Creation of Board Strategic Planning Committee

The Board takes this action today in order to enhance how the Board fulfills its role in oversight of strategy. The creation of the Board Strategic Planning Committee sets a formal home within the Board for coordination of the Board's strategic efforts, including planning, prioritization and monitoring of trends. In the past, the Board has relied upon the use of a Working Group initiated for a specific strategic planning cycle, but this ad hoc effort did not assure that there was consistent and coordinated attention to strategic items amongst the Board. In addition, this effort is well time to coordinate with the ICANN organization's maturing of operations to develop a dedicated planning function.

The new Board Strategic Planning Committee will serve a complementary role to the work of the Board as a whole, and will not overtake any responsibility that is assigned to another Board committee. The BSPC serves as a standing group to coordinate the Board's oversight of strategy on an ongoing basis, and not only as part of a five-year planning cycle. This includes continued coordination with ICANN org to help streamline processes and identify strategic priorities.

Oversight of strategy at the Board level is more than just developing the strategic plan and reviewing and analyzing trends, but also making sure the Board and its committees are addressing and working towards the identified strategic priorities. Recently, the Board Governance Committee introduced an effort to encourage all Board committees to identify how and which of the strategic objectives of ICANN are served through that committee's work. The Board Strategic Planning Committee will interact and coordinate with each of the other committees to confirm that the identified strategic priorities remain on workplans alongside the other "day-to-day" work that consumes committee time.

The Board Strategic Planning Committee will have specific coordination points with the Board Finance Committee (BFC) and Board Risk Committee (BRC), as planning and prioritization cannot occur without consideration of financial impact (within the purview of the BFC), or how the plans and priorities fit in with the Board's assessment and mitigation of strategic risks (within the purview of the BRC). The Charter's specific reference to both of these committees reflects the interdependent nature of the Board's strategic planning and prioritization work and confirms that the Board Strategic Planning Committee in no way takes over those important aspects of Board work.

Approving the creation of this new committee at this time also allows the Board Governance Committee the opportunity to consider and recommend the Board Strategic Planning Committee's membership alongside the membership of the other Board committees.

The Board's action today serves both ICANN's mission and the public interest in assuring there is continued attention to ICANN's strategy and strategic priorities at the Board level.

There is an incremental impact on resources, but no fiscal impact to support this new Committee, and no anticipated impacts on the security, stability or resiliency of the Internet's domain name system as a result of this action.

This is an Organizational Administrative Function that does not require public comment.