Re: Board of Directors Elections 2019 - Candidacy - Benjamin Berg

[Britt Yazel <bwyazel gnome org>]

Sorry for the late response, I just saw this question.

If I were elected to the board, how would I help to build trust and a collaborative working relationship amount the directors? This is a tough question to answer in a quantitative way, as interactions and human psychology are very complicated and very unique. From my experience working as a research scientist in academia where tensions and emotions are often high, I have found that the seed of any positive working relationship is to treat everyone and their ideas with respect, and to give each the benefit of the doubt that their viewpoint comes from a place of love for the mission and the project. To view someone through a lens of distrust, or to assume a nefarious nature, halts the conversation before it can even begin. Likewise, the key to healthy debate is to not lose sight of the big picture, and as such, before a working relationship can be established all parties must agree on the nature of the big picture. However, in places where conflicts do arise, inevitably stemming from topics such as monetary allocation, ethics, and organizational philosophy, I think it crucial to keep emotion to a minimum, as strong emotion leads to frustration, which will lead to grudges and hostility. It is particularly hard to set emotions aside for the sake of discussion, especially in a passion project such as this, but clear, level-headed rationality is how responsible decisions are made.

With all that said, I believe a huge pet peeve of mine to be on the receiving end of is dismissivness. Having an idea dismissed outright before consideration is a belittling, aggravating, and disrespectful experience. With that said, my track record is not flawless having found myself being dismissive of points of view before considering the justification and having to retroactively make amends, but each occurrence has reinforced my learning and my personal growth to be a better and more patient listener. If I were to have a seat on the board, this would be a strong stance of mine: to not be dismissive the ideas, points of view, and perspective of my peers, and to expect my peers to do the same for each other.

I hope that answers your question, or at the very least gives you an idea of where I am coming from.

 -Britt Yazel

On Tue, Jun 11, 2019 at 2:56 AM Tobias Mueller <muelli cryptobitch de> wrote:

Hi Philip and the other candidates,

On Thu, 2019-06-06 at 11:20 -0700, Philip Chimento via foundation-list
wrote:
> If elected to the board, how would you help to build trust and
> collaborative working relationships among the directors, and encourage
> healthy debate?
I think this is a great question for all the candidates and I would be
delighted to read statements of candidates who want to position
themselves.

Having worked with Benjamin on several occasions, the biggest one being
GUADEC 2016, I know that maintaining a collaborative working
relationship and healthy debate are not a problem.

Cheers,
  Tobi

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