Timeline for Election

The polls will open in early October and stay open for 30 days. The Leadership Development/Governance Committee plans to announce the final ballot on the AGU website by early September. Election results will be announced in November, and newly elected members of the Board and Council will serve 2 years, from 1 January 2025 to 31 December 2026.

Emails with election information will go out to all eligible voters in late September/early October. It is important for members to vote and provide feedback on the voting process so that Leadership Development/Governance Committee members and staff can continue to improve the voting experience for our members. In the 2022 AGU election, over 5,900 evaluations were received from voters and reviewed, with 89% of commenters indicating that they were satisfied or very satisfied with the process.

Experiments

During every election, members are encouraged to provide feedback on how AGU can improve future elections. Members have been consistently asking for ranked choice voting as an alternative to AGU’s usual paired slate elections. This year, the Leadership Development / Governance Committee chose to experiment with ranked choice voting in four positions: International Secretary, Board Director, Council Students, and Council Early Career Scientists. Instead of just choosing one candidate from AGU’s traditional paired slate, voters will have more than two candidates to pick from and will fill out the ballot indicating their first choice, second choice, or third choice (or more as needed) for each position. The candidate with more than half of first-choice votes wins outright. If no candidate gets a majority of first-choice votes, then it triggers a new counting process. The candidate who got the least number of first-choice votes is eliminated, and that candidate’s voters’ ballots are redistributed to their second-choice pick. In other words, if you ranked a candidate as your first choice, and the candidate is eliminated, then your vote still counts: it just moves to your second-choice candidate. That process continues until there is a candidate who has the majority of votes.

Ranked choice voting has been adopted in Alaska, Maine, and many U.S. municipalities. Among the countries that have implemented ranked-choice systems nationwide are Australia, New Zealand, Malta, and Ireland.

The other experiment we are conducting this year is to have both president-elect candidates elected to the Board, one as the President-elect and one as a Director. In 2016, the committee started interviewing all Board candidates which gives them great insight into who is the best fit for not only the work, but also the ability of the Board as a whole to function well as a team. It is an area of concern for committee members that, after a rigorous process, one of the candidates selected for the highest office of AGU is not elected to the Board at all, thereby leaving top talent on the table. The experiment this year addresses that concern as the Leadership Development / Governance Committee is confident that both candidates will be excellent Board members, and the voters will determine who will serve as President-elect. The candidates themselves support this approach. When we look back at the President-elect candidates for the past 4 elections, we feel this to be true of all President-elect candidates, half of whom had been Board Directors.

Committee Members and Charge

The AGU Leadership Development/Governance Committee is charged with identifying and developing leadership within AGU to advance the strategic plan and strengthen the governance model. The work of this committee is important to AGU’s mission, and its workload has increased significantly. Working with the committee chair Rick Murray, are members Regupathi Angappan, Carol Finn, Denise Hills, Betty Johnson, Jenny Riker, and Wonsuh Song. Staff partners include Janice Lachance, Interim CEO, and Cheryl Enderlein, VP, Leadership and Governance. They did an outstanding job and deserve our gratitude.

Process

For the upcoming election, the committee followed this process:

• Nomination: The Leadership Development/Governance Committee worked to increase inclusivity in the process this year. In addition to asking current AGU leaders to identify potential Board and student and early-career Council candidates, open positions were posted in AGU Volunteer Central before AGU23 and advertised through a variety of channels, including official AGU social media. Members were encouraged to self-nominate and/or nominate others. Those who met the leadership criteria were invited to apply.
• Application: This step of the process required interested candidates to read AGU’s new strategic plan, Conflict of Interest Policy, and Scientific Integrity and Professional Ethics Policy. Applicants also had to answer some questions set by the committee and sign conflict of interest and ethics disclosure forms if selected for the ballot. The committee reviewed all applications for Board positions and determined whom to invite for an interview. AGU is in the enviable position of having many more qualified candidates than it has Board positions.
• Selection: Committee members conducted 1-hour virtual interviews with more candidates than needed for the ballot. All interviews followed the same format – questions about AGU’s strategic plan and governance model, questions about 2 situations, a question about the position, and the opportunity for the interviewee to ask questions. The final selections and pairings were made based on the criteria set at the beginning of the process to support the strategic plan and bring diversity to the continuing members of the Board. Candidates not on the ballot will be considered for other leadership positions.