On behalf of the ORCID Board and staff, thank you to everyone who submitted nominations and participated in this year’s Board election process, especially the members of our Nominating Committee. With the election now concluded, the following have been elected to the ORCID Board to serve a three-year term starting in 2025:
Lasith Gunawardena, Professor and Head of Department of Information Technology, University of Sri Jayewardenepura (Researcher-Director, Sri Lanka)
Simon Porter, VP Research Futures, Digital Science (Member-Director, UK)
Carly Robinson, Assistant Director US Department of Energy Office and Scientific and Technical Information (Member-Director, USA)
Lori Ann Schultz, Senior Associate Vice President, Research Administration, University of Texas, San Antonio (Second Term, Member-Director, USA)
Elaine Tham, Regional Director Asia, PLOS (Member-Director, Singapore)
Please join us in congratulating the successful candidates and welcoming them to the ORCID Board.
ORCID holds Board member elections for about a third of the board seats every year, following an open nominations process. This year, the Nominating Committee was chaired with great dedication by ORCID Board Member Heath Marks. The Committee reviewed eight valid nominations for the Member-Director Board seats and 48 valid nominations for the Researcher-Director seat. The slate put forward by the Nominating Committee has experience in the areas the Board identified as top priorities for this year’s nomination cycle:
- Based in Asia and can advocate on behalf of ORCID in the region
- Skilled in the areas of technology, cybersecurity, or finance
- Members of one of the following stakeholder groups: publishers, vendors, or funders
- Experience in organizational governance
The Nominating Committee aimed to put forward a diverse slate of candidates driven by ORCID’s mission and inspired by ORCID’s strategic themes. The Committee was pleased to have nominations from candidates with the skills and experience specifically requested to better balance the existing Board this year. The Committee also ensured that the Board, as per our bylaws, retained a majority of representatives of non-profit members.
The Nominating Committee’s slate of candidates was reviewed by the Board at its September 2024 meeting, announced in this blog post by Heath Marks, and sent directly to ORCID members via our newsletter and an email to all voting contacts in member organizations.
Of the 1,404 members eligible to vote in the 2025 Board elections, 423 (30.1%) cast votes, above the 10% participation threshold needed for the election to be valid. Of those members casting ballots, 400 (95%) voted in favor of the slate, 12 (2.9%) voted to abstain, and 9 (2.1%) voted against the ballot. Two additional members (.5%) noted that they chose to abstain from voting. The election results were certified at 21:06 UTC on 20 November 2024 and are available here.
Please accept my thanks if you participated in the election, and join me in congratulating our new Board members on their election.
We also received an excellent and diverse set of applications to join our Researcher Advisory Council. These applications have been reviewed by staff and we will be extending invitations to the successful applicants in the next few weeks.
