We did it! Now what?

Hooray! The membership approved the governance bylaws changes recommended by the Institute Board of Directors! Now we can…what? The impact of the bylaws changes will be seen mostly in the composition and operation of CSI's board of directors, which will shrink from twenty-nine to eighteen members. This will be accomplished by:

• Reducing the number of Institute Director to one per region
• Adding two at-large Institute Directors
• Reducing the number of vice presidents to two
• Eliminating the office of immediate past president

The Board has been discussing various ways of getting down to the smaller board of directors, and will decide on a plan at the June Board meeting. There is general agreement that whatever plan is used, it will honor the terms of those elected by prior elections; no one will be asked to leave office early. The final plan won't be known until the Board meets, but the plan with the most support will see full implementation in FY2012.

Although most of the changes affect the Board itself, there are some side effects. Obviously, with each region having only one Institute Director, and the stated intent of relieving Institute Directors of the burden of running their regions, some changes will be required in region organization.

In most regions, the two Institute Directors also automatically served as their region's president and vice president. In that capacity, they were charged with running the region and making chapter visits. With the separation of responsibilities, regions now will have to choose the region president and vice president by some other means. Furthermore, regions will have to decide how the region will support its chapters. A simple, direct solution is to elect the region president and vice president and have them make chapter visits. All regions are now working on region bylaws revisions necessitated by the changes in Institute bylaws.

Even though the duties of Institute officer and region officer have been separated, there must be close contact between Institute Director and region officers. I would expect Institute Directors to converse frequently with the region officers, to attend region conferences, and to be the living conduit between region and Institute. E-mail and other forms of communication now make it possible for Institute to speak directly to region leaders and to chapter members, but in many instances there is no substitute for personal contact.

And what about chapters? Chapter bylaws that are based on the model bylaws found in CSI's Administrative References will require only minor changes. The Institute Director does appear in the model bylaws, but only as someone who is to receive a report. It seems reasonable that the referenced reports would now be sent to a region officer, rather than to the Institute Director, as it is the region that has the most interest in the reports.

In addition to reducing the size of the Institute Board, the governance changes also allow all members to participate in the annual business meeting; there is no longer a limit on the number of delegates a chapter may send to the meeting. The current model chapter bylaws address selection of delegates, which is no longer done by the chapters, so any provisions related to delegates should be reviewed.

Even if your chapter's bylaws are based on the model bylaws, there may be differences. I don't foresee the need for a lot of changes, but each chapter should review its own bylaws to see if there are any conflicts with the revised Institute and region bylaws.

Sheldon Wolfe, RA, FCSI, CCS, CCCA
Institute Director, North Central Region, CSI