Everything is in the title!
Maybe even structural changes on how we run things?
@Mega_shuffle @django nothing against you my friends 
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yes and bids for next ehbpc are open ! start a thread if your club wants to host it and which year !
It’s funny this matter always comes back on the table, especially after a year saved by EHBA and Berlin Bike Polo (best EHBPC ever as far as I’m concerned) after the EHBPC organization fiasco by MTP Bike Polo (nothing against you my friend 
, which is the most passive agressive expression to communicate btw).
Do you know that EHBA is an open organization you can join freely if you want ?
I always read about people complaining about EHBA (which is not perfect of course, nothing against you my friends), about ruleset but rarely see something constructive. It’s always “the ruleset is shit”, “we should do that”, “they must do that”. Until now, if someone wants to do something it is possible.
Ruleset is my example. I deeply involved myself into the ruleset update process the last years. Trust me, going on Poloverse or to Alejandro saying “this is shit, change it” is not enough. The smallest change can have the biggest impact on the whole ruleset. This will make some of you laugh but all the words are discussed and chosen. At the end, trust me, if you want some change you can make them happen ! But please, don’t think anyone will take it from scratch and make the perfect document from nothing. It took roughly a year of work when the EHBA ruleset was created, besed on the NAH one !
That said, I’m not against any election of course.
But first, the question should be "who is ready to get involved into EHBA ? Not as a talker, but as a maker ".
I don’t often speak about that in public, but my experience at the french committee (8 years ?) shows that most of the time, 100% of the candidates are elected, and after a few months, 2 or 3 people are working when the others just come to debate on matters that personnally impact them. Every year, I’m asked about election, my answer is the same “Yes, please do it, you have all my support”. Every year we end alone with Arthur and Jfran, doing the very minimum with the time we have : Organization of EHBPC Qualifiers !
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Whoever told you you need to be elected to participate told you wrong. The doors are ALWAYS OPEN to anyone interested in putting any work. EHBA is an open “organisation”.
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Yet I tried to be part of if last year without success.
The communication I had with people with responsibility didn’t allow me to understand how the structure have evolved nor how to get significantly involved.
I have nothing against the fact that you, Django and Alejandro do the work, I love what you do.
And I want you to do exactly what you are doing right now.
The fact that the criticism is here doesn’t mean they want you out it means they want the sport they play to be the best they know it can be. Not everyone can be a master speaker, and not everyone wants to spend half of every evening thinking about bike polo and both are ok, and both people are allowed to care.
I would like the community to feel connected to the EHBA and I see the disconnect is getting stronger.
Having the same people do the necessary work is not a problem itself. But there’s not checks and balances, which in our democratic world, brings distrust in the decision maker. Hence my claim to reform it.
I suggest people to have permanent positions, (3-6) people responsible for what you do and more.
For those I suggest that you, Ale and Django should be permanent representant of the sport at the Euro level (if you want).
I also want to improve other things that the ehba could provide. Transparence, accountability, pathway for constructive criticism, representativeness, which I would argue are points to improve for the time being. For which other people need to be present to debate.
I also apologize about the joke. I aknowledge I could have hurt my friends. I respect you and would definetely want you to be involved with the EHBA. Sorry django sorry alejandro.
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Sorry Jason, what exactly stopped you from working on any ideas you had?
The EHBA is nothing but the work that has been done to keep it alive. The structure is horizontal. Assign yourself a task and develop it.
Accountability, transparency, representativeness… please think before you throw words like this around. Remember when the community came together when you were in trouble.
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i felt like it was very transparent and when they needed to correct stuff it was done swiftly. i rather applaud what was achieve last season rather than a sour start 
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harmonizing the hole diameter of all mallet manufacturers
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getring rid of litigious situations with re wording and clarifiying the ruleset ( for exemple the mallet interference rule)
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the ref meeting was also handled greatly by alejandro , which imo allowed to one of the nicest polo ever in ehbpc and whbpc. the live streaming and recording by jason made it 100% efficient and watchable at any time.
-the back up solution for euro thanks to berlin capacity and coordination and communication ( transparency) of every party involved.
nice work to all of you
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i ll repost this link here to adress the representation of flinta p’ayer within the ehbpa : the board always had a diversitt of member. in the 2014 board i remember johana being of great help and involvment meanwhile she was still studying for her law school.
now if we talk about a 50/50 ratio its not very equal BUT not all members of the board were actually active , like bouchard say sometime people sign themselves just by good faith but dont really know what to do/ not have time for major tasks.
I reckon that’s the type of organisational structure most polo clubs have, so it’s not a big surprise that this trend continues at the European level. Also, all the alternatives need more bureaucracy, so it’s the fix-point we gravitate towards unless we actively push away from it. I for one don’t mind it, but it has some dangers!
This type of organising processes has actually a name, they call it do-ocracy and talk about it on this pretty weird website - but some points mentioned there are pretty interesting, especially the dangers they list, here are some examples:
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Burnout. People can get too attached to the do-ocratic system and volunteer for too many jobs, or too much work, and tend to have a low TruckFactor.
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Complacency. If a minority of people take on jobs, the others can become complacent and ignore new tasks, since “someone else will do it.”
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Frustration. Some people don’t have the time or means to do something, but they do have (real or imagined) expertise. In a doocracy, they will feel overrun and perceive the situation as slipping out of their hands. This can cause frustration. And remember: “Fear is the path to the dark side…”
and one I’d like to add in this context:
It can be hard to get a foot in the door - especially if the way things are done is not communicated very clearly.
on the EHBA website, it says:
If you want to join as a volunteer or share ideas or feedback, please contact us.
this could be made a bit more explicit, if you really want to invite more participation 
here’s a proposal:
We need your help to get certain things done, so please, if you want to get involved, or share ideas and feedback, contact us.
anyhow, my 2 cents on the matter, thanks for everything you do for euro bike polo everyone!
xoxo
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I think it could be more explicit in the sense of pushing people to do it, such as
We need your help to get certain things done, so please if you think something needs to change and are ready to start developing it, contact us.
Even a link to the DoOcracy thing could be useful. I think the way the website is presented kinda gives an idea that it is an actual official serious organization body, and not a smelly polo thing. Maybe the transparency part could be addressed by giving it a more DIY vibe, so everybody understands right away what they are getting themselves into. Also reminds me of Schakleton’s ad.
And to not leave it at only words: gimme access to the website and I’ll do it. This is a serious threat.
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Pass me your email, I’ll make it happen
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This discussion doesn’t sound very democratic.
Jason starts the post asking for something that should be absolutely legitimate, wich is elections for the EHBA that have not been done since 2016 and he gets basically attacked for it.
What is the problem with having normal democratical elections where every one can vote for who he/she would want?
Democracy doens’t ask for “who is ready to get involved in EHBA”, whoever wants to participate should be free to do so and it’s the peoples choice to vote for who they want to be there.
Who decided that EHBA is an “open Organization” and when?
It was the organization that represented European bike polo and people where elected into it. Who is it representing now?
Who is Part of it?
Who elected this people and when?
Welcome to poloverse, Martin5. Nice to see some new faces around. Since you are new, you probably don’t know so well the history and the people who were elected in the past to be on the board.
First, there is no organization. EHBA is the name that was given to the planned organization that was supposed to be formed by the first elected board in 2014. It did not happen. They focussed on other topics, such as organizing Worlds and Euros. So the task was handed to the 2nd board in 2016. I was a member of that 2nd board. Also we did not found the organization officially. The person actively working on it was Dorian from Geneva who resigned before finishing it, for personal reasons. Other active members resigned at an early stage and the rest did not contribute anything at all throughout the term, except me. So this whole concept of an elected board did not work, but nobody seemed to care anyways. Of course you can’t know all of this, since you are new here.
So what remained is the name of this old idea of an organization back from the day when polo was at it’s peak, and me as member of the last board. Some more background is outlined here:
Unfortunately, all the posts on this topic have extremely small participation, which is not really making a strong case that people care about the status quo or whether it should change. You may not know the polo community so well yet, as you are obviously new, but that’s the sad reality. They don’t care, they just want to play. I am fine with that. I do my part, others do theirs to keep it running, on a purely voluntary basis.
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Dear Mardanin,
I think we agree on this.
The only thing I wanted to underline 18 months ago, and it has not changed, is that we find way more people to complain and to talk a lot especially when things are not going the way of their own interest than to actually make things.
I know you did your part in the past and whatever people think I also think I’ve done mine.
But I don’t see anything, anywhere preventing someone to take the lead and organize some elections.
If the whole point is about “how the slots for EHBPC will be decided”, I think until now, Levin has just made an announcement in Perpignan’s name and won’t be choosing alone following his own criteria.
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Nobody here is against elections. Nobody is against having ambitious delegates with a vision and the official legitimacy of the community they represent. Nobody is against legal certainty, an official address, account and accountability. Nobody is against proper public relation and development, youth programm, sponsorship, etc. But it is easy to say what somebody else should be doing, or what would be nice to happen. It is something completely different to actually make it happen. That’s the bottom line.
Everything that has happened ever on the front of European polo organization has not been a matter of who has been voted to do it. It has been a matter of who did it. We had many voted reps who have done nothing. We had voted people who have done a lot. And we had volunteers who just did stuff they found important, without being voted to do so.
Anybody is invited to generate the structure they are missing. There is literally nothing that stops it. Go and organize it. Make a plan. Get people excited for your plan.
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Hello everyone, this is my proposal:
I offer myself to volunteer to re-organize an official EHBA board with official legitimacy of the community they represent.
I will collaborate with anyone who wants to help, join, contribute, share ideas, or work alone if no one else wants to join.
Here is a first idea of how this could be done (this is just a draft, open to any suggestion):
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Announcement and promotion of the upcoming elections, that will take place after the Euros in Perpignan to not disturb the work done so far. (this would have to be done with EHBA channels for legitimacy - instagram/fb/poloverse/others, the ones that don’t exist will be created)
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Form an election committee to assure transparency before and during elections ( evryone free to join)
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People have time until after the Euros in Perpignan 2025 to candidate, every memeber, active or not, of the european polo comunity is free to candidate and vote.
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9 positions will open, like in the previous committes, if we have less candidates elections won’t be necessary, if we have less than 3 candidates the board won’t be formed.
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the candidates once elected will divide the roles between them.
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every 2 years elctions will be held again by the election committee.
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My suggestion is to list all the responsibilities/duties etc. etc. that EHBA currently has.
Then based on that discuss what we really need. What do we think should be done more than currently is. If we should create an official org etc. etc. Current idea is to have elections but elections for what?
Some “free” thoughts:
- people that want to be “elected” should know what they will be doing there
- people voting need to know what decision will be made for them by the body
- the worst thing is that we will replace volunteers doing the job that doesn’t really need any democratic mandate with elected people that will have mandate but no will and energy to do that
Maybe to clarify myself, because I feel that my post will be considered anti-election voice.
Let’s say that we elected that 9 people:
- what will change from current situation
- what will be the goal of these body
- what will be their duties
- what will be their first step?
- etc etc
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Responsibilities and duties will be listed in the announcement, point 1 of my proposal.
Everyone who wants to get involved in the making of this proposal is welcome.
Elections to form an official EHBA board with official legitimacy of the community.
The role of the Board will be to discuss and decide what we really need.
I agree that people who want to be elected should know what they will be doing there, it will be made clear in the announcement.
I agree that people voting need to know what decisions will be made for them, we are trying to make things more transparent for everyone.
the volunteers doing the job now are absolutely welcome to be members of the board and a democratic mandate would just legitimate even more what they are doing and as said before, it will be demanded to the people to only participate if they are actually willing to put in the energy, without salary nor reward.
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