PC Minutes 6 Aug 00

Minutes of the Meeting of the Policy Council

6 August 2000

Bergen, Norway

In Attendance

Officers: David F. Andersen (Vice President - Finance), Nan Lux (Vice President - Member and Chapter Activities), Ali Mashayekhi (President-Elect), Alexander L. Pugh, III (Past President), Michael J. Radzicki (Secretary), Jac Vennix (President); Policy Council: John Barton, Carmine Bianchi, David Ford, John Heinbokel, Paul A. Langley, Frank Maier, Rogelio Oliva, Ginny Wiley, Graham Winch

Guests: Yaman Barlas, Jim Hines, Saburo Kameyama, David Packer, Habib Sedehi, Roberta L. Spencer (Executive Director), John Sterman, Diane Taylor, Carol Traner, Quifan Wang

Call to Order

The meeting was called to order at 1:08 PM by President Vennix.

Informational Items

President Vennix thanked the members of the Policy Council who were stepping down at the end of the year.

Executive Director's Report. Roberta Spencer delivered her 2000 (Summer) Executive Director's Report. A brief discussion about falling beer game sales, which deliver crucial revenues to the Society each year, followed. John Sterman suggested raising the price of beer game sets sold to corporate customers.

Report of the Vice President - Finance. David Andersen presented his 2000 (Summer) report. He alerted the Council that he would ask them to approve the budget, contained in the last two pages of his report, during the Action Items portion of the meeting.

Andersen also noted that, for the first time, his budget reflects projections for conference revenue. Hence, the graphical portion of his report shows a sharp upturn in Society revenues between 2000 and 2001. He also pointed out that the budget has a large amount of money allocated for the Society's "web presence," which in the past has been identified by the Council as a priority spending area. Lastly, he noted that his report contains the Society's audited financial statements and that care should be taken in interpreting the "budget comparison, current year only" section because the Society utilizes a cash basis accounting system and thus conference revenues are recorded on its books.

Report from John Wiley and Sons. Diane Taylor presented her annual report from John Wiley and Sons. The report provided an overview of production and subscription data for the System Dynamics Review and detailed internal (to John Wiley) and external (to John Wiley) factors that influence journal attrition rate and institutional subscription rate. It also reviewed Wiley's marketing plans for the Review and its on-going efforts to improve its journals through the use of the internet

System Dynamics Review Editor's Report. Graham Winch presented his Executive Editor's report. He noted that the main problem with the Review is a poor backlog of articles. In fact, he said he had to hold back an issue due to an insufficient backlog of papers.

A discussion on ways to address the Review's lean backlog then ensued. Yaman Barlas suggested that the Council look at the problem from a system dynamics point of view.

Another suggestion put forth was that the Publications Committee should aggressively look at the problem.

David Andersen argued that the Council could referee papers right at the Bergen conference and have an issue or two ready to go by the end of the week. In fact, he argued that the refereeing of conference papers for the Review should be a normal part of the Society's annual conference preparation. This activity should be headed by the President-Elect.

Graham Winch then informed the Council that, effective 1 Janaury 2002, he would resign as Executive Editor of the Review. John Sterman officially thanked Graham on behalf of the Society and recommended that the Vice President - Publications immediately form a committee to search for Graham's replacement.

Report from the Curriculum Committee. Jack Pugh reported that Paal Davidson is the chairman of the Society's Curriculum Committee and that he hopes it will do two things:

Compile a list of system dynamics courses world-wide.

Codify an "ideal" system dynamics curriculum.

Report from the Society's Webmaster. Jack Pugh reported that he and his assistants are working on a new Society web site and that he has two goals for the new site:

Provide more information for the non-system dynamicist.

Provide some distance learning opportunities in system dynamics.

With respect to the second goal, Pugh noted that Mike Radzicki and Robert Taylor have donated a web-based system dynamics tutorial to the Society and that Jay Forrester's Road Maps course could be placed on the site as well.

Lastly, Pugh noted that he would eventually like to see the Society's membership directory on the site.

Adjournment

Yaman Barlas moved and John Barton seconded a motion that: "the meeting be adjourned." The motion passed. The meeting was adjourned at by Jac Vennix at 2:02 PM.

Respectfully submitted,

Michael J. Radzicki

Secretary