Chess One wrote:
"Randy Bauer" wrote in message
oups.com...

Chess One wrote:

First to praise Randy Bauer for something - he is willing to show up in
public and argue his point, not just state it, but pursue it with some
conviction and determination - I would only wish his point were sharper!
But
rather than admit faint praise, he does not suffer from
fear-of-the-public,
which practically all other members of the board do, and as direct result
of
not-testing their precious opinions, are more-or-less intelligent
thereby.
What 'our' Randy needs to do is not run on his record of the past, but
run
on a program for the future. That, IMO, will decide his fate.

First, thanks to Phil for pointing out that I have been, even while on
the Board, willing to discuss and debate on RGCP. My time here has
been limited somewhat of late, because I think the fakes and trolls
have severely reduced the opportunity to have fair discussion of
issues. While I don't support Sam Sloan's candidacy or position on the
Executive Board of the USCF, I also do not support the fake postings
that he has been subjected to for the past year or so.

As to Phil's point about the future rather than the past as the focus,
I agree -- fair enough. I plan to run on strict adherance to financial
responsibility, improvement in member service (I think EVERY employee,
from the Executive Director on down, should have a performance plan
that is developed and reviewed on an annual basis and focused on their
contribution to membership service),

O! This is rare, after reading your comments Randy, I was about to ask, 'how
are you going to actually do what you aspire to' which is a fair question to
any politician! But you did it!

I remember a certain board-aspirant in a past election talking of greater
transparency at very great length, but he wasn't able to say exactly how he
would go about achieving it. But in this message you engage the topic of
'how', which is, IMO, of much greater weight than lots of 'whats'.

Actually, I applauded and supported Don Schultz when he provided the
necessary leadership to reinstitute the BINFO system for communication
among the Board. I think the USCF forums are another excellent
opportunity for members and others to interact. It at least has, by
requiring members to post their ID numbers, prevented the spamming and
forgeries that plague this newsgroup.

Elsewhere I just criticised both the current board and Sam Sloan for mixing
up a censure of Sloan for unwarranted speculations with this other topic of
revealing rating corruption - and said that the /apparent/ effect would be
to now view Sloan as being censured for outing the corruption, rather than
as the omnibus criticism it was intended to be. This rather clouds a more
important issue, IMO:-

I don't think the issues were connected -- in fact, just about every
Board member was vocal in their belief that Tanner should resign, and I
don't think any of them viewed it as anything other than what it was:
a real failing on Tanner's part and worthy of condemnation.

What has still not really been answered from USCF's camp is how the accussed
got it through the ratings department in the first place, and then, without
apparent invigilation, the accused was awarded a life-title. Questions on
the extent of this problem have been, of course, dismissed, which is the
exact opposite of calling for performance measurements!

I really don't know the answer to that question. However, in my
professional life, I've learned of people who get away with embezzling
millions of dollars without being detected for long periods of time; my
guess is USCF rating points aren't quite as valuable.

While I do not expect you to answer those specific questions from other than
general knowledge, or at all, I do admit a liking for this idea of yours of
asking department heads [and 'on down'] to have some performance criterion
for their pay - which I should like to call that by the normative phrase
'competency testing'.

This was actually instituted in the State of Iowa while I worked there,
and, over time, it created a greater culture of accountability for
results. Mind you, we still had our failings, but there are several
independent observers who praised the overall effort. Somehow, we have
to get back to thinking about the USCF actually achieving things --
concrete things, positive outcomes -- and the staff (and the Board)
should be put in that position of being accountable.

better marketing of chess in this
country,

First time I've heard that in a while. Is there an operations person
currently employed at USCF to do this? If not, or if the person would not
have sufficient experience or competence to do an enhanced task or marketing
as you would wish, would you hire someone to become 'marketing manager'? In
other words, how will you deploy a marketing effort? As someone interested
in marketing, would you neverthless cede the board marketing role to Paul
Truong, a fellow board-aspirant?

I think Susan Polgar has done more to market chess in this country than
any player in a long time. I don't know the percentage of credit Paul
should receive for this, but Susan suggests it is a lot. I would like
her to take on the responsibility for this aspect of the USCF's effort.
I have been a spokesperson for a large organization, and I am
comfortable in that role, but I am not a marketer by trade and would
prefer that others take the lead in this area. Regardless of Susan's
involvement, I think the USCF should be more active in this area.
However, rather than hiring a person, I think outsourcing makes more
sense -- quite frankly, I think there are a variety of professional
services where the current model suggests that entities of the size of
the USCF should outsource those functions that do not coincide with
their core competencies.

Here is an older question which I agreed with Beatriz was important, nay!
crucial! during our interview - how are you going to retain more scholastic
players? The numbers indicate the same number in and out every year,
without significant or even measureable growth over 7 or 8 years [in fact a
skippage of almost all the cheap ticket memberships, as many as 10,000! of
them lost]

It's all about providing something that people value, that is unique.
There are areas, such as Internet chess play, where I doubt the USCF is
going to be able to carve out a place from those who are further along.
However, given a strong scholastic presence, there must be
opportunities to continue to involve these players. I was one of those
strong scholastic players who ultimately stayed with the USCF, but the
chess playing world was a lot different then. Quite frankly, I think
the Board needs to dialogue with those who are the members, who may be
interested in paying for the USCF's services given their specific needs
and wants rather than thinking that they always know the answers.
While on the Board I suggested we need much better mechanisms for
collecting feedback from members, and I still believe it is worth the
investment.

(snip)

These are two vital statistics to the health of USCF and US chess, so it
seems to me, and I compare them with UK stats from 35 years ago, when UK
chess was about to birth some 20 GMs from its national club system.

That was a unique and very interesting time! At the same time, the US
was developing some strong GMs as well. No doubt, the UK experience
was much better per capita, but there are always countries who are
going to outperform the per capita statistics -- if not, the World Cup
and many Olympic events would be much less interesting than they
generally turn out.

I am also writing to a PhD doctorate aspirant on these themes; someone who
lives in a substantially more populated country than USA, and he asks some
similar questions about ratings & membership [which is mostly an American
requirement for rating chess] and chess activity - to wit; what is that
relationship?

If you can help me with these datum I should be obliged, as well as perhaps
engaging us with your opinion on this subject independently as a factor of
the health in US chess.

It's really not a subject where I have much expertise. I readily admit
that the area where I feel I can benefit the USCF is finance -- I know
how to balance a budget, we balanced the budget while I was on the
Board, I understand that choices have to be made and won't simply rely
on cooked revenue estimates to make the budget work, etc. That said, I
also have been a strong scholastic and adult tournament player as well
as an author so think I can help with general approach in these areas
as well.

and a firm foundation for the things the USCF should be
expected to provide -- national championships, support for state and
local affiliates, an honest, accurate and timely rating system, and top
notch magazines and other forms of communications with its members.

Which of those are money-dependent [in the sense that USCF needs to partner
with other agencies to fund them?]

It would be great if the USCF can continue to partner with other
agencies to fund things like national championships, and I think there
is greater opportunity to seek out funding from foundations,
governments, etc., even at the local level. This is an area where I
have some history, and I don't think we do as well as we should. At
the same time, the USCF has to be seen as a mainstream, viable
organization with its finances, market plans, and strategic plans in
place for many of these organizations to take the shot. That is
another area where I think, fundamentally, we have fallen down over the
last decade or so. I would want to work on those, and I would expect,
over the term of being on the EB, to be held accountable for results in
these areas.

I lived through this sort of accountability in the State of Iowa. I
was fortunate to work for a principled leader who instilled this
culture throughout government, and I believe we delivered. Budgets
were balanced for 8 years without raising taxes, and Iowa's tax revenue
as a percentage of personal income went from above to below the
national average. At the same time, K-12 test scores improved,
children with health insurance went up, per capita personal income
surpassed the national average, and employment hit record levels. I
doubt we could do the same/similar in terms of improvement for the
USCF, but I'd like to give it a try.

Cordially, Randy Bauer


Cordially, Phil Innes