RFC 3777 provides guidelines for the "IAB and IESG Selection, Confirmation, and Recall Process: Operation of the Nominating and Recall Committees". Within this process, the IAB has several roles:
These guidelines apply when the liaison is speaking to NomCom in his or her liaison role.
The person who fills the liaison role may also provide personal feedback
to NomCom but only through communication channels available to general
IETF participants (e.g. the feedback web form). When interacting with
the NomCom through liaison channels, the liaison will represent the
views of the IAB rather than personal opinion.
When the Liaison is speaking to NomCom in their liaison role it should
not be possible for the NomCom to determine the Liaison's personal
opinion about a particular candidate. Liaisons should stick to facts
and views that the Liaison believes represent the consensus of the
IAB. The Liaison should avoid personal opinions.Follow NomCom Liaison Rules in RFC 3777, which includes:
Liaisons are expected to represent the views of their respective
organizations during the deliberations of the committee. They
should provide information as requested or when they believe it
would be helpful to the committee.Act in the best interest of the IETF.
Meta-guideline:
When any of the four guidelines are in conflict, the liaison will use
their best judgment to resolve the conflict. Guideline 1 should override
guideline 3 when they are in conflict.
So that the Nomcom is not later surprised, it is important to point them to the confirmation process and the materials we want. Note that we ask for CVs, but candidates don't actually have to submit CVs and many don't.
It is extremely important that the IAB Liaison to the IETF NomCom provide the full list of IAB-required confirming materials to the NomCom chair at the start of the NomCom. This enables the NomCom and NomCom chair to ensure that willing nominees for IESG positions are made aware that required supporting materials will be provided to the IAB should they be put forth as the nominee of choice by the NomCom. Permission to share these materials with the IAB (as confirming body), to include CVs and questionnaire responses, should be requested in advance by the NomCom chair when the materials are submitted to the NomCom. The NomCom may wish to provide questionnaires which include sections that the candidate is comfortable sharing (e.g., "To Be Shared with Confirming Body"), and sections which will not be distributed beyond the NomCom members (e.g., Not to be distributed beyond the NomCom - "Joe and Sally are mean").
The following process will be used by the IAB for confirmation of nominated candidates for vacant IESG positions:
In undertaking due diligence in its role as the confirming body for nominations to the Internet Engineering Steering Group the IAB would like to advise all Nominating Committees of its expectations in terms of provided material.
When submitting the name of each candidate the IAB requests that the following items of material, clearly separated and labeled, be provided to the IAB at the same time:
The IAB recognizes that the Nominating Committee may solicit information that nominees provide for the exclusive use of the Nominating Committee, not to be shared with confirming bodies. The IAB understands that the Nominating Committee will not provide this information to the IAB.
The IAB will not disclose this material outside of those IAB members who have the responsibility to consider the nomination.
While IAB members are responsible for recusing themselves from any deliberations with which they may have been a willing nominee or perceived some other conflict, the IAB NomCom liaison should ensure extra caution is exercised during this phase. The proposed IESG slate from the NomCom should NOT be distributed to the general iab@ list, as that list contains IAB liaison, to include the IESG->IAB liaison, who themselves may be up for consideration, as well as the IETF chair. A specific list with just voting members minuses the IETF chair should be employed. iab-confirmation@ has been used for this purpose in the past.
Additionally, if members of the IAB have recused themselves, then specific lists should be provisioned to accommodate this, for example, if a member has recused themselves from APPS, iab-confirm-apps@ might be employed. It is advised that these lists, like the general iab@ list, NOT be archived and that they be deleted once the confirmation process is complete.
Members must recuse themselves from deliberations and voting for an area if they are a willing nominee for that IESG position.
They should also recuse themselves if they perceive a significant personal conflict of interest with regard to consideration of a given position. (E.g., spouse agreed to be considered for an IESG position). In general, IAB members should identify such potential conflicts of interest, and the IAB can determine whether it merits recusal from the IAB confirmation process.
Response to (2012) nomcom chair about timeline was:
IAB commit to confirming the slate within 30 days of receiving it. IAB will provide either a confirmation or rejection or questions/comments to nomcom within 15 days of receiving the slate. Since IAB meets on wednesdays, receiving the slate or any communication by the preceding monday shall help to speed up the process.
Moreover, IAB expects to receive the following information from nomcom:
The IAB recognizes that the Nominating Committee may solicit information that nominees provide for the exclusive use of the Nominating Committee, not to be shared with confirming bodies. The IAB understands that the Nominating Committee will not provide this information to the IAB. The IAB will not disclose this material outside of those IAB members who have the responsibility to consider the nomination.
One of the considerations to take into account when selecting a liaison is the affiliation. The observation that all liaisons to the nomcom were from the same affiliation has raised eyebrows in the community at one point.
If a liaison sees process violations or other issues, they should first attempt to resolve this issues with the NomCom chair. Beyond this, they should seek advice from the NomCom Advisor/Past Chair, and if these means are exhausted discuss the issue with the Internet Society President, who appoints the chair. If no conflict arises, the IAB chair might be consulted first.
While it is not the liaisons responsibility to provide the NomCom with the names of IAB incumbents willing to serve another term, or the list of incumbents planning to step down, the liaison should remind IAB members whose terms are expiring explicitly of the deadlines for nominations and ensure that they share their intentions with the NomCom before the deadline is reached.
The IAB IETF NomCom liaison should be prepared to provide periodic updates on the NomCom's progress to the IAB. The bi-weekly IAB business meetings provide an ideal venue for this, although during the early stages of the NomCom this may become a bit monotonous. In particular, any issues that might raise alarm, and any information regarding NomCom progress and delivery dates, or changes thereof, should be communicated to the NomCom in a timely manner. This is particularly important as the confirmation stage approaches, in order to accommodate scheduling of confirmation meeting calls, agenda time and other logistics.
The content of this page was last updated on 2020-12-10. It was migrated from the old IAB wiki on 2023-12-05.