Notes for TDA Reports, 2006

 

I spend aproximately 6 to 8 hours a day, 6 to 7 days a week on Fellowship IT tasks.  Less than 20% of my time is now devoted directly to website development and the majority of that time is devoted to maintenance just to keep present services working.   I have become a combination IT Administrator and reader services provider with the following primary tasks:

 

            1. Spanish language reader services

            2. IT managment: Database Administration, Network Administration, system maintenance.

            3. Corporate Help Desk services

            4. Software and technology evaluation, long term planning

 

It is important to appreciate that these are not static tasks.  Our IT services are evolving, rapidly growing processes upon which our enterprise increasingly depends.  The big issues are technological developmental direction, differentiation of tasks into separate domains of responsibilty with attention paid to appropriate staffing levels, and continuing evaluation of the degree to which the implementation of new procedures and technologies keep us on course for the execution of our mission.

 

That these matters have been consistenly brought before the Executive Committee for a number of years and the best response has been to create a committee to make suggestions about what should be on the website home page is illustrative of large scale administrative failure.  The organizational development which consumes the most financial resources and has the greatest long-term implications for how the Fellowship conducts its business and promulgates the work of the revelation continues to evolve without informed, timely, and relevant management by the Executive Committee or the officers. 

 

Unless this situation is quickly addressed, we risk organizational breakdown just at a time when we are crossing the threshold into an era of increasing demand for reader services and opportunities for worldwide dissemination of the revelation.   It is essential that we have healthy administrative and technological foundations from which we can meet these opportunities.  This is the responsibilty of each member of the General Council and the Executive Committee.  It requires that each person spend more time becoming better informed.  It requires better communication about substantial issues.  It requires making sure that our officers and as many members of the Executive Committee as possible are individuals who have sufficient backgrounds in IT related business issues to provide appropriate guidance for The Fellowship, to competently undertake the administrative procedure and staffing changes needed for stable growth.

 

Some Important Philosophic Considerations for the Fellowship Website

 

The Primary Website purpose should be to focus on Book dissemination.  The importance of book dissemination is something that nearly all readers agree upon.  When we start shifting the focus to particular views of what the book is or means, when we begin to focus on presenting the social community of readers, we begin to plant seeds of sectarian division.  As soon as we leave book dissemination as the primary focus, we find ourselves dealing with a significant submerged conflict within the readership -- the conflict between readers who want to make sure that the book is presented to the world free of any religous -- and particularly Christian -- associations, and others who feel that presenting the religion of Jesus and working to transform Christianity should be the highest priorities.  This conflict has simmered below the surface in the readership since before the beginning of dissemination in 1955.  The importance of book dissemination is the only thing which transcends this and is the element which can assure a unified effort to spread the book worldwide.  The world needs The Urantia Book far more than it needs more sectarian competition.  All readers need to work together on this task regardless of their differing views on what the book is.

 

Groups with special interests, rather than contending for control of Fellowship web resources, should focus on the creation of specialized websites.  Truthbook is a good example of a site developed to express the views of Christian readers.  But where is a site for introducing the book to Jewish readers?  To Islamic readers?  To Buddhist readers?  These are important resources in need of development.  Dynamic diversity -- and diversity without conflict -- is likely to be more stimulating than a generic presentation which attempts to offend no one.

 

Fellowship IT Services Report

 

In his comments to the 2000 TDA, outgoing President Steve Dreier noted that, "Our major organizations are facing the choice of reform or failure.  Our present system has exhausted the potential if its infancy." 

 

During the years since then our administrative procedures have changed in relatively minor ways.  Much of the way we conduct our affairs remains the same as when Steve made his comments in 2000.

 

What has changed significantly has been the evolution of IT services and their present dominance at the leading edge of organizational development.  Present IT services go well beyond the provision of a website and email services.  As a result of selling our physical office we began conducting increasing amounts of our business online.  The accompanying diagrams show not only our present system, but the degree to which this system has evolved in the past decade. 

 

The challenge of the next group of officers will be to integrate emerging IT services and functions with more appropriate and supportive administrative procedures.  For this reason it is extremely important that officers elected to this coming term -- in addition to having the spiritual insight needed to direct the course of revelation dissemination -- must have the practical business experience with IT matters needed to direct the course of organizational development at the particular stage of evolution in which we find ourselves.

 

Current IT Issues

 

This past year we implemented an online contribution form which includes the ability to process monthly autodebits and to process credit card transactions online.  As pointed out in Robert Burns' Finance Committee Report, we have contracted with an outside firm to create for us an online Point Of Sale system.  This is like having a cash register in a store, but in the case of a POS, it is online and can be used from anywhere that we have an Internet connection -- from an office anywhere in the world, from a conference bookstore, etc.  Extensive reports are available to administrative staff.

 

Plans are being made to integrate the information in the POS system with our reader database, as well as with the bookkeeping software.  

 

This past year Bobbie Dreier took on the maintenance of the Study Group Directory and with Steve's help we always have the latest contact information available on the website.  What Steve and Bobbie are doing illustrates what will be a growing trend in the next few years -- individuals accessing subsets of our organizational data in order to perform specific service projects.

 

The Fellowship is in need of a Database Administrator who can do the planning and programming to make more of this potential functionality available for the work of the revelation. 

 

We are currently negotiating with a Denver-based technology company whose CEO is a Urantia Book reader and who has offered help with IT services hosting.  It looks as if we will be able to add a second server to our network (one for public web services and one for internal administrative services) while at the same time we substantially reduce our monthly costs.

 

The Fellowship is in need of a Network Services Administrator who can manage server usage, software, and security issues.

 

We need to be recognize that we are evolving an IT administrative model which has three primary divisions:

            1. Database Administrator

            2. Network Services Administrator

            3. Website (and mail) Services Administrator

 

One of the challenges of the incoming officers and Executive Committee members will be carefully and consciously to manage this evolution so that it does not proceed in a haphazard way as a response to crises and needs demanding immediate attention due to lack of planning.

 

Website Issues

 

A reconstituted Website Content Committee has begun to function under the direction of Peter Laurence.  This is the current manifestation of an effort which began

 

 

Please understand my positoin here:  I think a website content committee is a very important development.  But the present situation requires a good sense of priorities which is not present in this decision.  It simply is not appropriate to be spending your time considering the style of furniture you're going to put in the dining room of your finished house when your contractor is knocking on your door asking for help in the pouring of your foundation.

 

 

 

But I will emphasize once again that what is most needed at the present time are people who can do the actual technical work -- this has become critical.  The best of committees can only make suggestions which in turn add to the list of technical tasks needing to be done.  With the attention of the current webmaster spread across the spectrum of growing Fellowship IT needs, very little is getting done with the degree of attention and quality of workmanship that would be desirable. 

 

It is extremely important that the incoming officers be knowledgable enough to undertake a review of our IT situation and actively participate in the establishment of priorities and allocation of resources.  Our list of IT tasks continues to grow while the number of individuals working on these tasks remains unchanged. 

 

A clear enough understanding of our IT situation to enable the productive establishment of priorities is one of our most critical administrative needs.

 

From the standpoint of Webmaster, here are the outstanding website needs.  Items 1 through :

            1. Upgrading of code used for web pages so that editing of content can be done on groups of documents rather than individual documents.
            2. Identification of key pages and their optimization for search engine returns.

            3. Person to specialize in search engine submissions and management.

            4. Collection of statistical data on users; evaluation of archived log files.

            5. Collaboration with professional designers on website visual layout and navigation scheme.

            6. Publication of backlog of Spanish materials.

            7. Development of a more coherent website architecture; implementation of a user segmentation model; this would provide access to certain areas for members, certain areas for administrative groups, etc.

            8. Translation of instruction pages for the polylingual search engine.

            9. Revisions to Spanish website.

            10. Preparation of polylingual introductory materials -- for people discovering The Urantia Book for the first time.

            11. Preparation of orientation materials -- Introductory orientation for new readers to help them find their way into the text.

            12. Integration of Fellowship DVD recordings with text of The Urantia Book on the website.

            13. Formatting and publication of Spanish topical index.

            14. Format polylingual versions of Paramony.

            15. Review and update site indexes to integrate with the index for the digital archive project.

            16. Complete integration of border templates with content pages.

            17. Create single paragraph descriptions for each paper in the book for use by search engines.  Translate these.

            18. Complete programming for insertion of Paper:Section.Paragraph tags in translations.

            21. Consolidate audio files and prepare separate website section for streaming media server.

            22. Automate study group directory updates.

 

It is important that we move to a website content architecture that reflects the work of Fellowship committees.  At present, website services are evolving in a direction which parallels the work of a number of committees.  If we do not make a conscious effort to integrate our committees with website content and services, a parallel system of services will evolve along with a duplication of effort, philosophical approach, and use of financial resources.  Features provided on the website are already beginning to parallel the work of International, Outreach, Interfaith, Membership, Education, and Publications. The best integration presently exists with International and Finance. 

 

Councilors can help tremendously in this situation by considering any IT skills and experience that committee nominees might have -- especially when electing committee chairs and organization officers.    

 

One of the resolutions coming out of the General Council retreat in Newport Beach in February of 2004 was the following:

 

a.    Create a website strategy that integrates as fully as possible the common dissemination and outreach goals of The Fellowship, Foundation, and IUA.

b.   The website needs experts who can help design and implement a more user-friendly online presentation targeted to audiences and their needs. It is too much work for one person.

 

At its meeting of September 19, 2004, the General Council approved the following: 

Item 2a – Each standing committee needs to appoint a web liaison person. David Kantor will chair the committee. It will deal with content issues. It will conference periodically.  To begin David will send an email to each standing and ad-hoc committee asking for a representative.

 

There was never any significant followup on this beyond my sending of a few emails to the committtee chairs.  It turned out that there simply weren't individuals available who had the requisite skills to implement this.

 

I still believe that this is the ideal approach to Internet services development and hope that it can be implemented as soon as possible.  

 

 

 

 

Insightful planning and administrative coordination will also enable The Fellowship to provide important additional services for Societies, committee work, study groups, and other related groups of revelation workers.

 

Last year I created a document which contained backup information for our critical services.  This has evolved into an almost 40 page document which is becoming The Fellowship IT Operations Manual.  This contains information on all IT processes, software, vendor relations, and so forth which are relevant to The Fellowship.  Because of the extremely confidential nature of some of the information contained in this manual, it is made available to only a few individuals involved in keeping our IT services running.  At present it is updated on a quarterly basis.

 

Digital Archive Project

 

An important spinoff from the website has been the Digital Archive Project which continues to develop.  I am including reports from Larry Watkins and Victoria Clark as appendices to this report.

 

This project developed naturally from our efforts to digitize and publish readership materials which existed on paper, magnetic tape, and other media.  The archive represents an organized approach to cataloging and storing this growing collection of digitized materials. 

 

Website Philosophy

 

            1. Make sure all information is available to all readers

            2. Exploit the wide range of information we have available so that people going to the Internet to search for specific information will discover The Urantia Book in the context of their particular search.

            3.  Focus on the book.  There is a great deal of diversity in the readership community.  But the importance of stimulating interest in The Urantia Book seems to interest everyone.

            4. Avoid the creation of a website which reflects the interests of only one subset of the readership.

            5. Publish only those materials which relate directly to the teachings of The Urantia Book or the historical social evolution of the readership.

            6. Provide only those services which minimize the amount of maintenance needing to be done until more workers are involved.

            7. Don't tell people what they should believe.  Provide them with as wide a range of information as possible so that they can have their own experience.  Respect the nature of personal religious experience.

            8. Avoid the presentation of Urantia Book readers as being predominantely from  a particular cultural or religious context. Help Societies and various local groups to provide web pages which reflect their own activities and constituient groups, but don't allow any one of them to assume that they represent the culture of "Fellowship members".

 

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Success means growth rather than completion.  Long term planning is necessary if staff and financial resources are to be adequate for fostering the success of present programs.

 

The IT system has grown too complex for our limited staff resoruces.  Things cannot be done to the level of quality desirable.  Things break and take time to fix.  We can:

            1. Increase staffing

            2. Reduce our use of IT resources

            3. Accept a mediocre level of performance

 

Our failure to evolve adequate staffing reflects a prejudice that we are a volunteer organization and everything should be done by volunteers and committees.  If we are to evolve into an organization serving a global readership, mmaking efficient use of contributed funds, we will need to hire professional staff in some areas.  We don't set up committees to do our accounting or to resolve legal problems that come up.  We hire professionals because these areas require a high degree of specialized knowledge.  IT services are the same.  They require specialized knowlege and a long-term perspective that is not possible with volunteers.  

 

We want a better websitee but we consistently cut funds requested for professional design consulting from our budget.

 

The success of present projects and the growth of our abilities to serve a growing international readership will likely result in the evolution of departments with paid staff working under the auspices of volunteer committees.  Attention needs to be given now to planning for this inevitable stage of development.  The alternative is for the Executive Committee to foster business relationships with outside consultants who are paid on a per task basis.  The costs and benefits of these two approaches need careful consideration. 

 

The immediate task is to act to secure the gains that have been made over past years.  Yes, there are problems and areas greatly in need of improvement.  But unless present gains are shored up with appropriate technical support, we risk breakdown anda period of recovery that we really can't afford.  We can keep moving forward only if we can temper our hopes and idelaism with practical meaterial steps to secure gains slowly made. 

 

There is a present effort to better integrate existing major Urantian websites.  Truthbook, Fellowship, UBRON, etc -- evolve a network of specialized sites.  We can focus on presenting the book; UBRON can focus on providing online forums, Truthbook can focus on providing Jesusonian inspiration, etc.  There is a great deal of advantage to the presentation of diversity rather than a doctrinaire position on what the book is or means.

 

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State of the Fellowship Report

 

The Urantia Movement could turn out to be the first major religious movement to develop in the post-information era -- we do not have big investments in real estate, temples, etc.  This allows us to be mean and lean in our movement into the world.

 

The readership community is extremely diverse in its religious inclinations.  In fact, it could be argued that the demographics of the readership community (at least in North America) replicate the religous demographics in the general population in the same geographic region -- from the charismatic to the philosophical. 

 

Check past TDA reports and make note of unfinished business -- find info on sequence of website committee actions.  Check on directive to provide better communication from the EC down to the Council. 

 

From Council minutes of 2/34/2004

 

Jack Kane discussed a variety of matters that are not clear to him as a new councilor. He suggested that attention be given to providing new councilors with adequate information for them to understand what motions are currently in effect.

David Kantor asked for help in getting back copies of minutes. He is missing many copies of minutes. John Hales will provide copies from the office files.

Lila Dogim suggests we review status of decisions from prior meeting at subsequent meeting. There was considerable agreement that this should be done in the future. The EC will develop a method for doing this.

 

From the Council retreat in Newport Beach 02/07/04:

 

Assigned to EC:

 

a.    Create a website strategy that integrates as fully as possible the common dissemination and outreach goals of The Fellowship, Foundation, and IUA.

b.   The website needs experts who can help design and implement a more user-friendly online presentation targeted to audiences and their needs. It is too much work for one person.

 

Resolution: (from minutes of 9/19/04 Council meeting:

 

Item 2a – Each standing committee needs to appoint a web liaison person. David Kantor will chair the committee. It will deal with content issues. It will conference periodically.  To begin David will send a email to each standing and ad-hoc committee asking for a representative.

 

New York Society Resolution from 2003 TDA requested that the website provide:

            1. List of current Councilors and their terms

            2. Contact information for Councilors

            3. List of current EC members and their terms

            4. List of current Society officers and their terms

            5. Minutes and reports

 

From June 30, 2002 TDA Meeting:

 

New York Society resolution:

1. The Executive Committee shall publish the Executive Committee Letter after each General Council meeting at a minimum, and these newsletters will include reports on any activity by the standing and ad hoc committees within 30 days; and

2. The President shall share the proposed agenda of General Council meetings with the societies no less than 30 days prior to the meeting; and

3. After the meeting of the General Council the summary of the actions taken to the societies within 60 days of the meeting.

Resolution #3 from the June 2000 TDA:

Whereas the Fellowship is a democratic organization comprised of and responsible to its members and their Societies, and,

Whereas the essence of a democratic organization is the ability of its constituents to provide informed input to their elected governing bodies through awareness of their activities, now therefore;

Be it resolved, that the General Council and Executive Committee shall keep the membership frequently and openly informed of their actions and decisions (14 for, 0 opposed, 1 abstension).

 

From 1997 TDA:

First Society Resolution:

WHEREAS Societies are intended by the Constitution of The Fellowship to be the component parts of The Fellowship, and

WHEREAS Societies are channels through which Fellowship members hold their membership, and

WHEREAS Societies are the most effective agents for development of local study and fellowship in the movement.

NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the General Council and Executive Committee formally and promptly apprise the Societies of their actions and decisions, and,

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the General Council and Executive Committee consider the impact on Societies of all actions which they are contemplating.

 

Emphasize this ongoing request to be informed; the clear sense that there neeeds to be better communication between and among revelation workers. 

---------------

Try to get a history of "web oversight committee"

First was after I published Keeler information.

Second was with Dan Massey, Steve Dreier, and maybe someone else.

Review process up to present Content committee and IT committee.  Review problems with current approach and suggest structure.  Suggest six year plan and suggest plan for migration to this new system.  Council and  2009 TDA should demand reports on progress. 

Review materials from original IT overview.

 

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Fellowship Sea Change

            Need for more long-term planning and financing

            Responding to emerging needs in the field rather than self-conceived projects

            Need for business savy combined with spiritual vision and insight

 

 

Be sure to stress continuity with organic process; importance of contributions made by previous officers and EC and Council members.

 

 

Counselors must assume responsibility to keep themselves informed.  If you get an official letter from the EC it is going to be politically biased and watered down for general consumption.  Call an EC member -- or several members -- after each EC meeting and ask questions.  Find out what is really going on.  Discuss it amongst yourselves -- socadmin is a good forum. The Council should not just be a rubber stamp organization.  It needs it's own officers.  When it has the same officers as the EC, those officers can easily manipulate the Council into a subservient, rubber-stamp organization. 

 

Robert -- his excellent organization of the logo committee -- seeing a project through to finish without micromanaging.

 

 

 

Future:  Committees as departments with paid staff; the importance of evolving a virtual organization in a difficult world; we're the first potentially major religious movement not saddled with real estate and offices -- we can zip forward using virtual technologies and decentralized (international) administration.  We will need to experiment and evolve.

 

International will need to evolve a support mechanism -- travel planning and logistics; support of folks in the field; evolve a new philosophy of evangelical mission work for the new age of digital communications,  appropriate to the revelation; don't forget intimate personal work -- interpersonal relationships provide the foundation for the kingdom and for our work.  Combine high quality interpersonal relationships with appropriately applied technology and supportive finance. 

 

Contribution base must be widespread; having only a few big contributors gives those contributors an unreasonable and dangerous amount of personal political power; encourage tithing.

 

 

Future:

 

Publications:  Reader periodicals and newsletters (electronic as well as print media); support materials for international work, expos, book fairs, etc., CD, DVD, and other relevant media products;

 

Finance: Aggressive fund raising, investment management strategies, endowment fund, reaching for the point at which the annual budgets can be financed by returns on investments and endowment funds;  

 

Education: 

 

Interfaith:

 

There is a need to integrate the work of Uversa Press marketing with the website so that there is a unified set of images presented to the public.

 

At present we have a readership community which is characterized by a wide range of diversity.  We can all agree on the need for book distribution.  As soon as we start getting away from this, the basic underlying conflict of the Urantia movement appears -- the conflict between those who want the world to view The Urantia Book in terms of an exalted humanism which avoides identification with any particular religious context, and those who take seriously Jesus' admonition to be taking the gospel of the kingdom to the uttermost parts of the earth and long to participate in the transformation of the religion about Jesus into the religion of Jesus.  This conflict is unconscious in some segments of the readership; it is palapble in the deliberations of the Executive Committee.  There are those who see their mission as preventing the Urantia movement from being perceived as a particular religious movement, and others who want to move it in the direction of confronting Christianity with its exploitative abuse of the life and teachings of the Master.

 

 

We want to foster a religion of selfless service rather than a movement of consumption -- we want the Fellowship to be seen as a medium through which service efforts can be amplified, not an organization that is going to provide resources and services that I can consume. 

 

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International Report

 

Outreach trip followup kits

 

International: Issue of employees or contractors being EC members -- The EC was clear that it did not want to legislate on this matter and that future ECs should be able to consider this on an individual basis.  The issue should be decided on an individual basis relative to what is best for the work of the revelation and not from a standpoint of preserving a particular bureaucratic model.