British Orienteering Governance Review

[Red Adder]

Continuning the footie theme, perhaps we could get someone like Sepp Blatter or Lord Triesman to help run us

[John Morris]

Andy Pat wrote:-

I understand Mike Hamilton has a wealth of experience in other sporting contexts, but I wonder if other similar sports to orienteering (in terms of participation) have similar sizes of governing body?

I think there's been serious confusion, aided by the "Governance Review" paper, about the nature and extent of governance, as opposed to management, in BOF.

On 19th June, I emailed Mike H, as follows-

[text begins]

Mike,

I spent 2 hours this morning manning a quiet Start at Southdowns’ 3-in-1 event – which gave me time for a thorough re-reading of the Governance Review. I found that I disagreed with only two words: “Governance” and “Review”.


One key mistake (imho) is the description of ‘standards management’ – which is what Events and Competition Committees are about – as ‘governance’. It most clearly is NOT governance, so if a reader accepts the false message of paragraphs 2 and 4, he or she will read on with mounting puzzlement, frustration and (possibly) anger.

The diagram below paragraph 5 only adds more confusion. Governance is the privilege of the AGM, and by delegation therefrom, of the Board. That’s it. The rest of the bodies on the diagram have purely advisory functions (as is noted – only – for the A&CAC). It’s hardly surprising that a – totally unnecessary – storm has arisen.

I suggest that you try substituting “standards management” for “governance” throughout the paper when referring to the Events and Competition Committees. I suggest that you refer to the work of all Committees as ‘management’ rather than ‘governance’. Use the word ‘governance’ (a) only when referring to the actions of the AGM or the Board or both, and (b) where, and only where, those actions involve no other person(s) – not even the CEO. I suggest…


The second obvious piece of misdirection is that this paper is not a ‘review’; it’s a ‘proposal’. And, in my opinion, it has a lot going for it. You, I and all the copy addressees know exactly why it’s necessary; however, none of us would care to write a frank review of what we know about the past behaviour of these Committees and their members, for fear of legal entanglement.


So – let’s relaunch this document as a ‘Standards Management Proposal’, a perfectly proper thing for the Board to publish, on a consultative basis. The consultation is now a prudent courtesy rather than a legal necessity, because the Board is acting well within its powers if, on behalf of its stakeholders, it moves to improve the effectiveness and/or economy of the sport’s management.


“Sitting on a branch, sawing off the tree…”, I wrote. Neil C tells me he does not understand what I meant by this phrase. My apologies if my humour is sometimes obscure… I suggest – and the SOA and NopeSport threads both support the suggestion – that both the intended message (about professionalising Committee activity) and the unintended message (about a self-declaredly important – although completely illusory – governance change) have really annoyed the stakeholders. The Committees and their adherents are angry – rightly – because their hegemony is (properly in my opinion) threatened. The rest of us are angry – rightly – because a simple, fit-for-purpose, managerial proposal has been so ineptly presented – by a Board which advertises its own excellence...

And if the Board continues to alienate a large proportion of the movers and shakers who actually run - and run in - events, week in, week out, it is the Board – and its branch - that will fall, not the orienteers in the forest.

And the REALLY depressing thing is that, by this single unfortunate move, the Board has taken us back to the early nineties when a number of us had to explain to the Officers of the day what BOF Central’s role was – and wasn’t. Out of that, eventually, with Robin Field as (erm…) catalyst, came our vastly improved current model. Which is, all of a sudden, being questioned by those who worked for twenty years to build it.


Please redraft and re-issue this defective paper, so that the very sensible proposal at its core can be seen for what it is – a move towards more effective management. And an apology to the Membership would be well received…

[Text ends]

The apology, I should make clear, is due from the BO Board, not our hard-pressed CEO.

[Mrs H]

Ok I've finally got round to reading this despite the fact that I only really wanted to look at the cover and while I take your semantical issues John I really dont think that is much to be worried about.

What does concern me is your man sitting on a branch concerns. To me it's like someone painstakingly doing the housework while the roof is still leaking and the ground subsiding.

This re-organisation is a stated priority - that means a lot of professional time is being devoted to it and yet basically its housekeeping and I don't think it has been a matter of priority with the membership who may far rather the time was devoted to issues like sorting out unreasonable insurance and health and safety, finding alternative "income streams", getting juniors in the sport and coached (tours) and generally making it easier to put on good quality and FUN events for people to take part in. That is after all what the MP3 vision said was important wasn't it? BUT and it is a big but - the changes may take BOF even further away from the membership and what they want as the membership's input is now purely advisory.

I sit on an advisory committee elsewhere - we all turn up at the meeting, say what we think, the governing body politely listen and nod and then go off and do what they were going to do anyway.

I may have missed it but I don't see anywhere what the criteria are for appointing people to the various committees - that seems to me to be rather an important factor if this new set up is to have any credibility at all.

Now of course it maybe that these changes will have the desired effect - but actually all the stated aims are to make it easier to do the governance/management thing it's not about the sport at all-- which worries me. The only way the membership can really get what the majority want is if the members' conference is run on trades union lines. It's like BOF is some self-maintaining entity on the back of the sport which is still being run at local level - I think the word that best sums it up in my mind is Feudal!

[Gross]

Paul Frost made a valid viewpoint on the SOA comments page that nearly all the posts were made by the 'old guard' with virtually none from anyone under 30.

One poster claims that Nope & the SOA comments are a more valid way of discussing the issues than BOF Club Conferences etc etc....

The future of orienteering belongs to the young and not the oldies trying to resurrect failed plans from 20 years ago....

How are the young views taken? Suggestions? (coz they won't bother with a BOF Conference either )

[Scott]

[Speaking entirely personally here, and not with my BOF Director hat on.]

I actually had this discussion with a small group of young (under-25) English orienteers a few days ago. As Paul points out, they were pretty much apathetic to the whole review, even once I'd explained it to them.

The general feeling seemed to be that, seeing as the BOF groups/committees were in any case likely to be composed of some M55s they had never met, it didn't make a blind bit of difference whether those M55s were appointed by some M55s on the BOF Board they had never met or by some other M55s on their association committees they had also never met.

To be fair, I think everyone involved in the governance of orienteering in the UK (from the BOF Board and committees, through the association committees and down to the clubs) could be doing a lot more to engage young people in the issues facing the sport.

And it would probably be a good start to spend more time discussing the actual issues - declining participation (at least in "traditional" orienteering), rising travel costs, volunteer shortages, the loss of funding. Unfortunately, for most young orienteers "orienteering governance" summons up images of old men having violent squabbles over irrelevancies.

The highest profile "governance" issue in the last couple of years has been "how many levels of event we should have," and I know very few people under the age of 30 who could understand why this made the slightest bit of difference to anything. Most of the ones I know found it unbelievable (and slightly depressing) how much time and energy that went into discussing it, given some of the (rather more serious) issues facing the sport. If this is the image of orienteering governance that young people have then it's no wonder they are disengaged.

(Major kudos, by the way, to the SOA, who do seem to have managed to get some "young" orienteers involved in their governance.)

[frog]

Our club has very few if any members under 30 who aren't still at school. I suspect most folk under 30 have minimal interest in the committee stuff and will only complain if the changed structure affects the actual orienteering, that's how I was at that age.
I don't like the way this is being rushed through and don't see why the proposed changes haven't gone through the system "properly" ie being sent out to all members and then discussed and voted on at next years BOF AGM with postal votes counting.

[70plus]

[Speaking entirely personally here, and not with my BOF Director hat on.]

I had this discussion with a small group of young (under-25) English orienteers a few days ago ... they were pretty much apathetic to the whole review, even once I'd explained it to them.

It would probably be a good start to spend more time discussing the actual issues - declining participation (at least in "traditional" orienteering), rising travel costs, volunteer shortages, the loss of funding. Unfortunately, for most young orienteers "orienteering governance" summons up images of old men having violent squabbles over irrelevancies.

Surely a good deal of time has been spent for several years 'discussing the actual issues' you list here, notably declining participation and volunteer shortages, but most importantly the narrowing band of 'oldies' where the keenest competition is concentrated. The problem seems to be that the discussions have produced no clear remedies. Of course it may be that there are no brilliant solutions? It can be no real surprise to find that under-25 orienteers are apathetic towards governance - lots of them don't see any point in voting either.

[SeanC]

How are the young views taken? Suggestions? (coz they won't bother with a BOF Conference either )

It's not just the youf. A system of communication/decisions based mainly on lots of different committees meeting not very frequently seems like a system designed before the internet was imagined.

I've put in a suggestion that the BOF committees have an online discussion group composed of people with an interest in the subject of the committee, ie not just the committee members but anyone with relevant information who is prepared to contribute ideas and viewpoints positively. On the development committee for example it would be good to have viewpoints/ideas etc not just from people from different regions, but also different groups of people (particularly the sort less likely to go to committee meetings - newcomers, younger people, those with young children, people who don't orienteer very often etc.). I think if you invite a range of people to join online discussion groups they could be really productive.

It would also be good where a discussion requires people with particular expertise, for example the development committee is due to discuss publicity sometime, so it would be good to discuss directly with the really successful club publicity officers who are likely to have a greater expertise in this area than many on the committee.

[Scott]

Surely a good deal of time has been spent for several years 'discussing the actual issues' you list here

Indeed, and I'm not saying that no time has been spent on them - merely that the impression of "orienteering governance" held by most young orienteers is that these issues are much further down the BOF priority list than things such as "the number of event levels" (and I do think that debate in particular has done significant damage to the image of orienteering governance).

Creepy weirdo that I am, I've spent a fair amount of time this year hanging around with groups of 18-25 year olds in assembly fields/campsites/pubs/minibuses and chatting with them about real issues - the lack of coaching, funding the performance programme, how events should be run, what can we do about the poor public image of the sport - and when you do that it pretty quickly becomes clear that they do care, they do have useful things to say, and they actually come up with some pretty good ideas. And the fact that they are not as tied to the way things have been done for the past thirty years can be pretty refreshing!

The problem is that as soon as you start mentioning BOF committees, or BOF plans, or BOF policies, their eyes glaze over and they switch off, because many young people see BOF committees as groups of old men who don't really "represent" them, and who spend their time issuing long and bafflingly-written policy documents and fighting their own personal battles over things that (to young eyes) don't seem remotely important.

Now I think most people here on Nopesport know that that impression is not accurate: BOF committees do some excellent and vital work, and for the most part are pretty progressive in their outlook and do engage with the bigger issues. But, at the same time, we can't escape the fact that that impression is there, and that there are good reasons for it.

And, of course, the problem works both ways - young people are never going to become involved when the incumbent generation believe that

It can be no real surprise to find that under-25 orienteers are apathetic towards governance

Now, to offer a point in defence of the proposed BOF committee reforms: one of the problems with association representation is that nearly all associations will appoint a financially well-off married professional man or woman aged 45-65 with grown-up (or almost grown-up) children who owns their own car and has been orienteering for at least fifteen years. And fair enough, because they are by far the major demographic in the sport.

Okay, this is crude and ridiculous stereotyping, and I sincerely apologise if anyone is offended, but you get my point - association-appointed representatives guarantee excellent geographic diversity, but not much diversity of any other kind. If done well, a centrally-appointed committee could do a much better job of balancing geographic diversity with other, equally important, types. I dream of a world where every BOF committee has at least one (knowledgeable and engaged) member under the age of 30, and none of them are me

But, that said, I am quite happy to admit that any central appointments process would need to be thought out very carefully indeed - and to be entirely open and transparent - if it were to be a success.

[Scott]

...and putting my Director hat back on, an update on the review is now available on the British Orienteering website.

[frog]

You can only appoint someone who actually wants to do a job though. When I was 25 I had no desire to do any committee work and would not have liked feeling pressurised to do so. As long as there is a clear way of choosing who the people representing orienteers are (preferably by election) and a clear way of contacting these people to discuss stuff i really don't care what age or sex the person representing me is and would rather the job went to the person with the most time and enthusiasm to do the job, which is unlikely to be a 25 year old.
The problem with the proposed new committee system is that everyone is appointed rather than being elected and apart from an annual club committee that is advisory only no way of feeding back issues or controling which direction the committees go in.
It all sounds very undemocratic.
I agree more online discussions or videoconferencing would be better than meetings and travel. I did a recent diploma where we had group online discussions with participants from around the UK and Hong Kong and a lecturer we could all hear over the computer speakers and then feed back by typing. It must be possible to have something similar with the group chair having the mike and everyone else typing responses.

[distracted]

In terms of what happens at a local level, you could argue that it doesn't matter what the committees do or say. People are likely to prioritise putting on the events/activities that suit them and their local membership, and the bigger issues are left on the sidelines because they aren't always very important. And experience tells us most people/clubs aren't worried about 'national' issues until such an issue affects them or their perceived experience of the sport.

Doing what is best for any sport (or anything) on a national level, without letting people's self-interest get in the way, has got to be very difficult to do... and I'm mighty glad I don't have to put forward a proposal for a system that will keep everyone as happy as possible.

[70plus]

As soon as you start mentioning BOF committees, or BOF plans, or BOF policies, their eyes glaze over and they switch off, because many young people see BOF committees as groups of old men who don't really "represent" them, and who spend their time issuing long and bafflingly-written policy documents and fighting their own personal battles over things that (to young eyes) don't seem remotely important.

I suspect that your groups of young orienteers, like many older ones, simply want to get on with their orienteering and leave the political side of things to those with that inclination. The sport has a basic set of accepted rules and conventions, and provided the authorities arrange a decent flow of fixtures they are probably happy. Perhaps the clique who take on the committee roles become too focused on the administrative side; perhaps the rest of us don't appreciate how much of that is needed.

As an oldie myself, I have no strong urge to maintain the status-quo, as it will see my time out. Younger orienteers should do more to determine what sort of future they want for O. The web is clearly a good medium for discussion, and this site is an excellent example; but it does not follow that the discussion will involve a high proportion of orienteers. A small number of names seem to contribute most of the posts here - as seems to happen on many forums. As I said - people just want to get on with their orienteering ...

[Gnitworp]

As I said - people just want to get on with their orienteering ...

...and get on with putting on events of their choosing regardless.

[mike g]

Unfortunately, for most young orienteers "orienteering governance" summons up images of old men having violent squabbles over irrelevancies.

This view is not limited to young orienteers; it is exactly my opinion of this review and all the previous ones I can remember.

There are plenty of changes to BOF committees that I would think were a good thing: e.g. having fewer committees and groups (for instance, why do we need a map group when mapping standards are international, or a permanently established rules group rather than just conducting a review of the rules once every few years?), making committees smaller (since they are likely to make decisions more easily), and making better use of technology to make serving on a committee less burdensome (e.g. no more meetings in Birmingham). But I don't see this consultation canvassing ideas like this - though it is so badly written that it's hard to know what is in the mind of its authors.

The question of which set(s) of (mainly) old men will appoint committees might matter if there were lots of people clamouring to be on them, and the best people were not being chosen. As if. More likely no-one in future will volunteer at all, with the increased bureaucracy and control that the board is looking to impose.