2014 PDGA Board Candidates Announced
2014 PDGA Board Candidates Announced
The PDGA Nominating Committee is pleased to announce the following four PDGA members as candidates for the 2014 PDGA Board of Directors elections. The PDGA elections will take place during the month of July and will once again be administered electronically by Intelliscan. Two at-large board member positions will be elected this year and the two candidates receiving the most votes will serve three year terms from September 1, 2014 to August 31, 2017.
Skyler ML Babcock, #44957 - Missouri
City/State: Columbia, MO
Born: 1984
Gender: Male
Introduction Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WgxhX-vezrA&feature=youtu.be
Education: B.A. Religious Studies, University of Missouri, Columbia
Occupation: Manager, Play It Again Sports, Columbia, MO
Marcy Borelli, #37881 - South Carolina
City/State: North Augusta, SC
Born: 1969
Gender: Female
Education: AAS Computer Science
Occupation: Co-owner of Killer B Disc Golf retail store, Customer Account Specialist for an international
manufacturing company
Robert Decker, CPA, #17745 - Kansas
City/State: Wichita, KS
Born: 1954
Gender: Male
Introduction Video: http://youtu.be/9UgKN7mEwh4
Education: Bachelors of Science, emphasis in accounting from Wichita State University
Occupation: Certified Public Accountant (CPA) in private practice. (Current PDGA Board Treasurer)
Rebecca Duffy, #33115 - Oregon
City/State: Dexter, OR
Born: 1969
Gender: Female
Education: Masters in Business concentrating on Technology and Industrial, Minor in Music
Occupation: Business Consultant – Owner of CamoCreek Business Consulting (Current PDGA Board President)
The PDGA Board of Directors formed the Nominating Committee with the overall goal being to enhance the quality of the election pool, ultimately improving the effectiveness of the elected Board. The principal motivation for this effort is the realization that the responsibilities of PDGA board members have become significantly more demanding as the organization and the sport has grown larger and more complex.
The charge to the committee was two-fold, both to provide outreach to promising new candidates for the Board and to identify the business skills, training and other abilities that contributed to productive service on the board.
It can be a daunting task to fairly evaluate a candidates potential for effective service on the board. In order to assist the voters and make the assessments as fair as possible, the PDGA Nominating Committee created a set of metrics that could be applied equally to each candidate. Realizing that this would be an inexact science, the goal was to identify some of the key attributes that we felt were deemed important for a PDGA board member to possess. The factors that were selected are listed below.
Training and/or Experience in:
- Competitive Disc Golf
- Disc Golf Organization
- Finance
- Sales and Marketing
- Tech Management and Development
- Human Resources Management
- Journalism
- Event Production
Skilled in:
- Oral Communication
- Written Communication
- Promotion
- Listening to Others
Intangibles:
- Enthusiasm for the Task
- Time Availability
- Collaborative
- Creative Innovator
- Vision
- Flexible/Adaptable
- Respected
We suggest that you carefully read the candidate bios and statements and make your own assessment of how each candidate matches up with these attributes.
The committee also suggests a second evaluation to provide a more practical assessment of each candidate’s potential for useful service on the board. To do that, we suggest that you imagine that you have your choice of all of the candidates for a number of typical PDGA board task assignments. See how each of the candidates matches up with these tasks. If you find yourself consistently picking out a candidate for numerous assignments, that’s a significant indicator. If, on the other hand, you can’t find a fit for a candidate, then that may be a sign that there would be the same situation on the board. The goal is to achieve a more typical and real-world assessment of each candidate’s abilities. The suggested tasks to consider are listed below.
- Moderating a member forum at Worlds
- Overseeing a redesign of pdga.com
- Selecting an editor for Disc Golfer magazine
- Liaison to the Rules Committee
- Overseeing PDGA actions in a lawsuit
- Coordinating the revamp of the PDGA logo
- Liaison with a youth development program
- Reviewing the PDGA's annual auditor's report
- Liaison to the Tech Standards Committee
- Providing IDGC staffing oversight
- Selection of a PDGA Executive Director
- Liaison to the Course Design Group
- Redesigning the national tour
The Bottom Line
As in any election, there are many important factors on which you simply won’t have enough information. In the case of candidates that you may know personally, they may gain advantage or be held unfairly accountable for things that you know about their past actions. Candidates who you don’t know are impossible to assess on some of the key factors and also may gain advantage by presenting biographical information that is not reflective of their true abilities. Candidates who have long, successful experience in PDGA work have a clear advantage in our evaluation process. If you have a job that needs to be done, it’s natural to pick the proven veteran over the unknown. However, we also know that it’s essential to have fresh perspectives and proven business experience on a successful board. It’s hard to give that untapped potential its fair weight in this process. In short, it’s very difficult to predict how effective any particular candidate may actually be as a board member.
For now, we hope that you’ll find that these assessment tools help you focus on the kind of board member that you want to move the PDGA forward to the future that you imagine.
Please Vote!
When you receive your email ballot in early July, please take a few minutes of your time to complete and submit it. In doing so not only are you fulfilling one of your basic rights and responsibilities as a PDGA member, but you are also demonstrating that the work performed by these core volunteers is important and worthwhile, both for you personally, and for the PDGA and disc golf as a whole.
For more information, visit the PDGA elections page.
Comments
Anyone who has any questions
Anyone who has any questions they would like to ask may contact me at [email protected]. We can talk about disc golf and the direction of the PDGA for as long as you like.
Sincerely,
Skyler Babcock