Legion World Forums LEGION OUTPOST Mission Monitor Board Every 10 Years Forum LMB Constitutional Convention

Everyone should know, that this work your doing is going to be completely ignored by me.

Vu, if I can I'll post the whole thing in a little bit when I get more of a chance, but so far, only a few things have been decided:

- Who is in attendence and who is the chairs of this convention (Kid Prime and Crujectra).

- How the election process will work for LMB Leader.

That's about it, although there is a plethora of other topics to get to.

What's going on is that the LMB, despite a good past few months, had kinda a rough year, and things have gotten a little discombobulated. Combined with the fact that once we all moved here to Legion World, a kind of 'blurriness' took place on specific issues, has led the start of a "Constitutional Convention" on what needs to be straitened out.

The Leadership stuff is priority number #1 for most of us--glad to see its moving.

Not sure if a mission statement is necessary, as I feel the people that can best write it down may not be up for participating (Cru being the exception).

CK What you got there is a good vision/mission. It just needs to be wordsmithed a little. I wouldn't get too hung up on this kinda thing.

While I don't think we wanna be doing this every 6 months, it can always be modified. Also don't ever think that a vision/mission statement that you put on paper is some sort of monument to be interpreted forever through the lens of original intent.

The vagueness you describe is actually not a bad thing if it allows organic growth of the LMB vision as it changes.

Tamper, it relieves my heart to hear you say that. I look forward to any suggestions you or others can make in terms of wordsmithing.

I agree that a certain amount of vagueness may be a good thing.

Most importantly,
That statement is the most important one made thus far in this convention.

<nods with great respect to Tamper Lad>

Glad to know someone's getting at least a little value outta this high-priced education. I think it cost me about 200 bucks to hear that nugget I just gave ya.

Get something down on paper because it's hard especially for those of us who are new here but might have friends that would enjoy this place to explain it at times.

No one heard me when i shouted "I object" - the correct response should have been for the chairperson to recognise the objection and give the objector the recognition required.

As Tamper Lad so succinctly pointed out, some of us are new here and may not be aware of the finer points of the drafting of this updated Constitution.

I think we're in unmoderated caucus LAM.

So are we following a set guideline - or just saying stuff off the top of our heads?

I think we're talking vision/mission for LMB

Well, we're kinda following a guideline with two moderators LAM, but its hard to coordinate with various members logging in and out all day. So sometimes objections won't be recognized until hours later...

Tamper, once more you've made a valid point. Something else else on paper would be nice to give to people that you might want to explain this too...

So that could be our goal, but with the vagueness you've mentioned. I hope I gave some semblance of a guideline. Spellbinder/Cru is the place we should turn to now IMO, and if at all possible, Lash. Then a maybe a few others could hone the wording.

(Tamper: you rock.)

Thank you Cobie and Tamper Lad for clearing the confusion...and Cobie, say a hello and a hearty chin rub for Queen Connie for me, okay?

Note on the back of a Bazooka gum wrapper to the caucus: let's all remember that this IS the LMB we're talking about. At any moment, someone could produce a ray gun and turn me into a chicken. Thus, we are BOTH following guidelines AND saying stuff off the top of our heads. We have the ability here to seriously discuss things that affect people one second and then be turned into spotted dick the next.

Having said that, I agree: let's get the most beloved of all posters in here!

You'd be the last person i would want to cross, Prime...You're the best there is at Legion World

Any progress being made here? I'm not sure what else can be said about a guideline for what the LMB is...

What we could use now:

- Someone to do some sort of a write-up (not me)
- Input from Spellbinder and Lash, and others.

Here's hoping we can hammer out two or three more things by the end of today--can't have DB's prediction of this taking years to be right!

When it comes time to actually define what the leader does, I have a conceptual framework to help you guys think about what a management/leadership job entails by Henry Mintzberg. It's quite helpful.

Thinking more about the vagueness Tamper suggested.

I feel it’s beyond important that we don’t implement too much structure here. There has always been an air of ‘free for all/no structure/informality’ among the LMB, and I don’t think we can afford to lose that. I’ve been alerted by PM that there is some concern that too much structure might hinder this spirit of the LMB. We must remember that when we’re doing this.

**Purr**

You can try to put in all the structure you want Cobalt but there are way too many CATS here for it to matter much...

Ever tried to herd cats? It's fun... for the cats that is...

**Purr**

Cat herding, that was an EDS commercial around the time of the collapse of the tech bubble.

Well, I don't know how formal a mission statement we've ever had, but according to:

LMBP Yahoo Group: "Welcome to the Yahoo!Group home of the Legion of Message Board Posters. Drawn together by our love of the Legion, held together by our friendship and mutual respect. All are welcome here, but please play nice."

and LMBP Outpost: "Welcome to the LMBP Outpost, the Internet home and headquarters of the Legion of Message Board Posters! We were drawn together by a love of DC's Legion of Super-Heroes, but it's the friendships we've forged that keep us together.
Feel free to look around, and click on the links to your left to explore the Outpost galleries and files, as well as the links to our personal Yahoo!Group and the exciting Legion World message board!. If you love the Legion of Super-Heroes, then you're in the right place.
Enjoy!"

So, in reality I view the LMBP as a collection of people, most of whom are fans of the Legion of Super-Heroes, who are drawn together in their search for a place to share their thoughts and common interests with others without fear of censure if they are "off topic", provided that they are respectful of others when doing so.

In LMBP continuity, I feel that the LMBP was formed by fans of the Legion of Super-Heroes. Over time, they have attracted other fans and (perhaps) social and heroic misfits who use their powers and abilities to fight for justice throughout the universe and on their adopted homeworld, Legion World.

Structure in of itself does not cause a formal stuffiness. In fact a well-executed structure with clear ground-rules is the foundation of the creative free-for-all process.

The worst thing for creative fun is ambiguity. When you have to ask yourself whether you should or shouldn't do something and you don't know where the boundaries are you either play it too safe and don't have fun or you step on someone's toes which is no fun at all.

**Purr**

Put in too many rules and you'll feel like you're chasing cats on horseback.

You can be too smart sometimes...

**Purr**

As for the "constitution," I agree that anything done here should be very informal and as simple as possible. Setting up guidelines for LMBP Leader Elections is fine, as is writing down a very brief and simplified "job description" for the Leader.

However, how far are we planning to take this process? If the goal is to actually hammer out some form of formal "constitution", then I think that is probably too much. There has been discussion in the past about how much structure to impose on the LMBP membership, and it has always been agreed that less is more in terms of formal regulations.

The more structure you impose, the less casual and fun things become, which really goes against everything that the LMBP stands for.

But that's just my opinion

The only three elements that absolutely necessary are
1) some sort of capsule defnition of LMBP which is more or less what you've presented just a mission guiding principle type thing.

2) mechanism for elections.

3) Something else else about the role of the leader. Nothing as formal as even a job description just a framework is enough. Just a list of "hats" s/he might wear in the course of the term. The leader can define what it means for her/him.

I think the four of us are in agreement here, regarding structure/informality. The breeziness is an important part, but with a simple structure to help push forth 'creative free-for-all' it works very well. (Nicely put, Tamper).

Despite starting out as what may have seemed like two ends of one arguement, I think this is a pretty coherent idea.

Here's Mintzberg's the 10 "hats" as I put it, I've taken the liberty of contextualizing his descriptions. (If any of you is interested in management I really reccommend his books. A bit dry but his back to basics no-nonsense approach is in vogue right now.)

InterPersonal Roles
Figurehead - Ceremonial duties both here and in the real world
Personal Leader - Guiding and advising fellow members
Liason - Representing LMBP to the other functional units in our case Legion World

Informational Roles
Monitor - really just gathering observations of members
Dissemination - collating and announcing the above
Spokesperson - to the outside world if needed

Decisional
Entrepreneur - look for new opportunities encourage members to take them
Disturbance Handler - hopefully by mediation, but if necessary...
Resource allocator - whatever this means in this context
Negotiator - on our behalf, if needed