IOA Board of Directors held its October board meeting in Europe. Our strategic plan calls on IOA to identify ways to increase the participation and engagement of international members across IOA to bring more inclusion to our programs, leadership, and strategy. Watch as members of the international ombuds community report on this special event.
It’s been a noteworthy year for Mary P. Rowe, an Adjunct Professor of Negotiation and Conflict Management at the MIT Sloan School of Management and a member of the faculty of the MIT Institute for Work and Employment Research (IWER). February 2023 marked the 50th anniversary of Rowe’s coming to work at MIT as the “Special Assistant to the President and Chancellor for Women and Work”—a role that soon evolved into being an early organizational ombuds, listening to all kinds of workplace concerns, from both men and women, throughout the Institute. Rowe ultimately served for 42 years as an MIT ombuds.
By Alicia Booker, PhD, IOA President & Ellen Miller, IOA Executive Director
In the spirit of believing we are one humankind, and one global community, we must take time to pause and acknowledge the extreme devastation, pain, suffering, and grief that so many are experiencing in our community, our organizations, and in our world. As we move into the season of holidays and family celebrations, our hearts, and thoughts go to all who are suffering.
By Ellen Miller, Executive Director 
The Asian Development Bank’s Office of the Ombudsperson (ADB) issued its 2022 Annual Report in August. The ADB does a wonderful job turning data into stories and does not disappoint with its latest annual report using creative design, an engaging presentation format, and information offered through a variety of lenses. It can be found at www.adb.org/ombudsperson and I encourage you to check it out.
Many organizations opt to keep the annual report either on the organization’s intranet or confidential and just for the C-Suite. We understand that some organizations may not want recommendations to be public if included in your annual report. I would encourage you to post some kind of summary for public consumption about the kinds of issues you hear from visitors. Nothing demonstrates value more to possible visitors and other formal channels than an annual summary of the impact you made in your organization with stakeholders.
From Ellen Miller, Executive Director, and Advocacy Committee Co-Chairs Sarah Klaper and Mark Patterson
More good news for higher ed ombuds based in the U.S.
IOA was proud to sponsor the Clery Center’s 2023 September Summit, where we had the opportunity to introduce Jim Moore from the U.S. Department of Education and do a speed presentation on the role of ombuds prior to his session. Sarah Klaper “pulled back the curtain” to explain how ombuds handle Title IX and Clery issues, while Ellen Miller covered the basics of what OOs do and don’t do. Here is a link to the short slide deck we prepared.
By, Sarah Ahmed Atif,
Program Coordinator, George Mason University Ombuds Office
The current George Mason University Ombudsperson, Kimberly Jackson Davidson, was introduced in February 2022, and the Office Charter was signed in October of the same year by University President Gregory Washington. We identify this moment of a signed charter as the official act of launching the Office. This October, completing one year of operations, the Office celebrated its anniversary by hosting various programs for different audiences.
The office hosted an Ombuds Gathering for academic ombuds from the DMV area at the beautiful Potomac Science Center on October 20. This program was an effort to bring the academic ombuds in one room to have a dialogue on events pertaining to the field. Following were the program topics:
By Shannon Lynn Burton, Ph.D.,
University Ombudsperson, Michigan State University
Dear IOA Colleagues,
The Journal of the International Ombuds Association (JIOA) has been busy this year! Please visit our website if you have not done so recently. There are new articles and book reviews posted.
By Belinda M. Robinson, PhD
Associate Organizational Ombudsman - Federal Bureau of Investigation
For nearly six years, in conjunction with the American Bar Association’s Ombuds Day Committee, the Ombuds community is celebrated, recognized, and congratulated on the second Thursday of October, also known as Ombuds Day. This year, Ombuds Day is celebrated on Thursday, October 12. The theme for 2023 is Ombuds: Diverse in Role. United in Service.
Ombuds practitioners are often described as navigators who provide a beacon of light; giving employees, and often the public, hope that their problems can be resolved fairly and equitably.
We are thrilled to learn that California has lifted its travel ban, opening the door for those who work for the State of California to attend upcoming IOA conferences. Read more in a recent article from thehill.com.
"A California law banning publicly funded travel to states with laws that discriminate against LGBTQ people is no longer active under legislation signed Wednesday by Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom.
California’s Senate Bill 447, also known as the BRIDGE Project, officially repeals a 2016 law that prohibited the state from sponsoring travel to states with laws in place that discriminate “on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression.”
The ABA Dispute Resolution Section is now accepting program proposals for our 2024 Spring Conference that will be held April 10–13, 2024, in San Diego, CA. This year’s conference theme is Mastering the Future: Revolutionizing Dispute Resolution in a Dynamic World.
We welcome program proposals from anyone who can enlighten and connect with our anticipated attendees, who include dispute resolution leaders, mediators, arbitrators, ombuds, judges, attorney advocates, court administrators, neutral providers, ADR consumers, and legal educators. The proposal deadline is September 13 at 5 p.m. ET, so now is your chance to bring your program idea to life!
Watch as IOA Executive Director Ellen Miller, IOA President Alicia Booker, and IOA President-Elect Sarah Klaper give updates on the new Professionalization Task Force as it kicks off.
ALOHA,
Marshall Israel
Ombudsman, Mediator, Peace-builder and Reconciliator
IOA is seeking applications for a new Association Ombuds. This position reports to the President and Executive Director and works in accordance with a charter and IOA Standards of Practice and Code of Ethics.
We are grateful to current IOA Ombuds Breanne Taylor for her excellent work the past year. Breanne decided to step down given a change in her current work responsibilities.
The Ombuds must be able to create a schedule to accommodate approximately 10 hours a month of work. IOA will provide a calendly link to facilitate scheduling and an email address for follow-up.
View the Request for Proposal (RFP) for more information and application instructions. Please feel free to reach out to IOA's Executive Director Ellen Miller with any questions.
RFP Deadline: 28 September 2023 at 5:00 PM PT
We have some very sad news to share, on behalf of IOA member Jennifer Moumneh:
It is with great sadness that I’m writing to share the news that our team member and dear friend, Jared Lee, passed away unexpectedly last week.
Jared was a key member of UC Irvine’s Office of the Ombuds, a wonderful colleague, a rising star in the Organizational Ombuds profession, and an overall amazing human being. He will be missed dearly.
By Board Member Sue Diviney and IOA Executive Director Ellen Miller
If you use Microsoft Teams and Outlook in your work with visitors, we have discovered a possible concern for your office. Using Teams can create visibility for both the visitor and others in their department given how Teams tracks users.
How can you see if this is an issue for you?
The Journal for the International Ombuds Association (JIOA) has an opening for an Associate Editor! Associate Editors work directly with authors throughout the revision process. JIOA believes in a highly constructive revision process. Associate Editors are directly responsible for providing editorial support to authors to achieve that goal. Specific responsibilities of Associate Editors include:
The ideal Associate Editor will have excellent communication skills; tact and discretion; familiarity with academic research, writing, and conventions; digital fluency; the ability to multitask and meet deadlines; a highly cooperative spirit; and respect for academic integrity. Three years of experience within the Ombuds field is preferred.
By Shannon Lynn Burton, Ph.D.,
University Ombudsperson, Michigan State University
Over five years ago, I was asked to put together a presentation to discuss why I wanted to be Michigan State University’s next University Ombudsperson after having served as Assistant and Associate Ombudsperson. What follows is my ombuds journey adapted from that presentation. There, and here, while I do not present a chronological perspective, I do share the multiple contexts that I believe an ombuds must navigate: Theoretical; Historical; Social; Professional and the Personal.
For those that know me, they know I love discussing theory… but more than that, I like making it practical. Theory is often like a computer code running in the background. You don’t often see it running, but you know that it is. In terms of my own code, I pull from two traditions: dialogue, deliberation and public engagement, as well as andragogy. While understanding conflict is a key factor in being an ombuds, understanding student perspectives and growth are really at the heart of this office’s work. For me, these traditions inform both aspects of the office: “student” and “ombuds”. I focus on the democracy perspective in dialogue, deliberation and public engagement, as well as emancipatory learning from andragogy. These approaches have three concepts in common:
IOA is an international association dedicated to advancing the profession of organizational ombuds. Our mission is our guidepost, yet as a small volunteer-driven association, we recognize that our size, structure, and limited staff have all impacted our ability to advance the organizational ombuds profession globally.
Our International Outreach Committee (IOC) has done a wonderful job identifying needs of the international community and has made a series of recommendations to the IOA Board of Directors. In response, the Board has established a special Task Force to develop a plan to implement the IOC recommendations and strategic priorities. The Internationalization Task Force will also consider the resources required to support your work and assess the value of creating a pilot regional project that would create a model for growing the profession.
This special Task Force will begin its work in August and report back to the Board in the first quarter of 2024. We are grateful that this effort will be co-chaired by Immediate Past President Ronnie Thomson at Sandia National Laboratories and Sam Zhou at MARS. If you are an IOA member practicing outside the U.S. or have experience working to expand awareness about organizational ombuds in the international space and would like to join this group, please reach out to Ellen Miller at [email protected].
By IOA
We are pleased to roll out the final process piece of our culture work: the new IOA Concern and Complaint Policy and Procedures which were approved by the IOA Board of Directors at their July meeting. Both the policy and procedures will be piloted for the next 18 months so we may benefit from both utilization and experience.
This has been a long journey. First, we realized we couldn’t consider conduct before we articulated the culture we wanted to create. We also realized we needed to articulate that how we treat each other matters. Perhaps obvious especially to ombuds, but critical to ensuring we are all operating with the same frame. After focus group discussions with members in 2022, it was clear we needed to start with organizational values (based on the values detailed in our Code of Ethics for practice) and community norms. After gaining community input, we rolled out new Values and Norms that guide all our interactions.
A Message from IOA
As a profession committed to fairness, we appreciate hearing from members about holding annual conferences in Indianapolis for IOA2024 and Miami for IOA2025. And as an international organization, IOA is always trying to balance a variety of potentially competing needs that our members may not be aware of. We hope it is helpful to share some information that impacted IOA’s decisions to contract with hotels in Indianapolis and Miami to host our conference as well as information about hotel contracting generally:
IOA's conference location is determined by a number of factors including what cities are willing to bid on our conference and if we have been to that region in the last five years.
