[Linux-aus] linux.conf.au 2014 Financials

[Silvia Pfeiffer]

On Sun, Jun 1, 2014 at 11:49 AM, Joshua Hesketh <president at linux.org.au> wrote:
> Hi Silvia,
>
> Thanks for your feedback.
>
> On 01/06/14 11:36, Silvia Pfeiffer wrote:
>> Just one small note of warning: more administrative overhead on the
>> teams that organise LCA is not going to make it a more financially
>> successful conference but instead will put off more people from
>> offering a bid.
>> Make sure that whatever financial oversight you put in place are done
>> by people outside the core team.
>
> The structure of the new subcommittee policy is to have community
> members (usually ghosts, council or trusted members) embedded in the
> organising so that they can assist with this kind of oversight. So yes,
> the burden placed on those organising the logistics is minimal.

Excellent.

>> TBH: I am not overly worried about an LCA having made a loss. It does
>> seems a bit strange that this conference was organised by a
>> professional events manager and yet the council wasn't made aware of
>> any financial issues until late. I assume you've done your assessments
>> of whether the events manager involvement was useful and actually
>> helped make the conference a success.
>
> The professional events manager handled logistics and was not involved
> in the financial side of the event management. Without the events
> manager it is unlikely there would have been an LCA2014. This was an
> added expense (and a fixed one) but not an unexpected one. The council
> knew at the time of the bid that this likely meant for a lower return on
> the conference but was happy to take that risk on the basis that running
> an LCA that makes less money is better than not running an LCA.
>
> While an event manager is an added risk that the council will always be
> cautious of (and weigh up on a per-bid basis), the loss came about due
> to much lower revenue than expected. In fact, the overall expenses for
> the event were on par with most other years.

Ah good to understand the circumstances, in particular that these were
independent variables.

> As such LCA and the council are hoping to track incoming revenue much
> closer moving into the future. Specifically to adjust expenses
> accordingly where revenue may be at a shortfall.

That sounds reasonable and should help address shortfalls earlier and
while not remove them completely, at least reduce them.

Your proposal makes a lot of sense to me.

Cheers,
Silvia.