(d)(4)(iii)(C) of the Regulations), that it is reasonable to "[i]ntroduce annual cash retainer of $35,000 for outside directors and maintain the $75,000 for Chairman of the Board" and "[a]n additional $5,000 annual retainer would be provided for committee chair (except the Chairman of the Board).
See http://www.icann.org/en/minutes/resolutions-08dec11-en.htm#3
GNSO Council members, ALAC members, and ccNSO Council members currently receive no compensation for their services. ICANN respects the generous contribution of time, energy and effort made by those who serve in these positions. [See Question 3 above, "What does it mean that the positions are 'Voluntary'?"]
The basic responsibilities of an ICANN Director require a minimum commitment of time which when averaged out over the year, could reach up to 20 hours each week. The time spent in these basic responsibilities is typically clustered around Board meetings and teleconferences, but there is a constant flow of information requiring attention on a consistent basis.
Directors spend additional time in connection with their work on Board Committees, a commitment that varies in relation to the number of Committees on which they serve, the scope of the Committees' responsibilities, and their role as Chair or member of the Committee.
An average GNSO Council member would spend at least 20 hours per month on Council related activities, with those chairing Working Groups or Task Forces spending at least 60 hours a month. Depending on work load, for example during the weeks before the three face-to-face meetings, this can sometimes escalate to as much as 20 hours per week or more. The commitment for the three face-to-face meetings generally run about three days with council members sometimes having extensive responsibilities on most days. For those involved in Task Forces or Working Groups, there may occasionally be additional face-to-face interim meetings.
The basic responsibilities of an ALAC member involve a minimum of 20-26 hours per month on Committee related activities This includes participating in online (e-mail) discussions, commenting on/contributing to documents/proposed actions (drafted in English), participating in monthly ALAC telephone conferences (in English), and meeting with/making presentations to, local and regional organizations.
An average ccNSO Council member would spend at least 12 hours per month on Council related activities, with those chairing Working Groups or Task Forces spending at least 30 hours a month. (The commitment involves a minimum of six hours per month based on an average of 1.5 two-hour teleconferences (or physical meetings) per month plus about two hours of preparation for each meeting for reading task force reports and potentially discussing with the community. Participation in Working Groups and/or Task Forces could easily double that minimum time commitment.)
You can apply for all four types of positions by completing Section C in your Statement of Interest.
Please mark all the positions for which you are interested in being considered and in which you would be willing to serve if selected by NomCom.
[Note: The Nominating Committee (NomCom) may contact you later if it would like to consider you for a position that you have not marked, but NomCom is working on a very tight schedule. Your carefully considered response to this section now will facilitate NomCom's deliberations.]
ICANN Public Meetings are held regularly in different parts of the world. A calendar of events is posted on the ICANN Website, at http://www.icann.org/en/general/calendar/.
ICANN generally has three Public Meetings per year, the location of which rotates through five geographic regions around the globe. There may also be regional meetings scheduled at various times during the year.
Note that much of the work of the ICANN Board, GNSO Council, ALAC, and ccNSO Council is done via e-mail and teleconference.
ICANN Directors, GNSO Council members, ALAC members, and ccNSO Council members enjoy protections from liability for their activities in service to ICANN. These may be summarized as follows:
(a) Indemnification by ICANN. Under its Bylaws, ICANN indemnifies members of ICANN bodies against expenses, judgments, fines, settlements, and other amounts that actually and reasonably arise in a proceeding because those persons are acting or have acted as agents of ICANN. There are various conditions to this indemnity, including that the indemnified person's acts were in good faith and done in a manner reasonably believed to be in ICANN's best interests and not criminal. (See Bylaws, Article XIV at http://www.icann.org/en/general/bylaws.htm#XIV.)
(b) Statutory Immunity. United States federal law and California law contain provisions shielding volunteers to non-profit organizations (such as ICANN) from liabilities for their volunteer work, with some conditions. The U.S. Volunteer Protection Act of 1997 protects volunteers (i.e. those serving without compensation) to non-profit organizations from liability for harm caused by their acts and omissions while acting within the scope of their responsibilities in the organization and not in a willful, criminal, grossly negligent, reckless, etc. manner (see42 United States Code §§14501-14505). California law provides similar liability protections to volunteer directors. (See California Corporations Code § 5239.)
Although there are various conditions and limits to such protections, in the aggregate they provide significant protection to those acting in good faith and in the scope of their responsibilities to ICANN.
Yes. ICANN will pay reasonable costs for Nominating Committee appointees to the GNSO Council, ALAC, and ccNSO Council to attend the ICANN Public Meetings.
You understand correctly that no elections will be held. The selections by the Nominating Committee that are announced by ICANN's Secretary are final in that no vote or ratification by Internet users (or by the ICANN Board) will be required at the time of the selection.
In 2002, ICANN underwent a reform process involving extensive discussions throughout the ICANN community. The overall structure that came out of this process is described in ICANN: Blueprint for Reform (posted 20 June 2002) and the Final Implementation and Recommendations of the Committee on ICANN Evolution and Reform (posted 2 October 2002). These documents called for formation of a Nominating Committee (NomCom) to select individuals to serve on key ICANN bodies. The latter report included the proposed Bylaws for implementing the recommendations. The Bylaws that were approved at the Amsterdam ICANN meeting on 15 December 2002 assign to the NomCom the responsibility for selections of all ICANN Directors except the President and those Directors selected by ICANN's Supporting Organizations, and for such other selections as are set forth in the Bylaws. [Article VII, Section 1]
The NomCom's responsibility for selection of three members of the GNSO Council is set forth in Article X, Section 3, paragraphs 1, 2, and 3.
The NomCom's responsibility for selecting five members of the At-Large Advisory Committee is set forth in Article XI, Section 2, paragraph 4.
The NomCom's responsibility for selecting three members of the ccNSO Council is set forth in Article IX, Section 3, paragraph 1(b).
The Transition Article, Article XX, sets forth additional details of the NomCom's role in relation to the transition to the new ICANN structure. Technical revisions for clarification of a few parts of the Bylaws were approved and became effective as of 25 March 2003, but these changes did not modify the basic role of the NomCom.
It will be extremely valuable for Appointees to be present during the meeting in Toronto, Canada. They will learn a great deal by their presence at the meeting, and the overlap prior to taking office will afford invaluable communication with outgoing members of the given leadership bodies.
The Nominating Committee's objective is to inform the ICANN Secretary in time for the Appointees to attend the October 2012 meeting.
The ICANN Board determines and reviews how each country should be included in a particular Geographic Region, with the review at least once every three years. The latest review is ongoing and the most recent information on this is available at: http://www.icann.org/en/announcements/announcement-3-30sep11-en.htm.
According to the Bylaws there are five ICANN Geographic Regions
By having geographic diversity provisions in its Bylaws, ICANN emphasizes broad international representation both on the Board and throughout other key structures within ICANN.
See http://www.icann.org/general/bylaws.htm. In particular:
Bylaws Article I, section 2(4)
Bylaws Article VI, Section 2(2); Section 5
Bylaws Article VII, Section 5
Bylaws Article XI, Section 2(4)(b)]
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