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Subj: Chairman Election Information: Platforms
Refer to: Central Region Letter 02-06; February 24,
2006
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PLEASE DO NOT
HIT REPLY TO E-MAIL ME. I WILL NOT GET IT. E-MAIL ME DIRECTLY AT MY USNA
ALUMNI CLASSMAIL ADDRESS, len.wass@1964.usna.com
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Chapter Officers
- Please give this e-mail the widest possible distribution among your members
and other alumni in your area.
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Dear Central Region Alumni:
As I pointed out in my last Newsletter my duty to communicate with
you is made clear by the Alumni Association Bylaws/Operating Manual: “…being a Trustee of the Association involves serious responsibility...Of
utmost importance is the responsibility to communicate effectively in
explaining to our individual constituencies about issues, initiatives and
activities of the Association.”
The active internet debate underway by alumni on the upcoming
election for Chairman of the Association centers, in my opinion, on whether
multiple candidates should be presented to the alumni for a vote, or simply a
single candidate slate developed by a nominating committee. (The bylaws
permit multiple candidates and direct that a provision be made for write-in
candidates on all ballots.) As I mentioned in the last Newsletter there are
two candidates for Chair in this election but one is a write-in candidate
because the nominating committee submitted only a single candidate slate to
the Board. The “official” candidate printed on the ballot is the
incumbent, ADM Carl Trost, USN (Ret.) ’53. The write-in candidate is
BGen Thomas V. Draude, USMC (Ret.) ’62.
This Central Region Newsletter gives you information on their platforms
so that you might make up your own mind on whom to vote for. The March issue
of Shipmate will arrive at your home soon. In it is a tear-out ballot.
Central Region alumni will only have the opportunity to vote for the Chairman
position this election. If there were not a write-in candidate you would
have had only a single candidate to choose. You now have two candidates to
choose from, but one requires you to write in his name.
I expect that the March issue of Shipmate will provide information on
ADM Trost’s platform, because he’s not published one separately.
(In my two former campaigns Shipmate was the mechanism to publish my
platform.) Please read his materials in that issue.
Unfortunately, the Alumni Association will not publish campaign
materials submitted by BGen Thomas V. Draude, USMC (Ret.) ‘ 62 so I
have presented his platform below. Please read his material.
Tom Draude Platform/Informal Bio
I am Tom Draude '62 and have sent you this email as I wish to be considered
for Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the USNA Alumni Association.
I ask for your support as a write-in candidate. I believe it is time to bring
new faces and fresh ideas to the leadership of the Alumni Association and
make its leadership more representative of, and responsive to, its wide and
diverse membership. I respectfully request you to write in "Thomas V.
Draude,'62" for Chairman on the tear out ballot in your upcoming March
issue of Shipmate. I also request that you forward this email to as many
other USNA alumni as possible, because I have no way within the current
alumni system to get the word out to many of our alumni. Please allow me
a few minutes of your time to accomplish the following objectives: to explain
why I want to be Chairman of the Board of Trustees; to describe why I think I
should be elected as a "write-in" candidate; and, to tell you
something of myself.
Why do I want to be Chairman of the Alumni Association Board of Trustees?
In short, I'm motivated to become Chairman because I want to continue to
serve, and believe I bring new leadership talents to this critical position
that will address some fundamental problems with your Alumni Association.
There seems to be a conviction that only a small group in Annapolis is
qualified to select the Chairman. This was driven home to me when I was
nominated by the former Commandant of the Marine Corps for Chairman in
October, informed I was a candidate later that month by the head of the
Nominating Committee, and then informed by the same Nominating Committee head
nearly three weeks later (and after some prompting from me) that I was
dismissed as a candidate because of the Board's desire to select a single
candidate. (The by-laws allow more than one candidate and the Nominating
Committee put out a call to all alumni for recommendations for Chairman
candidates - then rejected me in favor of a single candidate slate -- after
it had approved me. When I replied that this sounded like an Endorsing
Committee of the current Chairman rather than a true Nominating Committee,
its head agreed.) My qualifications were never brought into question.
Concurrently, I received a "peacemaking call" from a senior trustee
of the Alumni Association to explain to me that this is the way things are
always done for the Chairman slot. Under pressure, the Nominating Committee
was dissolved at the December BOT meeting, and a new one was appointed. The
same senior trustee that made the "peacemaking call" to explain how
things are done was appointed to head the new Nominating Committee. To no
one's surprise, the new committee subsequently sent forward a single name for
Chairman, the incumbent. Because it made its deliberations
“secret”, we will never know what was discussed or how they
arrived at the single candidate slate.
This sort of nonsense should not be allowed to continue. The Board of
Trustees should not be led by a small group of persons who exclude the rest
of the alumni from participating in the leadership selection process. Our
alumni are quite capable of making their own decisions. It's time to bring
in some fresh faces with fresh ideas. When did we become change-averse or tied
to the belief that effective leadership resided only in those who are chosen
by a very few? I believe in diversity and to me that means the leadership of
the Alumni Association should be representative of its membership who are
very diverse in their make up, and include mid-range officers; civilians;
young/old; female/male; etc.
I believe it's time to give the Association’s leadership selection to all
alumni rather than continuing to reside in a small, tightly knit group. I do
not question their motives, but I do question their ability to lead without
welcoming and embracing full participation and scrutiny from all alumni. The
Alumni Association is not a military command and control organization;
rather, it is an association of colleagues that should be governed and
managed with a collegial and efficient corporate model.
Why do I think I should be elected?
First, my success in this endeavor requires you to do more than check a
block. My name is not next to any block. You must write in my name as a
candidate for me to be elected.
I think you should elect me because of whom and what I am and what I bring to
the position of Chairman. In the bio at the end of this email, I fill in some
gaps regarding my ties to the Academy. I think you should also know something
more about me.
I believe in commitment. My wife Sandi (a former USMC Second
Lieutenant) and I just celebrated our 39th year of marriage. Two of our
children received NROTC scholarships and were commissioned in the Navy. Loree
was an S-3 carrier pilot, LSO, and instructor pilot who made two Middle East deployments before she left the Navy. My older son Patrick is an intelligence
officer who returned in October from an assignment in Iraq.
I believe in leadership. My 30 ½ years on active duty reinforced in me
that leadership - in combat and in peacetime - requires a focus on
accomplishing the mission and on taking care of your troops. That focus
served me well in my three stints in Vietnam and during Desert Storm. I
carried that focus with me as I joined another great outfit after my Marine
Corps retirement in 1993 - USAA.
I believe in customer service. In over ten years with USAA, I also
acquired an appreciation for one of its strongest attributes: customer
service. I saw this in action while I was at the Home Office in San Antonio , at its Federal Savings Bank, and at the Western and Southeast regions of
its Property and Casualty Division that I headed. Our representatives simply
put themselves in the place of the member and asked themselves, "What
would I want to happen to show that I'm valued?" Then, within laws and
regulations, the rep did it. A leadership that cared about them and their
families also reinforced our culture. We showed we cared by showing up, by
being there, and we were very successful.
My experience with the Alumni Association's nominating process leads me to
believe that the caring part of customer service, of leadership, is largely
missing in our Alumni Association. Frankly, any meaningful change must start
at the top. That's why I want to be Chairman. I intend to bring the USAA
culture of customer service to the Alumni Association, and you are its
customer.
I promise to do a thorough review of our By-Laws and Operating Manual to
ensure the processes of nominations and selection of candidates will be
inclusive of all alumni, not restricted exclusively to a small, select group.
I promise to engage the Board in a governance process that ensures closer
involvement in the interests and needs of constituencies that need to be
heard.
If elected, I promise to employ the leadership skills that have served me
well. I promise to listen and to lead a Board that will listen. I promise to
return the Association to its stated mission of serving Alumni.
I respectfully request that you look for the tear out ballot in the March
issue of Shipmate as soon as it arrives, and write-in "Thomas V. Draude,
'62" for Chairman. I also request that you forward this email to as many
other USNA alumni as possible, because I have no way within the current
alumni system to get the word out to many of our alumni.
Semper Fidelis,
Tom Draude '62
BGen, USMC (Ret.)
Phone:
540-720-4674 (H)
Email: sage62@aol.com
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