2010 Proposals from the 23-24 November 2010 CIS Regional Meeting in London for a CIS Plan of Work and that a Steering Committee should be set up

The 23-24 November 2010 CIS Regional Meeting in London examined and discussed the 2008 Recommendations for the future of the CIS: report from the group of CIS members' meeting

One of the recommendations was in 3 d) that there should be a CIS Plan of Work and that a Steering Committee should be set up.

The following amplifies this recommendation and as an interim measure an Informal Regional Working Group should be set up to take this proposal further, The Working Group now consists 5 members of the CIS Network with one of them acting as a co-ordinator. Those who volunteered are Sheila Pantry - UK (co-ordinator), Irja Laamanan - Finland, Jonathan Gorvin - UK, Goran Vranic - Bosia Herzegovina, Boryana Barbukova, Bulgaria.

To start the work, the Working Group proposes that the work should be mainly via email and face-to-face meetings are not required at this stage.

to formulate the vision of the revitalized network
to collect and disseminate best practices for collaboration and partnership between CIS centers at regional level (Mr. Machida talked about such an experience in Asia).

Meanwhile CIS HQ should be asked to

It seems to me that prior to define strict criteria for the Centres and to formulate a Plan of Work it would be useful:

to make a brief review of the current situation of the network, taking account of differences such as the statute of CIS Centres (research institution, NGO, labour inspectorate etc, its superior authority), in order to identify some of the reasons for its ineffectiveness.
to ask Centers about the problems they face in their everyday activities and to summarize them as background for setting stringent but effective criteria and preparing a Plan of Work.

Proposals are that a Steering Committee should be set up under the following Constitution

1. Title

The name of the group should be "The CIS Steering Committee (CIS SC)".

2. Objectives

Noting the ILO Conventions / Recommendations...

The CIS Steering Committee's objectives shall be:

to provide an additional link between CIS Centres and CIS HQ to enable development of Centres and create higher visibility of the CIS Network
- to formulate the vision of the revitalized network
- to collect and disseminate best practices for collaboration and partnership between CIS centers at regional level (Mr. Machida talked about such an experience in Asia).
to receive ideas, wishes, proposals and suggestions from CIS Centres for new areas of work/topics and amplify these for further discussion at CIS Annual General Meeting. If accepted, these ideas to be included in the following year's CIS Plan of Work projects for the forthcoming year or years depending on the timescale of the project.
to ensure that all projects have realistic, defined timescales and reach fruition, and if necessary by encouraging other volunteers who are not Steering Committee Members to be involved the projects.
to evaluate and monitor progress of the Plan of Work projects and present a report at the Annual General Meeting
to ensure that relevant publicity is produced on a regular basis by the Steering Committee to enable CIS Centres to draw attention to the work of the CIS Network

3. Membership of the Steering Committee

The Steering Committee shall consist of no more than 6 people who volunteer to work together to make suggestions for a Plan of Work. This should include one person from the CIS HQ.
Membership shall be limited to 3 years for each member. At the beginning all the Members shall work together for two years. After two years, three members will retire and 3 new volunteers will be sought. This will enable some continuity in the work.
A Co-ordinator shall be appointed from the Steering Committee Membership.
Any Steering Committee Member not contributing for six months shall be requested to relinquish their position and another person appointed.
CIS HQ will receive an update every quarter about the work of the CIS Steering Committee.

Likewise the Steering Committee will need to receive regular communications from CIS HQ.

4. Communication by the Steering Committee

Once established the Steering Committee members' work should be mainly via email, telephone, conference telephone calls / video meetings but face-to-face meetings may be required, particularly at the early stage of development.

As various new communication systems become available via the Internet they should be taken up so as to avoid the need to travel.

5. Financing the Steering Committee

CIS HQ should allocate a budget to enable the Steering Committee if necessary, to meet from time to time.

6. CIS Plan of Work 2011/12

Initially the Steering Committee should take-up the Recommendations made by the 2008 Group of CIS Members and reaffirmed by the 2010 London Regional Meeting as follows:

6.1. The publication Setting up a CIS Centre Guidelines should be updated.

Sheila Pantry, who wrote the previous editions agreed to update the Guidelines for publications early part of 2011.

The Guidelines should then be issued to all CIS Centres and should be available via the CIS website and also on CIS Centres websites.

6.2. CIS Newsletter - this should continue and members should be encouraged to reuse the contents in their own countries.

6.3. Update the List of CIS Members

The Steering Committee should undertake the updating. Members should share the content and contact the members and update the list for CIS HQ.

6.4. Twinning, Training and E-Training

Ideas already exist in previous reports. These ideas should be examined by the Steering Committee and a priority list made with some actions taking place during 2011/2012.

6.5 Encouraging active New centres to be established

Each Centre should contact other organisations in their own country and ascertain if there is potential for further centres to be established. The Requirements for acceptance as a centre should be clearly stated and any new Centres should understand the contributions needed.

SP REF: CIS Regional Meeting proposals for setting up a Steering Committee and Plan of work 2010.