While the current Board only has three months left of its tenure there is still a lot that we want to do in that time. I wanted to update members on our proposed activity. Three months is one eighth of our total time in office!
First, and most importantly, we want to elect a strong new Board – one that will set the agenda for UK backgammon through to 2019 The first part of this process is to ensure that we get enough good quality applicants and applications. Please do consider standing. You have one day left to self-nominate. You can find details of how to do so here: https://ukbgf.com/elections-ukbgf-board-2017-8/ It won’t take you more than 15 minutes. UK Backgammon needs you. We will publish the voting details once we have all of the nominations in. We would expect to know the new Board by mid-October. Please stand.
Secondly, we want to induct the new Board and ensure a smooth and orderly transition. To this end we will be inviting the new Board to the October, November and December Board meetings and will immediately be seeking their advice and council on a number of pressing issues that need to be decided on. We will hold a joint planning session where we will help the new Board set their key objectives for 2017 and 2018. We will also support with logistics and paperwork such as how and where Board meetings will be held and access to the website, bank account, social media accounts etc.
Thirdly, we will be deciding the events and scoring for the 2017 UKBGF Tour. Obviously the new Board will have a key role in this. This planning will include decisions on what tournaments (if any) the UKBGF will run in 2017 and 2018 and where and when those tournaments might be.
Fourth, I am setting up a Equalities and Diversity Working Group to look at how we can encourage more people from all sections of our community to play backgammon. This group will make a series of recommendations to the Board about how we can get better at attracting a diverse range of players and how we can better serve a diverse range of players. I have asked Mike Murton to Chair this group and I am delighted to announce that he has accepted the position. If you would like to sit on this group please email: sean@ukbgf.com I will support Mike any way that I can with this going forward.
Fifth, we will be conducting a full review of the website and looking at how we present ourselves to the outside world and potential new players.
Sixth, we will be reviewing our membership lists and ratings system and looking for opportunities to grow the membership.
Seventh, we will be adding more data to the Ratings System to make it even more complete and accurate.
Lastly, we will be reviewing our progress against the objectives we set ourselves two years ago: https://ukbgf.com/ukbgf-future/ We will particularly focus on where we have fallen short so that we can work with the new Board to learn from what we have done to date. Both what has worked and what has not.
There are three months left but there is still a lot to do!
Yours,
Sean Williams
Chair
UKBGF
Point 4 makes me very happy. I think it would be very important to have someone who knows what about the implications of living in a World where equality does not exist. Someone who has fought hard to change the world that they live in to make it more equal for all. Someone with experience.