2. Charter

Revised Charter - Standing Committee on Improvement Implementation (SCI) – Approved by the GNSO Council on 31 October 2013

General

The GNSO Standing Committee on Improvement Implementation (SCI) is responsible for reviewing and assessing the effective functioning of the GNSO Procedures and Working Group guidelines. Its tasks include making recommendations:

On request, for those procedures and guidelines that have been identified as presenting immediate problems
On a periodic timescale for all procedures and guidelines in order to identify possible issues and/or improvements (subject to a clear definition by the SCI on which procedures and guidelines should be reviewed)

The SCI is also responsible for considering requests concerning issues related to the GNSO Council processes and procedures and to Working Group guidelines that have been identified either by the GNSO Council or a group chartered by the GNSO Council as needing discussion.

Working method

It is recommended that the SCI follows the "GNSO Working Group Guidelines http://gnso.icann.org/council/annex-1-gnso-wg-guidelines-07apr11-en.pdf (Approved by the GNSO Council on 16 March 2011)", as deemed appropriate.

The SCI is expected to carry out the activities identified in this Charter. In carrying out these activities, the SCI may opt to use sub-teams or work teams to carry out part of the tasks for which it may attract volunteers that are not members or observers of the SCI. However, the SCI remains responsible for reviewing and approving any recommendations, which are to be submitted to the GNSO Council for its consideration.

For the periodic review of recommendations, the SCI is expected to develop a consistent review plan indicating items to be reviewed, proposed timeline as well as additional resources needed, if any. This review plan will be submitted to the GNSO Council for its information.

For items that are submitted for review 'on request', the SCI expects to receive detailed input from the group affected by the process/operational change concerned. Either the GNSO Council or a group chartered by the GNSO Council can make such requests. The requester should provide the following information, [GNSO-SCI-ReviewRequest-yyymmdd_template.docx] in order to have comprehensive information available to the SCI on the issue:

Which group do you represent? (E.g. Council, WG.)
To which rules or processes do you refer?
Please outline the problems
What specific changes do you propose to address the identified problems?
Do you have any additional suggestion for making the rules/processes easier to administer?

One member of the group that submitted the request should - if not already represented on the SCI - be nominated as an observer to the SCI until the review of the issue in question has been completed.

Members of the Standing Committee (Primary and Alternate members)

1 representative from each constituency/SG
1 Nominating Committee appointee

Members of the Standing Committee should designate an alternate who can participate in the SCI deliberations in case of absence of the primary member. Only one of the two, primary or alternate, may take part in a consensus call.

Observers of the Standing Committee

1 representative from each constituency in formation
Liaison or an appointed representative from other ICANN Supporting Organizations or Advisory Committees (as determined by the SCI as appropriate)

1 observer representing the group that has submitted a request for review during the time that the request for review is being dealt with (provided that the group is not yet represented on the SCI)

Chair and Vice Chair Elections

Only the primary members of the Standing Committee (see description below) shall be eligible to run and vote for Chair and Vice Chair. The Chair and Vice Chair shall serve for a 1-year term with the option to continue for a second 1-year term. For the avoidance of doubt, time served as Vice Chair shall not prohibit the Vice Chair from serving as Chair. The Chair and Vice Chair are expected to act in a neutral manner and avoid any situation where a conflict of interest may arise for example as a result of exercising another function or role within ICANN.

In December of each year, the SCI will ask for volunteers from its primary members to serve as Chair and Vice Chair. If the current Chair or Vice Chair is not term limited, wishes to continue for a second year, and there are no other volunteers, no election will be held. If there is more than one volunteer for either position, the following procedure will be followed:

If there are only two candidates for Chair and no candidates for Vice Chair, the GNSO Secretariat will conduct an election via e-mail ballot and tally the results after one week. The losing candidate will have the option of accepting the position of Vice Chair. If he or she elects not to accept this position, the SCI will ask for volunteers for Vice Chair; or

If there are more than two candidates for the Chair or one or more candidates for Vice Chair, the GNSO Secretariat will conduct an election for each position via e-mail ballot and tally the results after one week. In the event no one candidate receives a clear majority, the GNSO Secretariat will conduct an election between the two candidates receiving the most votes via email ballot and tally the results after one week.

Staff Support

The ICANN Staff assigned to the SCI will fully support the work of the committee as directed by the Chair including meeting support, document drafting, editing and distribution and other substantive contributions when deemed appropriate.

Staff assignments to the SCI:

GNSO secretariat
1 ICANN policy staff member

Decision making

Unless otherwise determined by the SCI members, committee decisions will be made by “full consensus” process[1] as described in the GNSO Working Group Guidelines (see section 3.6).

Reporting

At a minimum at every public ICANN meeting, the SCI Chair shall provide the GNSO Council with an update concerning:

The issues dealt with and related status
Recommendations expected to be submitted to the GNSO Council
An activity timeline

[1] Subject to GNSO Council Consideration

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

Previous Charter (replaced by the Charter above) - Standing Committee on Improvement Implementation (SCI) - as amended by the GNSO Council (see resolution 20110428-2)

General

The GNSO Standing Committee on Improvement Implementation (SCI) will be responsible for reviewing and assessing the effective functioning of recommendations provided by the Operational Steering Committee (OSC), Policy Process Steering Committee (PPSC) and Policy Development Process Work Team (PDP-WT) and approved by the GNSO Council:

On request for those recommendations that have been identified to present immediate problems
On a periodic timescale for all recommendations in order to identify possible issues and/or improvements (subject to a clear definition by the SCI on which recommendations should be reviewed)

The immediate goal of the OSC and PPSC is to develop:

Recommendations to implement operational changes, and recommendations for all process changes needed to meet the requirements contained in the "Board Governance Committee GNSO Review Working Group On GNSO Improvements" which are to be implemented with approval and under the guidance of the Council.

It should be acknowledged that OSC and PPSC still have tasks to finish, possibly on different timescales. Expiry of their charters has therefore to be taken carefully into consideration by the GNSO Council. Nevertheless, since several OSC and PPSC recommendations have already been adopted and implemented and the practicability of some of them has raised concerns, it is advisable to kick off the SCI work immediately. Following the implementation of further OSC/PPSC recommendations the SCI will be responsible for reviewing and assessing the effectiveness of these new recommendations. This in consequence might mean that the OSC/PPSC and SCI will be coexistence for a certain period of time.

Working method

It is recommended that the SCI follows the "GNSO Working Group Guidelines http://gnso.icann.org/council/annex-1-gnso-wg-guidelines-07apr11-en.pdf (Approved by the GNSO Council on 16 March 2011)", as deemed appropriate.

The SCI is expected to carry out the activities identified in this Charter. In carrying out these activities, the SCI may opt to use sub-teams or work teams to carry out part of the tasks for which it may attract volunteers that are not members or observers of the SCI. However, the SCI remains responsible for reviewing and approving any recommendations, which are to be submitted to the GNSO Council for its consideration.

For the periodic review of recommendations, the SCI is expected to develop a consistent review plan indicating items to be reviewed, proposed timeline as well as additional resources needed, if any. This review plan will be submitted to the GNSO Council for its information.

For items that are submitted for review 'on request', the SCI expects to receive detailed input from the group affected by the process/operational change concerned. Such requests can be made by either the GNSO Council or a group chartered by the GNSO Council. In order to have comprehensive information on the issue available this group is requested to provide the following information, if applicable:

Which group do you represent? (E.g. Council, WG.)
To which rules or processes implemented by the OSC or PPSC do you refer?
Please outline the problems
What specific changes do you propose to address the identified problems?
Do you have any additional suggestion for making the rules/processes easier to administer?

One member of the group which submitted the request should - if not already represented on the SCI - be nominated as an observer to the SCI until the review of the issue in question has been completed.

At its kick-off meeting the SCI should nominate a Chair and a Vice Chair from its membership. The Chair and Vice Chair are expected to act in a neutral manner and avoid any situation where a conflict of interest may arise for example as a result of exercising another function or role within ICANN.