stephlocke / passideas

Suggest, upvote, and see feedback on ideas for PASS

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passideas's Issues

Explore 501(c)(6) tax-exempt nonprofit status as a business league

PASS is a not-for-profit corporation under Illinois law, but is subject to taxes on its income under applicable federal and state laws. Income taxes are provided for the tax effects of transactions reported in the financial statements and consist of taxes currently due or received plus deferred taxes related primarily to timing differences in expense recognition between financial statements and income tax reporting and the potential tax benefits or tax losses carried forward to future years. Deferred income tax assets and liabilities represent future tax return consequences of those items.

PASS has tax operating losses carried forward of approximately $1,120,000 as of June 30, 2019. Management anticipates that PASS will have sufficient taxable income in future years to fully utilize those losses.
Source

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On the surface, PASS should be able to qualify as a tax-exempt 501(c)(6) nonprofit as a business league, which would allow it to stop depending on operating losses in order to cover future income. Additionally a proper tax-exempt status may help PASS qualify for additional cost savings on many other fronts.

PASS should explore what steps would be necessary to achieve proper 501(c)(6) tax exempt status, including a cost/benefit analysis. PASS should share that analysis transparently with the community--particularly if the determination is made that it cannot qualify as a 501(c)(6) tax exempt business league.

Regular updates from the executive committee

I would suggest that one of the executive committee provide a state of the organization each month, after a meeting. This might include explanation or details on what was in the meeting, or even trailing the meetings and discussing the minutes approved for the previous meeting.

Community thoughts on PASS

We should collect information about PASS is perceived and start looking at what PASS members value:

• A PASS members "census" style survey to gather feedback (and support #9)
• Social listening and NLP for identifying common issues (this can be done with Logic Apps, a spreadsheet, and a bit of Cognitive Services for cheap)

What other ways could we solicit feedback, particularly from the ~120k eligible PASS members who didn't vote?

Provide training to local group & SQLSaturday organizers for AHP violations

Currently PASS makes it easy for organizers to opt-in to the AHP for SQLSaturdays. Organizers need to only check a box. (To my knowledge there is no equivalent option made available for Local Groups / PASS affiliate user group meetings.

However, PASS provides no training to local organizers, and the SQLSaturday License Agreement requires that local organizers indemnify PASS for any legal actions arising from the event. This essentially puts the local organizers on the line, both from a reputation & legal standpoint, in the event of a major incident of harassment or abuse during an event.

PASS should provide appropriate training & resources for local organizers to be fully equipped to deal with AHP violations at their local events--both SQLSaturday and user group meetups. Without this support from PASS, local organizers are often lost and helpless, both for how to properly implement a code of conduct, how to manage incident reports, and how to respond.

In order to build a safe and welcoming community, requiring that training will ensure that local events can be safe, welcoming environments. Codes of conduct are important, and PASS should not only make it easier for them to be adopted, but provide the additional support & training to ensure organizers are not just ticking a box without proper implementation.

This training should be run similar to the way most employers run their various cybersecurity & sexual harassment training, with periodic (yearly) re-training.

Open Source SQL Saturday

The SQL Saturday site likely does not include an IP that is critical to the organization. I would propose this be run as an open source project that allows the community to contribute enhancements and fixes. A committee can triage, evaluate, and debate PRs or Issues and help ensure that regular enhancements and bug fixes can be delivered.

Quarterly Updates from Directors

Each director for PASS is elected, and as such, they ought to provide the membership with some statement of their work, effort, accomplishments or thoughts on the organization. I would suggest this ought to occur each quarter.

The $500 hackathon

I would like to put together a hackathon where the PASS HQ and community members work together to build solutions or alternative technology demonstrators that cost less than $500 per year to run.

Getting IT spend ($600k this FY) down is a helpful way of addressing the deficit without reducing service to the community. Our community is a technology community that is particularly well equipped to support PASS in this area.

Sponsor proposition working group

The experience/ROI at the latest virtual Summit was poor for sponsors. Summit revenues from sponsors and the importance of 365 sales and more to PASS' ongoing financial viability, this is critical to turn around.

I would like to see a working group or advisory committee put together with some of PASS' sponsors to identify some approaches for a new sponsor / attendee engagement model that can be trialed over coming months.

Open Data on Meeting and Events

I'd like to see data from our chapters, SQL saturdays, Summit, and other events published for analysis. Meetings, number of attendees, diversity, speakers, etc. can be collected and shared.

Make the AHP or a Code of Conduct mandatory for all events and local groups

Currently adopting the SQLSaturday AHP is optional for SQLSaturday events, and there is no mechanism for Local Groups to adopt the AHP, and must adopt their own Code of Conduct.

PASS should require that all PASS-affiliated entities adopt a baseline code of conduct (presumably, the existing AHP).

Local groups & events should be allowed to supplement the AHP with additional protections & event-specific details, as necessary or appropriate for that group, so long as they maintain a consistent baseline. ie) Events should have autonomy to do more, but not to do less.

In order for this to be feasible. PASS will need to provide training & resources to local organizers first, so that they are equipped to manage their codes of conduct.

Organizers who are unwilling or unable to adopt a baseline code of conduct should have their Local Group Agreement or SQLSaturday License Agreement revoked.

Internationalization of PASS resources and events

Let's support members from different parts of the world by providing a multi-lingual experience.

i18n

• PASS main site
• SQL Saturday template
• User group template

Create Vendor Diversity on Board Seats

PASS was started by CA and Microsoft. As the data platform and mission have evolved, and with CA leaving the board, I think having multiple vendors here might be good. I would look to sell two board seats. Perhaps in a permanent way to someone like GOOG or AMZN, or maybe on a term, perhaps 3 years, to any vendor that would want to support the community and provide leadership and ideas.

Engage/partner with groups that support underrepresented groups

PASS should form ongoing / strong relationships with groups such as Out in Tech or Blacks in Technology.

These partnerships should strive to not only grow the PASS Community & Membership in a diverse way, but to mutually benefit both groups. These groups would certainly be able to assist PASS in understanding the needs of different underrepresented groups, which PASS has so far been unable to significantly increase the number of members & community leaders from these groups.

Adopt a policy governing non-discrimination standards for contractors & suppliers

In order to ensure that suppliers act in a manner that adheres to a business' own standards, many businesses establish standards of conduct that set expectations for behavior of their suppliers. This is especially important for businesses that rely on suppliers in other countries.

Many businesses include expectations of non-discrimination in their supplier standards.

For example, the IBM Supplier Conduct Principles: Guidelines states:

IBM Suppliers will not discriminate in hiring and employment practices on grounds of race, religion, age, nationality, social or ethnic origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity or expression, marital status, pregnancy, political affiliation, or disability.

Source

As the largest group of Microsoft Data Professionals in the world, PASS's size gives it the ability & duty to ensure their contractors & suppliers have adopted baseline non-discrimination standards.

In particular, PASS Should ensure that major contractors/suppliers such as Christianson & Company have the same high standard for their employees as PASS (should) have for their community members at events.

Collect data about the diversity of the community & events

The About PASS page states "PASS is a not-for-profit organization run by and for a diverse community." However, this has not been my experience, and there is no data to back up this assertion.

PASS has traditionally refused to track "diversity" metrics -- not even gender. Collecting that, in any form, for any aspect of the community... is critical to measuring and improving PASS's problem with inclusion & diversity.

Both annual surveys and demographic data are valuable tools in measuring diversity, inclusion, and the efficacy of an organization's efforts. Anecdotal qualitative stories are not an effective way to measure any of these things and do not justify the assertion on the About PASS page.