sure

Thanks Dan. Good post.

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Seen on ST: NOTSOSWUYD: None of the secrets of success work unless you do.

Solid post Dan, I really liked it. As one of those "Volunteers" that served for 8 years, I had my share of disagreements with the ED and there were 3 during my tenure. However never did I believe any of those merited a dismissal in any form be it "voluntary or directed". Then again, I never had a personal agenda, better yet I never pushed one nor requested special consideration. Apparently the majority of this Board doesn't hold that belief or practice that concept.
Jack

jack you were aways a solid guy. with a solid head! ;-)

i didn't always agree with you. but you did understand something - you never took your eye off of this - you give the members their money's worth by granting value to the members' vendors, that is to say, the members derive benefit at the race site. what members want are: better races, safer races, fairer races, cheaper races, and more of them! therefore, member benefit all passes through the RD, one way or the other. sometimes that means kicking a little RD ass, or, sometimes that means giving benefits to the RD he can't get anywhere else. either way, it all flows through the RD.

the problem with organizations like USAT, and i'm not picking on USAT by any means, this is a universal problem: it's a service organization, it's purpose is necessarily to promote and prop up something other than itself. it's like the red cross, the purpose is not for the red cross to help the red cross. it's to help victims of disasters, or, it's to bolster the blood supply.

problem is, sometimes people in these organizations - staff and board alike - get to thinking that it's their job to first and foremost protect the organization. i understand that thinking. if you don't have a strong USAT, it's like not having a strong lifeguard department, at some point you can save anybody from drowning. still, the point of the lifeguard department is to save lives, not jobs, not budgets.

i don't know what any of this has to do with skip gilbert, but, i think you always knew that the USAT's mission was not to itself, but to the RDs. and you were dead-on, spot-on, right. sometimes i think that mission is not always crystal clear.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

Dan,

Thanks for the article, and more importantly, thank you for upholding your journalistic integrity. In a world of Twitter, Facebook and internet forums, it is far too easy to read and report rumors which many will take to be truth. The Mike Wise Twitter hoax is a perfect example of how people consume information/news these days.

It's good to know I can trust what is published on ST.

Drew

Thanks Dan. That was my point as well. USAT has indeed forgotten it's mission and that it was indeed founded by Race Directors for Race Directors. In this arena I certainly had my disagreements with Skip but I never doubted his integrity or devotion to the Federation. The same can not be said of the Board. This Board has several members that have [exhibited performance with which jack takes issue] and have pushed them to the exclusion of the members and the mission. This is not a recent occurence and Skip's continued effort to block those personal agendas is what I believe got him the "exit stage left". This is Board that also lacks knowledge of the Sport and I can't help but think that the addition of a [blank] member has further "watered down" that expertise. It's a Board that condones [performance with which jack takes issue] and at the very least stands by as certain Board members push their [performance with which jack takes issue] to the point that they in fact [exhibited performance with which jack takes issue] and the [performance with which jack takes issue].

So at what point do we stop condoning such activities?? It is our Federation yet I know the response by many on this site will essentially say "who cares". The Sunshine Policy helps but the fact of the matter is that unless you live in the region of the elected official, you have no recourse to have that Board member removed. As one living in Texas I can't generate the needed petition to remove someone say in Florida. So what recourse do we have as we watch our Federation [subject to performance with which jack takes issue] by those who have only their [performance with which jack takes issue] in mind.
Jack

speaking for myself, i find it hard to criticize board members. it's an absolutely thankless job, and i've only very rarely seen people join the board for the purpose of serving their own business interests. you take a guy like a rob kasper, that guy has just given. he has no business interest in triathlon, he seeks no glory, he's a behind the scenes guy, and as board president he just spent his 20 or 30 hours a week, making no money at it, having to go to all those meetings. he's the epitome of gave at the office.

i don't know the board member in florida very well at all. but, speaking of rob kasper, i trust his judgment, and rob thinks very highly of that board member. and, i hope we can just leave it there. that member's up for election this year, if floridians want a different board member they have that option open to them.

as you know, there is just no glory in usat board service. the only ill i have to say about this board is that their actions last thursday are in no way decipherable if you read the board meeting minutes, as i have done for the past two years, and, unless i missed it, there is nothing in those minutes that would point one toward a knowledge of the issues that led to skip's departure. that means either i missed it, or it's all discussed in executive session, and that means we can't know some pretty critical things going on in our federation that might cause us to take an interest, and, perhaps, vote.

all that established, when you read the board minutes you do see the fruit of an awful lot of hard work. so, for the ill that might be said about member or another, i take my hat off to them for the work they're doing; work that few others are willing to do.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

My 2 cents:
I emailed Skip Gilbert twice over the last year or so. Both times, he replied within the same day. Both times the answers (or responses) were articulate and well thought out. The first was regarding the ranking system and the deficiencies I had observed and the second was to tell him of the first rate experience we (my son and I) had at Age Group Nationals and how helpful specific members of the staff were. Although we haven't been associated with USAT for the years that most of you have, our experience has been very positive and that usually flows down from the top. I believe he has done a solid job with an organization that has been growing so quickly and one that has been trying to expand its services to the members. That by itself is a tough chore. I hope his successor will bring as much enthusiasm to the job that Skip had.

You know you are right, it is a thankless job but then again as the term applies they volunteered and therefore they should be doing an honest and fair job not using their position(s) to further their own agendas. No one twisted their arms, they volunteered and that still doesn't absolve them of performing the morally and legally correct.

I think you are getting "soft" in your old age. At any rate the discourse is good and thanks for the opportunity.
jack

i have no argument with anything you just wrote. while it is a thankless job, when you find yourself in the position of board president (as an example), you ran for that, you lobbied for it, you wanted it, you got it, now you have take ownership of the decisions you make and the actions you take.

accordingly, what i don't want to do here is accuse folks of dishonorable behavior. i don't want to take each board member and of start calling him or her a lot of nasty things. let's not do name calling.

on the other hand, the official work on the board, what the board has done, stands they've taken, votes they've cast, things that appear to have been done in the dark, not in the minutes, not explained, those are all the sorts of things i think it's fair to ask your elected board member to justify. then, let that member take the time to answer the questions. and let's also give them the credit for the work they have done, in the light of day, expressed in the minutes.

i remember when we didn't have published minutes. or published financials. so, we have come a long way.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

You're way too nice on this. When a member of the Board appoints his wife to a Committee position and his children to the coaching staff to accompany USAT Athletes to a USAT owned event, please tell me what you call that. If I recall from the By-Laws and I believe this has not changed, other then the Finance Committee and the Nominating Committee, the Board and the President in particular has the power to create and abort committees without any vote and has the further power to appoint without a vote those persons he desires to those various committees. So you tell me what you call it when the one in charge appoints his family members to key positions??
Jack

P.S. Before you delete this one this was a fact released officially by USAT in announcing this spouse of a Board member had been appointed to the Women's Commission. They didn't admit to her relationship but they did give her name. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to put that all together. I also had that confirmed by folks inside USAT. I bet if you look that up in Webster's Unabridged it will give you the same word you deleted from my first post. Touchee!
JW
A rose by any other name is still a rose.

Dan,
I applaud you for taking up the cause, and for lifting up Skip and the situation that USAT finds itself in. Having served on boards from the corporate world (Chicago Housing Authority) to public service (**** Independent Neighborhoods) to community (*** Council Executive Board) and having coached at the Elite level (USCF '97 Track Nationals), I can echo your sentiment that it's a thankless job fraught with the opportunity for the ill-informed and less-passionate non-participant to further their agendas and biases in light of someone who is legitimately trying to make it a better organization or world to live in. And that's the way of the world, unfortunately, wherein those who embrace the organization or sport are pushed aside by those who only scratch the surface but have that skill that enables them to enjoin others to action. Suffice it to say that Skip did his best, led with his heart, and he had nothing, absolutely nothing, to hang his head over.

Good to hear from you Jack :)

From your interviews were you able to find out who voted in which direction? Is that going to be included in published minutes or was that done in Executive session?
I have heard from one reliable source what the vote breakdown was and if true I think Jack would be surprised.

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Mike Plumb, TriPower MultiSports
Professional Running, Cycling and Multisport Coaching, F.I.S.T. Certified
http://www.tripower.org

"From your interviews were you able to find out who voted in which direction?"

from what i understand, the vote to censure was unanimous. however, the decision to remove skip was not. as far as i can tell, the group advocating for skip's removal was below. keep in mind, these categories below are based on interviews with some board members, and with skip.

[edit] i've decided to unlist the lists of who were for and against making a change of ED. this, because, although i've presented this grouping of who were fore and against retaining skip to 10 board members on this list, some have answered, some have not. i think they all should answer. but celeste, for one, is representing USAT in budapest. so, i think i'd prefer to wait and let everyone have an honest chance to explain their positions.[/edit]

i think it's important that we honor the service of board members. but i also think it's important that they honor their members with an explanation of what they did, and why they did it.

i want to be clear, though. i'm not stating that they did the wrong thing by removing skip. i think they've been tasked with a tough job, and if this is their decision, i think we owe them the benefit of the doubt. i'm not taking sides. but, when you give an elected official the chance to explain his reasons for what he's chosen to do on behalf of the organization 135,000 people own, well, they'd better damned well explain!

and we haven't had that yet. the reason, i suspect, is that they're doing the HR dance right now. until they and skip agree on terms of termination, they're going to be silent. but i have very little patience for that. these board members decided to get rid of skip using an acrimonious process. if they now have to deal with skip's acrimony, that's the fruit of the process you chose. his dismissal was not what you'd call ceremonious.

i'm not going to criticize their decision to make a change in the executive director position. but if they didn't honor skip's service appropriately, they dishonored themselves. this is certainly what it seems like from what i've heard, but i'm willing to hear good reasons to the contrary. ball is in the board's court.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

IF your lists are correct, can't help but notice that all three Elite/Pro Athlete Representatives are in the same camp.

"IF your lists are correct, can't help but notice that all three Elite/Pro Athlete Representatives are in the same camp."

while this is not universally the case, they usually are in the same camp, and, not just this group, but, historically.

here's the difference: in times past, many of the elite athletes on the board pretty much sat there, did no work, and voted their cause, not really taking much interests in the core mission of USAT. but with the advent of some really good board members like mark fretta and joe umphenour, the athletes have started to take more of an activist role.

these three guys are pretty stellar minds. victor is very sharp. attorney. smart as a whip. steve sexton i don't know, but, i understand he's a phd candidate in the bay area.

that established, as smart as you are, there is some learning you can't accelerate. it just comes on you with age. when i was young, i refused to believe that. however, even if you're writing sonatas and solving mathematical equations at age-6, the mystery of attraction to females eludes you. the same truism exists throughout life. you can accelerate fact accumulation and the ability to reason, but it's hard to accelerate wisdom and experience.

just don't underestimate these guys. from everything i've heard, and the little that i know, they're smart, engaged, and active. they're atypical of elite board members. one assumes their energy and intelligence is moderated by the experience of the oldsters on the board.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

 
i want to be clear, though. i'm not stating that they did the wrong thing by removing skip. i think they've been tasked with a tough job, and if this is their decision, i think we owe them the benefit of the doubt. i'm not taking sides.

i'm not going to criticize their decision to make a change in the executive director position. but if they didn't honor skip's service appropriately, they dishonored themselves. this is certainly what it seems like from what i've heard, but i'm willing to hear good reasons to the contrary.

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I have to say from your recent posts that it really does seem like you have taken sides. You indicate your willingness to give the board the benefit of the doubt and answer the membership base, yet you are quick to publish the names of voting board members which immediately casts people against each other. Why not wait?

Are you new here?

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-

The Triathlon Squad

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Are you new here?[/reply]
Point taken but sheesh....

"yet you are quick to publish the names of voting board members which immediately casts people against each other. Why not wait?"

wait for what?

and, by naming who appears to stand on each side, who am i siding with? those who were in favor of changing the ED, or those who were in favor of retaining him?

i don't think anybody should be embarrassed by his or her vote. in the published minutes meetings, the vote tally, for and against measures, is always listed, per person, his or her vote aside his or her name. so, whichever side i'm on (i'm interested in hearing which side that is), i think folks should stand by their votes, and the side they're on should not be hidden.

so, if you thought it was important to retain skip, i think you should address why that is. if you think it was important to make a change, i think you should explain why.

otherwise, i think it's cynical to complain about why it is so few USAT members vote. if you make the hard votes, or the important votes, secret, that's destined to create cynicism among the stakeholders. yes, you're right, it might cast people against each other, at least in the arena of policy. last night, in california, we cast two people against each other for the purpose of a u.s. senatorial debate. and it was contentious. should we not have done that?

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

great observation.
for what its worth, it is my experience that when boards of non profits move into a protection mode the tenure of the Execs is reduced. High powered and goal driven people have high expectations (even if those expectations are wrong and/or unfair) and rightly or wrongly not living into those expectations leads to conflict. This conflict inevitably leads to board members leaving or executives leaving. The reasons for a firing or a resignation in an organization bent on protecting itself may on paper be different but the system and motives are often the same.

by the way, i think there's something i need to add for your benefit.

there is something to which i refer that is not covered any any stories, except in a cursory fashion in the story i wrote, and that is the manner of dismissal. skip was escorted from the building. he had no opportunity to address his staff. he was let go in an undignified fashion out of proportion to any reason for dismissal, based on the facts at my disposal.

that's what i referred to when i said that, based on what i currently know, the board dishonored itself in the way they handled the matter. i truly am withholding judgment as to the board's wisdom in making a change. if that's what the board decided it needed to do, i understand that. but one way a change can be made is to say, "your contract is up in 4 months, we think it's time to have a new executive running the show." and then you make your change in a way that saves everyone dignity, and you don't have that rancor and divisiveness to which you refer.

i think i should have made that more clear, and, my mistake. without that information, i can see why you wrote what you wrote. i know of no evidence suggesting that skip needed to be excused from his duties in the manner in which he was. i don't expect to be presented with any (because i'm pretty confident none exists).

so, again, making a change is one thing; the manner in which you execute the change is another. i have no problem with the board deciding that 6 years is long enough for any executive director. but i would be surprised if even some of those board members who favored making a change were not taken aback by the manner in which it was carried out.

but i'm willing to listen. if my view is wrong, i'm eager to hear why that is, and, i'm teachable.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

Dan, very interesting reading. For me, this is a very sad day for being involved with USAT. So many in our sport have personal agenda's, and are willing to take anyone down to get what they want. No compromise, just their way or no way.

I have worked directly with Skip over the last few years and it has been a long time since I have met such a strong leader trying to direct an organization like USAT. He has had to deal with so many other strong groups in our sport, like WTC and ITU, who all just want to do things their way, period. I know he has work hard to try and get some comment things for our sport, like rules. No easy task with some folks he has had to work with.

I always saw him use great judgment and logic to approaching issues, never emotion.

I do agree with you that our board, no matter they are not paid, owe us members details and facts as to why they have done what they did. Right now to me, it looks real real bad.

And for the folks who could not work with Skip, I would offer some just need to look in the mirror. I NEVER found skip a person who was not willing to listen, and really had the vision to try and help improve our sport. Does this mean he would not play games to try and give a small segment of our members special treatment? I sure would hope not.

As was also posted, he always responded to questions within a day, if not hours, with a real listening to what was asked, and great answers!!

Please keep pushing for getting the facts out. I still am asking myself if what they did was legal, let alone ethical.

Again, IMO, a very dark action for our organization.

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Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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