From Len Chassman, who served as Hollywood's last Executive Director. He was employed by the guild for 17 years:

Having retired four years ago from my former position on SAG's executive staff, I am no longer a Guild stakeholder. My opinions regarding the direction of the Guild are irrelevant. However, regarding the issue of membership/staff relations, I believe that I have some expertise to offer, based not only on my nineteen years with SAG but on a 42-year career which included service to AFTRA and to WGA.

In his report on the recent New York membership meeting, Michael Arkin reported that the Guild's newly elected National President expressed the view that "each new administration that comes to office deserves to 'clean house' and find people they like to work with to be the executive director and other senior staff positions." If this is an accurate statement of the policy of the majority leadership group, it represents a serious departure from a philosophy which has been a strength of the talent guilds throughout their histories; I refer to the non-politicization of professional staff.

Unlike many labor organizations, the talent unions and guilds expressely declined to make the chief executive or other ranking paid executive positions subject to election by the membership. This has led to a level of stability and continuity that has served performers, writers and directors well over the past seventy years. While it is appropriate that the chief executive serve at the pleasure of the membership, functioning through its elected board of directors, such authority should be exercised recognizing existing contracts of employment and based on performance over, in my opinion, a complete cycle of major negotiations (i.e., at least three years). The termination of an executive, simply because a new leadership majority wants someone with whom it "likes to work", politicizes that paid staff position to the detriment of the long-term stability and continuity of the organization. If this is to be the policy, the union must be careful to offer any candidate to fill the NED/CEO post a contract expiring with the next election, just in case a new leadership group might attain a board majority and want someone it "like to work with". I wonder about the quality of any executive who would accept the job under those circumstances.

What is also not clear is the depth of direct control to be asserted by the board majority. How far down from the top will the board exercise it's hiring/firing authority? Certainly, the morale of the staff under such uncertainty will suffer and one wonders about the ability of the Guild to attract and retain talented employees when one's job depends upon the leadership majority "liking to work with" them.

All Guild members should give this serious thought.

Warm regards to all,

Leonard Chassman