It seems votes, like buses, come along in groups. In the 11 months since I became S-G, we've only had any voting by the WCF Members at the July Council meeting. We've done a number of consultation exercises though, on issues such as the 10 Year Schedule of events, our new decision-making process, and so on.
By chance, a number of things have now all coincided to mean we have 3 votes all running through November, on different topics:
> our Presidential election is underway, with votes from all WCF Full Members due by 24th November.
> we also have been polling our Full Members about the draft 11th Edition Statutes, which incorporate the new decision-making process. That vote runs until 11th December.
> and we are about to poll about half our Full Members about a seat on the WCF GC Rules Committee.
You might wonder why the last one is "about half". It's because Australia, Egypt, England, NZ and USA all get to appoint a rep directly on the GC Rules Committee - while the other 6 Full Members (South Africa, Canada, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Scotland) are asked to elect the 6th member of the committee.
By chance, all these have come at once. If the new Statutes are approved, then in future at least some of these would be simpler, quicker email ballots.
We avoided a fourth vote: luckily, we had exactly 4 nominations for the 4 vacancies on the Management Commitee, so all candidates are appointed without an election. Keith Aiton and Gordon Smith retired by rotation (MC members have a 4 year term) but were prepared to stand again. We are joined on the MC by Mike Orgill from USA and by Chris Wakeham from South Africa - welcome to Mike and Chris.
Our two Presidential hopefuls are Amir Ramsis and Stephen Mulliner - both well-known figures in the croquet world and also both current members of the MC.
The President and MC roles all commence from 1st January - so we'll have a new-look MC for the New Year. We've started including Mike and Chris in our email debates so that, by January, they have some idea how we operate and what the current topics are - should make it less of a shock in January!
Sunday, October 30, 2011
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Where did September go?
I finally found how much croquet is 'too much' - playing every weekend for a couple of months - I did get to the point of arriving at an event thinking "I'd rather be at home catching up with xyz". Not an ideal frame of mind! Still, the season ended on a high - I played for Colchester in the CA's Interclub Championship final and we won. Fellow MC-member, Ian Burridge was also on the team. Bizarrely, this "last day of the season" was also the hottest weather I'd played in all year!
After Charles Jones' murder, we rallied and asked Amir Ramsis (MC member and Vice-President of Egyptian Croquet Fed) to take the role of Acting President, which he kindly accepted. We've started the process for the annual elections in December and called for nominations for President and MC posts.
Our new website is getting closer, and our website committee has been looking at a partly complete new site prepared by James Hawkins. It should be more attractive and easier to use and update, so I'm looking forward to it going live. I continue to find it hard to keep the existing site current, as it can be a bit scarey to edit!
We've consulted with our Members on the changes to our Statutes necessary to implement the new email-based decision-making process, approved by Council in July. We'll shortly take a revised copy of the Statutes to a vote (under the old 60 day postal vote scheme of course), and if passed, we'll then be into the 21st Century and able to work electronically!
We polled all the players in this July's championships (Golf Croquet at Hurlingham & Surbiton, and Under 21s at Hunstanton) and got feedback from about a third. This has been shared in full with the organisers and host, and summarised on our website. Generally, the events were both well-liked, though there are things to note for next time.
We're currently working on the detail to implement a decision of the "4 Governing Bodies" that control and play in the MacRobertson Shield - to pass the administration over to the WCF and make the Mac clearly Tier 1 of the Association Croquet World Team Championship. This is how it was staged in August 2010 but we need now to cement that structure. I hope we'll have a draft set of changes to our Statutes and Regs ready for the 4 Governing Bodies to consider very soon.
Finally, we're getting well-advanced now with preparations for the 4th Women's GC World Championship this November, in Bay of Plenty region, New Zealand, and 13th ACWC next April/ May in Adelaide, as well as making some initial progress too on the 1st Women's AC World Championship, which is likely to be next October.
There always seems to be so much to do!
Martin French
Secretary-General
After Charles Jones' murder, we rallied and asked Amir Ramsis (MC member and Vice-President of Egyptian Croquet Fed) to take the role of Acting President, which he kindly accepted. We've started the process for the annual elections in December and called for nominations for President and MC posts.
Our new website is getting closer, and our website committee has been looking at a partly complete new site prepared by James Hawkins. It should be more attractive and easier to use and update, so I'm looking forward to it going live. I continue to find it hard to keep the existing site current, as it can be a bit scarey to edit!
We've consulted with our Members on the changes to our Statutes necessary to implement the new email-based decision-making process, approved by Council in July. We'll shortly take a revised copy of the Statutes to a vote (under the old 60 day postal vote scheme of course), and if passed, we'll then be into the 21st Century and able to work electronically!
We polled all the players in this July's championships (Golf Croquet at Hurlingham & Surbiton, and Under 21s at Hunstanton) and got feedback from about a third. This has been shared in full with the organisers and host, and summarised on our website. Generally, the events were both well-liked, though there are things to note for next time.
We're currently working on the detail to implement a decision of the "4 Governing Bodies" that control and play in the MacRobertson Shield - to pass the administration over to the WCF and make the Mac clearly Tier 1 of the Association Croquet World Team Championship. This is how it was staged in August 2010 but we need now to cement that structure. I hope we'll have a draft set of changes to our Statutes and Regs ready for the 4 Governing Bodies to consider very soon.
Finally, we're getting well-advanced now with preparations for the 4th Women's GC World Championship this November, in Bay of Plenty region, New Zealand, and 13th ACWC next April/ May in Adelaide, as well as making some initial progress too on the 1st Women's AC World Championship, which is likely to be next October.
There always seems to be so much to do!
Martin French
Secretary-General
Thursday, September 8, 2011
What happens next….
After Charles Jones’ horrific murder in Thailand New Zealand
After some thought, the Management Committee has decided to ask Amir Ramsis – who has been on the MC since 2003 – to take the role of Acting President for the next 4 months. Amir is also Vice-President of the Egyptian Croquet Federation and frequently travels to GC events round the world.
The WCF Statutes envisage routine elections every November/ December for any roles on the MC that have become vacant through rotation and retirement – so we will include the election for the next President in this timetable.
In the next 4 months, we have just one event, the Women’s GCWC in New Zealand
Apart from that, the MC has been working through all the actions from the July Council Meeting. We have been drafting revised Statutes to embody all the processes required by the decision to start a 2 year trial in January of the new email-based discussion and decision process of Council. These are almost ready now to go to the Members for a consultation cycle prior to a formal postal vote (under the existing 60 day postal process, of course).
We’ve also been working on finalising the 10 Year Schedule of events and the format descriptions for each of the 8 approved event types, and these are again just about ready to go out to the Members along with a call for bids for events through to the end of 2014. This will allow us to have a clear forward programme of events in place, for some years ahead.
Personally I’ve also been busy with several croquet tournaments (a late-season flourish, playing every weekend for the next 4 weeks), and also being very involved in the negotiations and planning to move my local croquet club (Ipswich CC) from its position in a local park, to a golf club a couple of miles out of town. The improved facilities will make it much easier, we hope, to recruit and retain new members. So a busy early Spring next year in prospect, with a hut to build and everything to arrange.
In the meantime, may your swing be straight and your aim true.
Sunday, July 10, 2011
In the thick of it
(...but without all the swearing, for those of you who followed the TV series of this title!)
So we're pretty much ready for the Council Meeting on Sunday 17th July now. We've received postal votes from all those Members I was expecting to vote by email rather than in person, and we have 25 delegates registered to attend in person.
All last week I was playing in the British Opens at Surbiton, which gave me a chance to check out the facilities we'll be using for the Council Meeting. I have to say, Surbiton has done wonders. I think I last played there a bit over 20 years ago, when the lawns were quite ordinary and the club hut almost finished. Now the 7 lawns are some of the flatest I've played on (lovely being able to approach close to a hoop without having to worry about your ball falling to one side at the last minute) - George Noble and team are to be congratulated. The rest of the club's facilities are also now very good indeed, and there is a great team spirit amongst the many helpers who look after the bar, catering, BBQ, clearing and setting out the lawns and all the rest of it. Well done Surbiton! And to Samir for great management of the Opens.
So, the Council Meeting is there on the 17th at 1pm - preceded by a Management Committee meeting (the only time we ever get to meet face to face!) and lunch for all Council members.
Between now and then, I'm off to Hunstanton for much of next week, as the Under 21 GC World Championship starts there on Tuesday. Monday afternoon, I'm helping to set up the safety fencing and flags, and looking after a practice session and player registration. Ian Burridge is the Tournament Manager and Charles Jones the Tournament Ref - so a high input from the MC on this one!
Straight after the Council meeting, things start revving up for the main GC Worlds, which run from 18th to 24th July. Stephen Mulliner is the MC lead on this one (thanks Stephen), so I'm just going to drop in once or twice during the week. And anyway, I've got a graduation to go to in Swansea at the end of the week.
Hopefully, after that week, things will calm down. Then there is all the follow-up to do from Council (writing minutes, circulating any further papers, identifying all the follow-up actions....) and then the large heap of topics we've put to one side to look at after Council is done. A couple of these will be urgent - especially tryng to move the bids for the first GC World Team Championship forward. We want to stage the event in about 15 months time, and have a lot to do to be ready for then.
Next blog will probably be after the Council meeting, giving my first-time impressions of this annual fest.
Martin French
So we're pretty much ready for the Council Meeting on Sunday 17th July now. We've received postal votes from all those Members I was expecting to vote by email rather than in person, and we have 25 delegates registered to attend in person.
All last week I was playing in the British Opens at Surbiton, which gave me a chance to check out the facilities we'll be using for the Council Meeting. I have to say, Surbiton has done wonders. I think I last played there a bit over 20 years ago, when the lawns were quite ordinary and the club hut almost finished. Now the 7 lawns are some of the flatest I've played on (lovely being able to approach close to a hoop without having to worry about your ball falling to one side at the last minute) - George Noble and team are to be congratulated. The rest of the club's facilities are also now very good indeed, and there is a great team spirit amongst the many helpers who look after the bar, catering, BBQ, clearing and setting out the lawns and all the rest of it. Well done Surbiton! And to Samir for great management of the Opens.
So, the Council Meeting is there on the 17th at 1pm - preceded by a Management Committee meeting (the only time we ever get to meet face to face!) and lunch for all Council members.
Between now and then, I'm off to Hunstanton for much of next week, as the Under 21 GC World Championship starts there on Tuesday. Monday afternoon, I'm helping to set up the safety fencing and flags, and looking after a practice session and player registration. Ian Burridge is the Tournament Manager and Charles Jones the Tournament Ref - so a high input from the MC on this one!
Straight after the Council meeting, things start revving up for the main GC Worlds, which run from 18th to 24th July. Stephen Mulliner is the MC lead on this one (thanks Stephen), so I'm just going to drop in once or twice during the week. And anyway, I've got a graduation to go to in Swansea at the end of the week.
Hopefully, after that week, things will calm down. Then there is all the follow-up to do from Council (writing minutes, circulating any further papers, identifying all the follow-up actions....) and then the large heap of topics we've put to one side to look at after Council is done. A couple of these will be urgent - especially tryng to move the bids for the first GC World Team Championship forward. We want to stage the event in about 15 months time, and have a lot to do to be ready for then.
Next blog will probably be after the Council meeting, giving my first-time impressions of this annual fest.
Martin French
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Where did June go?
My last post was about getting the main batch of papers out for the WCF Council meeting scheduled for the 17th July. That was in May - the second (and final) batch had to go out by 17th June and took a lot of effort to finalise.
There were no formally-submitted amendments to the Management Committee's proposals and resolutions send in the first batch, but there were a number of extra papers and some whoppers from the new Croquet Federation of India and Latvian Croquet Federation, supporting their membership applications. These are all to be found at http://www.wcfcroquet.org/Council_2011/CouncilPapers.php.
One disappointment was that we didn't receive a finalised information pack from the Pakistan Croquet Federation - hopefully things will be sorted out there before too long.
I had some fun drafting for the MC our MC Report and a new Business Plan. The first gave me a chance to reflect on all the stuff that's going on and to survey wat we've achieved in the past year. The second was an opportunity to think further about where we should be going. Our last Business Plan was very thorough - tying everything back to many objectives stated in our Statutes - but as a result was 25 pages long and not very readable. I did my best to write our new plan in 4 pages - but subsequent edits took it up to 5. Still I'm very pleased with this straightforward top level plan (both available at the link above).
The bit of the plan that looks tricky is getting Development rolling. Indeed, reading some past Reports and Business Plans reveals this has been continuing lament for many years - so we need to really ask ourselves how can we make more Development progress. Once the Council meeting is done, we'll turn more attention to this topic and see if we can make some decent progress.
Of course, we're also in the thick of the UK croquet season now, so July for me consists of:
> playing in the British Opens 3rd - 10th
> helping at the Under 21 GCWC 11th-15th
> Council Meeting 17th
> attend a bit of the GCWC say 19th or 20th
> son's graduation in Swansea 21st/22nd
> Compton tournament 30th/ 31st.
...so my apologies now if I don't get much time to post anything in July!
I hope you have the chance to play in, spectate or help with any of the WCF events in July - hope to see you there.
Martin French
There were no formally-submitted amendments to the Management Committee's proposals and resolutions send in the first batch, but there were a number of extra papers and some whoppers from the new Croquet Federation of India and Latvian Croquet Federation, supporting their membership applications. These are all to be found at http://www.wcfcroquet.org/Council_2011/CouncilPapers.php.
One disappointment was that we didn't receive a finalised information pack from the Pakistan Croquet Federation - hopefully things will be sorted out there before too long.
I had some fun drafting for the MC our MC Report and a new Business Plan. The first gave me a chance to reflect on all the stuff that's going on and to survey wat we've achieved in the past year. The second was an opportunity to think further about where we should be going. Our last Business Plan was very thorough - tying everything back to many objectives stated in our Statutes - but as a result was 25 pages long and not very readable. I did my best to write our new plan in 4 pages - but subsequent edits took it up to 5. Still I'm very pleased with this straightforward top level plan (both available at the link above).
The bit of the plan that looks tricky is getting Development rolling. Indeed, reading some past Reports and Business Plans reveals this has been continuing lament for many years - so we need to really ask ourselves how can we make more Development progress. Once the Council meeting is done, we'll turn more attention to this topic and see if we can make some decent progress.
Of course, we're also in the thick of the UK croquet season now, so July for me consists of:
> playing in the British Opens 3rd - 10th
> helping at the Under 21 GCWC 11th-15th
> Council Meeting 17th
> attend a bit of the GCWC say 19th or 20th
> son's graduation in Swansea 21st/22nd
> Compton tournament 30th/ 31st.
...so my apologies now if I don't get much time to post anything in July!
I hope you have the chance to play in, spectate or help with any of the WCF events in July - hope to see you there.
Martin French
Thursday, May 19, 2011
First Council papers go out - Hurrah!
I've had my head down the past few weeks getting all the main papers and Resolutions ready for the July WCF Council meeting. The Management Committee has taken the responses from the two big consultations we ran recently - on the 10 Year Schedule of events and Decision-making in the WCF - and produced some Resolutions to Council which, if approved, would give us a clear long-term programme of events and radically improve how the Members control the WCF. Of course, we didn't get everything right in our original consultation proposals, so we have taken the comments made on board and revised the ideas in these Resolutions.
Feedback on the 10 Year Schedule was very positive, but there were several comments that there were just too many events, and also concerns about the funding model for team events and how Knock-Outs are seeded. So in the revised 10 Year Schedule that goes to Council for approval, we have reduced the frequency of some events while keeping the premier singles events every two years and world team championships every 4 years. We've also dealt with the other two issues raised.
The responses to the Decision-making consultation were very positive except from one Member, whose circumstances are perhaps different to most: they are a federal body representing a number of independent state administrations. I can appreciate they will find it harder than most to consult with their member administrations and collate their responses in the proposed new model, where issues are debated in email cycles and brought to a vote. We've made a few changes suggested and will see what the Members think.
We also have Resolutions to ratify the new WCF Finance Regs and to accept the recommendations of the WCF Ranking Review Committee, which has been examing the AC world ranking system. They have concluded a fairer representation of a player's current form would be given by a new Dynamic Grading system in place of the current CGS. It removes the amount of lag before new results make a major impact on your grade. You can check the system already - if you go to the World Rankings site http://butedock.demon.co.uk/cgs/rank.php, you'll find Statto has added a Dynamic Grade radio button. If you click that, you'll see how your position changes under the new system. It must be a better system, I'm 11 places higher!
This isn't all the papers for Council. While these had to be distributed 60 days before the Council meeting, there will be some supporting documents that go out 30 days before (17th June). I'm working on those already, including the annual MC Report. We should also have applications to join from:
Martin French
Secretary-General
Feedback on the 10 Year Schedule was very positive, but there were several comments that there were just too many events, and also concerns about the funding model for team events and how Knock-Outs are seeded. So in the revised 10 Year Schedule that goes to Council for approval, we have reduced the frequency of some events while keeping the premier singles events every two years and world team championships every 4 years. We've also dealt with the other two issues raised.
The responses to the Decision-making consultation were very positive except from one Member, whose circumstances are perhaps different to most: they are a federal body representing a number of independent state administrations. I can appreciate they will find it harder than most to consult with their member administrations and collate their responses in the proposed new model, where issues are debated in email cycles and brought to a vote. We've made a few changes suggested and will see what the Members think.
We also have Resolutions to ratify the new WCF Finance Regs and to accept the recommendations of the WCF Ranking Review Committee, which has been examing the AC world ranking system. They have concluded a fairer representation of a player's current form would be given by a new Dynamic Grading system in place of the current CGS. It removes the amount of lag before new results make a major impact on your grade. You can check the system already - if you go to the World Rankings site http://butedock.demon.co.uk/cgs/rank.php, you'll find Statto has added a Dynamic Grade radio button. If you click that, you'll see how your position changes under the new system. It must be a better system, I'm 11 places higher!
This isn't all the papers for Council. While these had to be distributed 60 days before the Council meeting, there will be some supporting documents that go out 30 days before (17th June). I'm working on those already, including the annual MC Report. We should also have applications to join from:
- Croquet Federation of India
- Pakistan Croquet Federation
- Latvian Croquet Federation.
Martin French
Secretary-General
Friday, April 29, 2011
Getting ready for Council
I've finally got the last of the player info in for the July Golf Croquet World Championship (hurrah!) and only have a few items missing still for the Under 21s. I wouldn't have believed how much time and effort it takes to get biographies, photos and email addresses in. We're planning that in our new website, we'll have the ability for players to login and upload their own photos and bios. It will still no doubt take some chasing for updates and missing info, but at least I won't have to wrestle with all the wild and whacky formats sent in response to a request for "a Word doc or text".
We're holding a Council Meeting of all 27 Members at Surbiton, on Sunday 17th July - sandwiched between the Under 21 GCWC and the main GC World Championship, which starts on the 18th. All Resolutions have to be produced and distributed two months before - so by 17th May. So at present the MC is focused on turning a number of things we've been working on for the past 6 months into specific Resolutions to Council.
For example, I've gone through the 10 Year Schedule proposal and the responses to this consultation from Members, and we've identified a number of things for the MC to put in place and also 3 specific Resolutions to Council. There's also one area which requires much more thought than expected so we are delaying that till after Council - that's the question of what funding model should be used for team events. The consultation responses were all happy with how we handle event funding for singles - especially now we have halved the licence fee. But for team events it all becomes much more complicated - so we've put that to one side for now.
We've also got the first ever set of Finance Regulations and Investment Policy ready for ratification, and also a Resolution to start a 2 year trial of the new decision-making process we've recently consulted on.
So for the next 2 weeks, I think we'll be preoccupied with getting ready for Council. Though actually, I'm off to Hunstanton for the next 3 days for a tournament delightfully known to old hands as "The Pilchard"!
Let's hope the weather holds.
Martin French
We're holding a Council Meeting of all 27 Members at Surbiton, on Sunday 17th July - sandwiched between the Under 21 GCWC and the main GC World Championship, which starts on the 18th. All Resolutions have to be produced and distributed two months before - so by 17th May. So at present the MC is focused on turning a number of things we've been working on for the past 6 months into specific Resolutions to Council.
For example, I've gone through the 10 Year Schedule proposal and the responses to this consultation from Members, and we've identified a number of things for the MC to put in place and also 3 specific Resolutions to Council. There's also one area which requires much more thought than expected so we are delaying that till after Council - that's the question of what funding model should be used for team events. The consultation responses were all happy with how we handle event funding for singles - especially now we have halved the licence fee. But for team events it all becomes much more complicated - so we've put that to one side for now.
We've also got the first ever set of Finance Regulations and Investment Policy ready for ratification, and also a Resolution to start a 2 year trial of the new decision-making process we've recently consulted on.
So for the next 2 weeks, I think we'll be preoccupied with getting ready for Council. Though actually, I'm off to Hunstanton for the next 3 days for a tournament delightfully known to old hands as "The Pilchard"!
Let's hope the weather holds.
Martin French
Friday, April 15, 2011
Interesting responses
I've still been wrestling with getting the final bits of player info in for the two events we're staging this July: the GC World Championships (Hurlingham and Surbiton) and the Under 21 GCWC (Hunstanton). I have had to become expert at opening biographies sent to me in all sorts of whacky formats - for example I've discovered for .odt documents I can sometimes unzip them then read the XML content in Dreamweaver - and copy and paste the words into a Word document (the format requested)!
We've been running two large consultation exercises recently with our Members, and results have been coming in the past couple of weeks. The first, called "10 Year Schedule" is the MC's attempt to pull together everything it can think about regarding events and a 10 year forward plan of which events ought to occur when - and ask the Members for their views on a number of ideas and loose ends. Responses to this have by and large supported the MC proposals and we've started considering what Resolutions we need to put to the Council meeting this July to turn them into definite plans.
The second has been on Decision-making in the WCF. The MC's proposal was to change Council into an engaged, decision-making body that worked via 21-day managed email cycles. So an issue might be handled in 3 cycles: initial debate; revised proposal; formal vote. Hopefully, the Members will get more opportunity this way to see and understand the opinions of their fellow Members. The current Resolution and Amendment model can result in some unintended outcomes, which would have bene avoided had there been more dialogue before the vote - that's what I'm hoping we can improve upon. The first two responses received were interesting - and 180 degrees apart. The first agreed with every part of the MC's proposal. The second pointed out that they were simply not resourced to handle the internal discussions required and to respond with their official views within 21 days, and preferred the existing model where people were elected to the MC to make such decisions "for the good of croquet" - with the backstop that Members can always overturn MC decisions if they think we've got them wrong. I can quite understand this response - it was well-argued and wasn't hostile to proposal, just thought on balance they were happier with the current model. It will be interesting to see how the remaining responses pan out.
Must dash now - the season (in UK) starts now, so I'm off to Southwick for my first A-Class wekeend of the year. Time to think about my goal for the season: probably "to get my Grade over 2400" - I've been stuck just below for the past couple of years. Have I plateaued??
Martin French
We've been running two large consultation exercises recently with our Members, and results have been coming in the past couple of weeks. The first, called "10 Year Schedule" is the MC's attempt to pull together everything it can think about regarding events and a 10 year forward plan of which events ought to occur when - and ask the Members for their views on a number of ideas and loose ends. Responses to this have by and large supported the MC proposals and we've started considering what Resolutions we need to put to the Council meeting this July to turn them into definite plans.
The second has been on Decision-making in the WCF. The MC's proposal was to change Council into an engaged, decision-making body that worked via 21-day managed email cycles. So an issue might be handled in 3 cycles: initial debate; revised proposal; formal vote. Hopefully, the Members will get more opportunity this way to see and understand the opinions of their fellow Members. The current Resolution and Amendment model can result in some unintended outcomes, which would have bene avoided had there been more dialogue before the vote - that's what I'm hoping we can improve upon. The first two responses received were interesting - and 180 degrees apart. The first agreed with every part of the MC's proposal. The second pointed out that they were simply not resourced to handle the internal discussions required and to respond with their official views within 21 days, and preferred the existing model where people were elected to the MC to make such decisions "for the good of croquet" - with the backstop that Members can always overturn MC decisions if they think we've got them wrong. I can quite understand this response - it was well-argued and wasn't hostile to proposal, just thought on balance they were happier with the current model. It will be interesting to see how the remaining responses pan out.
Must dash now - the season (in UK) starts now, so I'm off to Southwick for my first A-Class wekeend of the year. Time to think about my goal for the season: probably "to get my Grade over 2400" - I've been stuck just below for the past couple of years. Have I plateaued??
Martin French
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Entries, entries everywhere
I'm up to my knees at the moment in sorting the entries out for the Golf Croquet World Championship and the Under 21 GCWC. Both take place this July in England - the GCWC at Hurlingham and Surbiton (see http://www.gcworlds2011.org/ if you want more details and tickets to spectate) and the Under 21s at Hunstanton.
I hadn't been through the entries process before, and there's a lot more to it than imagined. Things happen in 4 top-level stages:
For the Under 21s we had a different problem - and a slightly revised process. Members nominated players but for many of them (perhaps half?), they had no World Ranking. This meant there was little information about their playing history or experience available already. We asked Members to provide some details - and got widely varying levels of detail. So this makes it quite tricky to make decisions. The pressure was a little less, as there were 28 nominations for 24 places.
Now all that remains is to get in the photos, bios and entry fees! What could possibly go wrong?
I hadn't been through the entries process before, and there's a lot more to it than imagined. Things happen in 4 top-level stages:
- the WCF works out how many places should be allocated to each Member association, based on their share of players in the World Top 100 (all Full and Associate Members get at least one place). A small number of "wild card" places are reserved too.
- the Members then send in their entries for their allocated places, which are accepted automatically - and any nominations they wish to make for a wild card place
- the WCF then considers the wild card nominations and tries to share them out fairly, following half a dozen different criteria described in the Sports Regs
- then I chase to get email addresses, biographies, photos and entry fees for each player.
For the Under 21s we had a different problem - and a slightly revised process. Members nominated players but for many of them (perhaps half?), they had no World Ranking. This meant there was little information about their playing history or experience available already. We asked Members to provide some details - and got widely varying levels of detail. So this makes it quite tricky to make decisions. The pressure was a little less, as there were 28 nominations for 24 places.
Now all that remains is to get in the photos, bios and entry fees! What could possibly go wrong?
Friday, March 11, 2011
Decisions, decisions...
I haven't blogged for a while because instead of being pre-occupied with one main thread, the MC has had a lot on the go at once - so it hasn't been so easy to muse on any particular issue here. We've also had entries and nominations coming in for the GCWC this July and the Under 21s that precedes it, which take some sorting out and chasing of photos, biographies, entry fees etc. for the players.
The big consultation on events we sent out a month ago is beginning to get well-considered responses now - and a couple of Members have asked for more time, which I had always suspected would happen. We've also just sent out the second of these major consultations we had planned - this one on how to improve WCF decision-making. Our statutes say the WCF is controlled by its Members. But the existing postal-voting system, with 60 days notice required and 40 days for an amendment, doesn't really help the Members exercise this control. What has sometimes happened with complex issues is that votes have happened at Council meetings, without a great deal of talking between Members before the meeting and with some of the key players not being present in Council. The outcomes haven't always suited everyone.
So we thought it important to find a model where the Members talk to each other, and where proposals develop and are brought to a vote in a series of discussion cycles. Luckily, ubiquitous email makes this possible - and didn't of course exist when the Statutes were drafted. The MC's proposal is to manage, for the Members, an email discussion system which would develop proposals over typically 3 cycles: 1) kick the idea around and get people's views, 2) come up with a reasonable proposal and get comments on that, then 3) vote on the revised proposal. You can flex the number of cycles depending on the maturity of the issue and how quickly agreement is reached.
This is essentially how the MC now operates. The MC operates on 1 week cycles, but we'll probably need 3 weeks or so for Council, because many Members have International Committees or Executives who will need to consider the proposals and agree their responses.
I hope the Members go for this proposal, as it really will put control into their hands.
The big consultation on events we sent out a month ago is beginning to get well-considered responses now - and a couple of Members have asked for more time, which I had always suspected would happen. We've also just sent out the second of these major consultations we had planned - this one on how to improve WCF decision-making. Our statutes say the WCF is controlled by its Members. But the existing postal-voting system, with 60 days notice required and 40 days for an amendment, doesn't really help the Members exercise this control. What has sometimes happened with complex issues is that votes have happened at Council meetings, without a great deal of talking between Members before the meeting and with some of the key players not being present in Council. The outcomes haven't always suited everyone.
So we thought it important to find a model where the Members talk to each other, and where proposals develop and are brought to a vote in a series of discussion cycles. Luckily, ubiquitous email makes this possible - and didn't of course exist when the Statutes were drafted. The MC's proposal is to manage, for the Members, an email discussion system which would develop proposals over typically 3 cycles: 1) kick the idea around and get people's views, 2) come up with a reasonable proposal and get comments on that, then 3) vote on the revised proposal. You can flex the number of cycles depending on the maturity of the issue and how quickly agreement is reached.
This is essentially how the MC now operates. The MC operates on 1 week cycles, but we'll probably need 3 weeks or so for Council, because many Members have International Committees or Executives who will need to consider the proposals and agree their responses.
I hope the Members go for this proposal, as it really will put control into their hands.
Thursday, February 17, 2011
The past is always with us
I'm currently struggling with the past. Not all of it, mind you, but particular bits where people dispute what happened or what was agreed or have odd views about who did what and why.
My S-G role is to make things happen, but it's tricky when people can't agree what has happened before I got involved, and whether it was right or not. Hey ho.
The other thing I was amazed about this week were the reactions I got to a personal post on the NB asking for ideas on how to have a simple practical test for how firm a hoop is. I set hoops a lot (I think I was RoT at 5 A class or championship events last season). I've pondered this off and on for some time - and though it's not a difficult concept, coming up with a very practical simple quick field test for firmness seems difficult. Anyway, I had a number of sensible, reasoned suggestions about what could be done (none quite meeting my requirement for "simple" though) but also a few quite strident responses assuming this was all a plot by the WCF to regulate hoop firmness and in one case extrapolating to ludicrous extremes (like being able to sue the organisers if the hoops failed the firmness spec!). Predicatbly after such a silly statement, the writer then appealed for "common sense". It's a funny old world.
My S-G role is to make things happen, but it's tricky when people can't agree what has happened before I got involved, and whether it was right or not. Hey ho.
The other thing I was amazed about this week were the reactions I got to a personal post on the NB asking for ideas on how to have a simple practical test for how firm a hoop is. I set hoops a lot (I think I was RoT at 5 A class or championship events last season). I've pondered this off and on for some time - and though it's not a difficult concept, coming up with a very practical simple quick field test for firmness seems difficult. Anyway, I had a number of sensible, reasoned suggestions about what could be done (none quite meeting my requirement for "simple" though) but also a few quite strident responses assuming this was all a plot by the WCF to regulate hoop firmness and in one case extrapolating to ludicrous extremes (like being able to sue the organisers if the hoops failed the firmness spec!). Predicatbly after such a silly statement, the writer then appealed for "common sense". It's a funny old world.
Monday, February 7, 2011
Everything you wanted to know about WCF events....
Hurrah! Finally, I've been able to press the Send button on a major piece of consultation we've been working on for over 2 months. We were putting together about 6 or 7 proposals on various things to do with how to improve WCF events, and I sent the first one to the WCF Members for their comments. Then it dawned on me we'd have a further 6 ready send all in the next month or so. So instead, we've pulled them together into one large document, and it's gone out to Members tonight.
It centres around having a published 10 Year Schedule of forthcoming events. We'll update it regularly, and the placeholders will gradually get replaced by agreed bids to stage specific events. This will help Member associations - and players - plan further ahead, and also prevent the "clumping" of events that has sometimes happened. All the MC has contributed ides or comments but I must thank Ian Burridge who has done the major work on the schedule itself.
What else does the document cover? Well as well as the Schedule, there is information on the eight World Championship event types ( AC and GC singles and Team World Championships, Women's AC and GC events, and GC Over 50s and Under 21s). We are proposing to halve the WCF License Fees, which host associations pay in order to hold a recognised WCF world championship. We are also defining a clear annual bid process and timetable - we'll start shortly taking bids up till 2014, and then each year we'll call for more bids 3-4 years ahead. And finally, there are a large number of detailed refinements proposed, for example to rules on seeding and draws.
I hope before long to publish the consultation document on the WCF website. Now work starts on a second important consulation document, this one covering how to improve the involvement of WCF Members in the decision making process. And tomorrow, I hope to announce the Under 21 GC world championship for July 2011 - so there's plenty going on!
It centres around having a published 10 Year Schedule of forthcoming events. We'll update it regularly, and the placeholders will gradually get replaced by agreed bids to stage specific events. This will help Member associations - and players - plan further ahead, and also prevent the "clumping" of events that has sometimes happened. All the MC has contributed ides or comments but I must thank Ian Burridge who has done the major work on the schedule itself.
What else does the document cover? Well as well as the Schedule, there is information on the eight World Championship event types ( AC and GC singles and Team World Championships, Women's AC and GC events, and GC Over 50s and Under 21s). We are proposing to halve the WCF License Fees, which host associations pay in order to hold a recognised WCF world championship. We are also defining a clear annual bid process and timetable - we'll start shortly taking bids up till 2014, and then each year we'll call for more bids 3-4 years ahead. And finally, there are a large number of detailed refinements proposed, for example to rules on seeding and draws.
I hope before long to publish the consultation document on the WCF website. Now work starts on a second important consulation document, this one covering how to improve the involvement of WCF Members in the decision making process. And tomorrow, I hope to announce the Under 21 GC world championship for July 2011 - so there's plenty going on!
Monday, January 31, 2011
Busy busy busy!
Lots going on at the moment. I've been trying to make some progress with the WCF website, on two fronts. First, I've been doing some updates to things like the Taylor List of contact details for individuals. I found a database in my local copy of the website that seemed to be the Taylor List, also found (lucky day!) I had MS Access on my PC so could open the db. I dutifully made the requested changes to the Taylor List then uploaded them to the live website and....nothing! Brian Storey helped point me in the right direction (thanks Brian) - it seems this local copy is irrelevant, instead you have to edit the live MySQL database! Scarey - I mean, what could possibly go wrong?
So when I tried to upload the latest World Team Rankings which Chris Clarke had provided (thanks Chris), after a while crawling around bits of the site trying to find where the data was held, it dawned on me it might also be in the same MySQL db - and it was! So, now an expert (!), I was a bit quicker in getting these changes loaded. Then over the weekend, trying to pick-off easy things from my To Do list, I wanted to update a couple of WCF Member contact details that had changed - and yes, they were also in the same db. At one level, this is great, I know how to change things now (within limits). But on the other hand, editing the live db seems just wrong to me - far too many opportunities to mess things up.
The other tack on the website has been to agree with the Management Committee an approach for a complete revamp for the website. All websites 'silt up' over time, and often the best solution is to start afresh. We are planning to do that this Spring (UK). We have advertised for a webmaster, as we need someone with more skills and time to devote to it than I have. So, with luck we will have a shiny new website later this year. The current website has served us well, and I appreciate the huge amount of work Brian Storey put into it when he was S-G.
Finally, the WCF GC Rules Committee has been looking at two new official rulings for Rule 9. A complete updated list of official rulings has now been uploaded at http://www.wcfcroquet.org/Rules/Official%20GC%20Rulings%20-January%202011.pdf.
The MC has two quite large proposals in the final stages of edits and updates, which we hope to get out to the WCF Members for their comments shortly - it's taking a big push to get these proposals out the door - "just one last little thing" keeps delaying us. I'll be glad when they're done as then we can catch up with some other things we need to do, like planning for events.
So when I tried to upload the latest World Team Rankings which Chris Clarke had provided (thanks Chris), after a while crawling around bits of the site trying to find where the data was held, it dawned on me it might also be in the same MySQL db - and it was! So, now an expert (!), I was a bit quicker in getting these changes loaded. Then over the weekend, trying to pick-off easy things from my To Do list, I wanted to update a couple of WCF Member contact details that had changed - and yes, they were also in the same db. At one level, this is great, I know how to change things now (within limits). But on the other hand, editing the live db seems just wrong to me - far too many opportunities to mess things up.
The other tack on the website has been to agree with the Management Committee an approach for a complete revamp for the website. All websites 'silt up' over time, and often the best solution is to start afresh. We are planning to do that this Spring (UK). We have advertised for a webmaster, as we need someone with more skills and time to devote to it than I have. So, with luck we will have a shiny new website later this year. The current website has served us well, and I appreciate the huge amount of work Brian Storey put into it when he was S-G.
Finally, the WCF GC Rules Committee has been looking at two new official rulings for Rule 9. A complete updated list of official rulings has now been uploaded at http://www.wcfcroquet.org/Rules/Official%20GC%20Rulings%20-January%202011.pdf.
The MC has two quite large proposals in the final stages of edits and updates, which we hope to get out to the WCF Members for their comments shortly - it's taking a big push to get these proposals out the door - "just one last little thing" keeps delaying us. I'll be glad when they're done as then we can catch up with some other things we need to do, like planning for events.
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Putting it all together
We've been building up quite a few decisions and proposals on how events are run - and particularly how they are scheduled and agreed. I've been struggling with how best to discuss these with the WCF Member associations and get their ideas and approval. We sent one set of specific proposals out for consulation at the start of January - but it struck me that if we did the same with everything, the Members would be snowed under. They'd also get lots of "point solutions" to comment on, without being shown the big picture of where we're trying to get to.
So after about a week of trying to "clear the decks" to let me think about this, I've finally managed to pull all our event-related ideas together into one larger story. This centres around an outline schedule for events for the next 10 years. Attached to this, we can talk about the different kinds of event, how they are planned, the fees charged, how seeding and the draw operates and so on. It should help us to resolve a number of "loose ends" and also give the Members a clearer picture of the future and what events they might want to bid to host.
This would be a great advance, as at present we're having to try to organise events at the same time as discussing how to update all the rules that relate to holding events - with no clear picture of where we're trying to reach. So I've just finished a first draft, and hope to soon get it out to my colleagues on the MC for their thoughts and corrections, before it goes to our Members.
Next challenge: do a similar 'big picture' proposal on how to make the WCF more effective and the Members more engaged in its decision-making. We've discussed the material in the MC - it just needs pulling into shape. Mind you, it's probably not fair to hit the Members with both these large consultations at once.
Meanwhile, things are hotting up on the entries for the GC World Championships in July in London, and with getting ready for entries to the Women's GC Worlds that will be staged this November in New Zealand. So I have to split my time between trying to improve the "big picture" of how we're organised, and getting the important day-to-day things done. It's good to be busy!
Martin French
S-G
So after about a week of trying to "clear the decks" to let me think about this, I've finally managed to pull all our event-related ideas together into one larger story. This centres around an outline schedule for events for the next 10 years. Attached to this, we can talk about the different kinds of event, how they are planned, the fees charged, how seeding and the draw operates and so on. It should help us to resolve a number of "loose ends" and also give the Members a clearer picture of the future and what events they might want to bid to host.
This would be a great advance, as at present we're having to try to organise events at the same time as discussing how to update all the rules that relate to holding events - with no clear picture of where we're trying to reach. So I've just finished a first draft, and hope to soon get it out to my colleagues on the MC for their thoughts and corrections, before it goes to our Members.
Next challenge: do a similar 'big picture' proposal on how to make the WCF more effective and the Members more engaged in its decision-making. We've discussed the material in the MC - it just needs pulling into shape. Mind you, it's probably not fair to hit the Members with both these large consultations at once.
Meanwhile, things are hotting up on the entries for the GC World Championships in July in London, and with getting ready for entries to the Women's GC Worlds that will be staged this November in New Zealand. So I have to split my time between trying to improve the "big picture" of how we're organised, and getting the important day-to-day things done. It's good to be busy!
Martin French
S-G
Sunday, January 9, 2011
Hall of Fame open for 2011 nominations
THE WCF Hallf of Fame seeks nominations from January to June each year.
See http://www.wcfcroquet.org/Halloffame/hoff.htm for the people already inducted into the Croquet Hall of Fame - and also the nomination form for new candidates. Unsuccessful candidates from last year are carried forward - so don't need to be nominated again.
Happy Nominating!
Martin French
See http://www.wcfcroquet.org/Halloffame/hoff.htm for the people already inducted into the Croquet Hall of Fame - and also the nomination form for new candidates. Unsuccessful candidates from last year are carried forward - so don't need to be nominated again.
Happy Nominating!
Martin French
Friday, January 7, 2011
WCF Newsletters
Hi folks,
I've started a monthly newsletter to the WCF Member associations, summarising what the WCF Management Committee has been doing, what's decided, what's in progress and so on. I'm planning to publish them to the WCF website about a week after they've gone to the Members. I've just put the first two newsletters up:
Thanks.
regards
Martin French
Martin French
Secretary-General of the World Croquet Federation
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