IPMA News -- December 2001

Edited By Bob Monn and Shelagh Taylor

IPMA Board Election Results

-- Dennis Jones, Chair, 2001 IPMA Election Committee

The IPMA is pleased to announce the results of the annual election for the Board of Directors.  Four of the twelve Board positions were up for election this year.  The following IPMA members were elected to three year terms, beginning January 1, 2002.

• Mary Ellen Bradley, Department of Ecology
• Phil Grigg, Department of General Administration
• Mike McVicker, Department of Information Services
• Christy Ridout, Department of Social and Health Services

Here is a recap of the election process:

• IPMA sent out a solicitation on November 9 to all members asking for volunteers to be involved by serving on the Board.
  
  
• Three of the four current Board members whose terms are expiring expressed interest in running again (Mary Ellen Bradley, Phil Grigg, and Mike McVicker). No other members asked to be considered.
  
  
• The Election Committee then recruited Christy Ridout to run for election to round out a slate of recommended candidates for the Board positions.
  
  
• 187 ballots were distributed on November 26 with spaces to allow for write-in candidates.
  
  
• 92 ballots were submitted by November 30 at 5:00 pm.
  
  
• The ballots overwhelmingly endorsed the recommended slate of candidates. (Four ballots included votes for four different write-in candidates; 68 of the 88 other ballots included votes for all four listed candidates and the remaining 20 ballots included votes for one to three of the listed candidates.)

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Changes at DIS

-- Shelagh Taylor

In late November two senior Department of Information Services (DIS) staff announced they will be leaving the agency:

• Paul Taylor, DIS Deputy, announced he will be "leaving DIS after six and a half years, a journey that began with the public records task force through portfolio management and on to digital government and the Academy." As the DIS Deputy, Paul Taylor serves as Chief of Staff to the Information Services Board. Paul will be joining the Center for Digital Government as its Chief Strategy Officer, beginning January 1, 2002. He will be working in its expanding custom research practice, supporting future Digital State and Digital Cities assessments, and writing a regular column for Government Technology magazine.
  
  Paul says he would like to stay in touch with the IT community, and can be e-mailed at pwt@pwt.net.
  
  
• Mike Curtright, Assistant Director for the Computing Services Division, announced he is retiring effective January 16, 2002. While Mike spent the last 2 ½ years as the Assistant Director of CSD, his 26-year career pre-dates DIS, going back to the days of Service Center 3 and Service Center 1.
  
  Mike Curtright began his career with state government in August 1975 as a computer operator for DSHS in the basement of the public lands building. In January of 1976 he transferred to Service Center 3, again working as a computer operator. After a few months he promoted to the old Computer Systems Analyst job class, developing internal agency applications. In January 1979 he moved to the Department of Game, and nine months later promoted to the Washington Data Processing Service Center 1. For the next twelve years, he worked on contract with many different agencies developing new applications including the first AFIS system for Washington State Patrol and the Department of Labor and Industries’ Group Insurance System.
  
  During the early 1990’s, Mike played a key role in the merger of Service Centers 1 and 3 into one computing utility. Mike says, " No longer did our customers have to negotiate and deal with two separate agencies when doing business with DIS. We automated many of the processes that previously had been manual activities, allowing the staff to be more productive, as well as learn new skills. This is one of the accomplishments that I am most proud of, being involved with streamlining, automating processes and merging the separate data centers into one business."
  
  Looking back over the past 26 years, Mike thinks " the biggest change to our day to day business has been the coming of the desk top, providing the tools for management and staff to be so much more productive in delivering services to the citizens of this state. I can remember when it took days to put together letters, presentations, and documentation. Now it is just a part of our day to day activity."
  
  Mike says he will miss the pace of the IT business, but is looking forward to a few months for winter run steelhead, a vacation in Hawaii, and then time to determine what he wants to do for the next 30 years.
  
  

On December 6, Gary Robinson, Acting Director of DIS, announced that "Joyce Turner, who currently serves as an Executive Policy Analyst at the Office of Financial Management, will be joining DIS as Acting Deputy Director. Joyce has 15 years experience in state government, and served Governors Gardner and Lowry as Director of Government Operations. Before joining OFM, she was Governor Locke's Special Assistant for Management Services. Joyce has worked as a consultant in the private sector, and brings extensive vision, leadership and management skills to DIS. Please join me in extending a warm welcome to Joyce as we assist her with a quick transition into this new and dynamic position."

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Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA) Brown Bag Lunch

On December 12 the local chapter of the Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA) will be having a brown bag lunch and networking session with a guest speaker from Intel on computer incident handling. This presentation should be of interest to anyone who wants to make sure their organization responds promptly and effectively to computer security incidents. See announcement for more information.

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Other News

--Compiled by Bob Monn and Shelagh Taylor

Best Practices for Disaster Recovery

The December 1 issue of CIO magazine included an article outlining Nasdaq's Best Practices for disaster recovery; see Nasdaq Lessons Learned from Sept. 11.

Security and Disaster Recovery Planning

The November 26, 2001 issue of Network World magazine featured a series of articles on security and disaster recovery planning as a follow-up to the September 11 World Trade Center attack. The series also includes an article on the terrorists' use of technology and methods used to counter it. See the full series.

Portfolio Management

The October 1 issue of CIO magazine included an article on portfolio management. See the article to find our what Schlumberger and the State of Washington have in common.

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November 8, 2001 IPMA Board Meeting

Members Present: Jim Albert, Mary Ellen Bradley, Thomas Bynum, Sheryl Hall, Dennis Jones, Dennis Laine, Mike McVicker, Bob Monn, Darrel Riffe, Doug Tanabe and Shelagh Taylor.

Mary Ellen Bradley, IPMA Chair, opened the November 2001 meeting of the IPMA Board of Directors at 7:30 a.m.

Reports

Secretary/Treasurer: The minutes from the October 11, 2001 Board meeting were approved.

Thomas Bynum presented the October 2001 financial status and activities reports. The Board approved the reports.

Business Planning: Doug Tanabe distributed the Merrill Lynch monthly portfolio status report.

Organizational Business – Proposed Changes in By‑Laws Regarding Membership and Board Election Procedures: The current procedure: The chair appoints a nominating committee to recruit members of the IT community to run for the four board member positions that are up for election. It has been a matter of policy to have at least one more candidate than the number of positions to be filled. The ballots are mailed to all registered IPMA associate members to be completed and returned. The four candidates with the greatest number of votes are declared the winners and the candidate with the fifth most votes is designated as first alternate in the event that one of the board members does not complete his/her term.

The problem with the current procedure: It is getting progressively more difficult to recruit qualified members of the IT community to run for the board of directors.

In an effort to address this problem with the board election process, Darrel Riffe presented two alternative modifications to the IPMA By-Laws. The first would retain associate memberships but have the eight board members not up for re-election vote for four of the candidates presented by the nominating committee. The second option would abolish associate membership in addition to the provisions of the first option. After considerable discussion the board voted not to enact either alternative.

During the discussion Bob Monn presented a third alternative that would not require a change to the By-Laws. The essence of the proposal was to give associate members an opportunity to express an interest in running for the position on the Board. The nominating committee would review the applications and submit an appropriate number of candidates to the associate membership for a vote. If an applicant were not included on the ballot, the nominating committee would contact that person and explain why their name wasn’t put forward and also explain that if they wished, their name would be added as an additional candidate to the ballot. A motion was made and passed unanimously to adopt that procedure for board member elections. To that end Dennis Jones, a member of this year’s nominating committee, would work with Bob Monn to get an e-mail message out to all associate members soliciting interest in running for the 2002 IPMA Board of Directors. The actual number of names on the ballot will be at the discretion of the nominating committee. If there are more vacancies than members expressing interest, the committee will revert to active recruiting.

An item that was in both of the proposals presented by Darrel Riffe was to remove Article VII, Section 6, which prohibits proxy voting by board members. A motion was made to enact this change to the By-Laws. The motion was seconded and passed unanimously.

Executive Seminar: Darrel Riffe reported that planning is beginning for next year’s Executive Seminar at Campbell’s Resort on Lake Chelan. For the next couple of months the Skamania Lodge is being held as an open option in the event that something about Campbell’s doesn’t work out. Skamania then will be notified that the IPMA will not be returning in 2002 but may return in 2003.

Forum: Dennis Laine reported that the planning committee met on October 24 and concluded:

• The theme will be "Silver Anniversary FORUM - 25 Years of Service to the State"
  
  
• A lunch meeting has been scheduled with Corporate Sponsors on November 15 at the Worthington Center so that the Forum planning committee can discuss the theme, expectations on speaker behavior, potential key note speakers, and other issues.
  
  
• The committee would like to have a keynote speaker who was involved in business resumption activities related to the September 11 terrorist attacks. This will be discussed with Corporate Sponsors at the November 15 meeting.
  
  
• The committee has discussed having the keynoter be the new DIS Director.
  
  
• Cloth bag registration enticements have been priced and can be acquired for about $3.75 to $4.00 each in quantities of 1000.
  
  
• The contract with GES Exposition Services, Inc. has been signed.
  
  
• There will be more emphasis in the breakout sessions on mainframe development, middleware, etc.
  
  

Professional Development: Sheryl Hall reported that she and Dennis Jones have begun planning the 2002 Professional Development calendar of events. The January 23^rd event will be held in a larger room than was used in October. There is an issue yet to be resolved with the Worthington Center regarding the chairs and whether they can be separated to provide more comfortable seating. Another issue has to do with trouble determining how many people who have signed up for a session actually will attend.

Jim Albert mentioned that there was a huge demand for Project Management type seminars, networking, training, etc.  There was a discussion of the possibility of establishing a Project Management Special Interest Group (SIG) under the IPMA organizational umbrella. Mike McVicker, Thomas Bynum, Jim Albert and Dennis Jones agreed to be on a committee to research it further.

Communications: Shelagh Taylor presented a draft code of conduct for IPMA Corporate Sponsors and Vendor Partners as follows:

The IPMA, through its corporate sponsorship program, offers an excellent opportunity for information technology companies to play a leadership role in IPMA events. The IPMA is the only local professional IT organization that has a focus on Washington state and local government. The corporate sponsorship program promotes a partnership with the IPMA to encourage growth in the IT professional through: management development, exposure to state-of-the-art IT products and services, and educational and training events featuring current IT issues and directions.

Guidelines for Presenters:

• Feedback from our customer surveys show that attendees do not like to listen to sales pitches during presentations.
  
  
• Be respectful of your fellow corporate sponsors. Do not promote your company's products or services at the expense of another corporate sponsor's product or service.
  
  
• Presentations must not include offensive language or perpetuate a stereotype.
  
  
• Materials used in presentations should be made available within a week to the IPMA webmaster for publication.
  
  
• Presentation given must be what was signed up for after promotional material has been published.
  
  

New Business:

Annual Planning Retreat: Shelagh Taylor alerted the board to the fact that it was time to start making arrangements for the annual planning retreat. Doug Tanabe, as Vice-Chair, will begin that process and be prepared to discuss it at the December board meeting.

The meeting was adjourned at 9:05 a.m.

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