President’s Blog.

11/10/2024

 Presidential Blog, Approaching Amsterdam 2025……

Dear friends and member colleagues,
IJOC General Assembly, Amsterdam 2025: In my previous message, I had already stated that we are very pleased to return to Amsterdam for our GA and the accompanying FEI in person maintenance courses. However, one correction for dates. Please note that our General Assembly (and the IJOC Officials Forum) will take place on the 24th of January. The Judges course is on the 25th and the Stewards course is on the 26th. The Course Designers course will run (as in previous years) on both 25 and 26 January.

Upcoming Board Elections: As stipulated in our statutes, there must be a rotation of 1/3 board members each year and this year it is also the term for the Presidential elections. Accordingly, there are two board member seats and a presidential seat up for elections. Kindly note that, you will soon receive the appeal process information for candidates to apply.

IJOC Statutes: As you have well received, the first set of our draft Statutes are now circulated. In case you have comments, please do share them with our Secretary General. Please do not forget that “the earlier the better” for us to process all the comments in a timely manner. On behalf of our Board, I would like to thank personally Liliana Rivera (BOL), Cristina Alves (POR) and Elisabeth von Bawey (FRA) for their dedicated work in establishing this first draft.

IJOC Webinars: Our next webinar is already planned for the 29th of October, and I am pleased to inform you that following the “Sustainability” Webinar we will have our FEI Colleagues talking about “FEI Equine Welfare Strategy” on the 26th of November. As you know, we have already conducted two webinars so far. We are working hard to find the most suitable slot with the course directors to accommodate the annual case studies session within this year as well.

IJOC Online Archive: We would appreciate if you can kindly go through our library. Should you have any supporting documents for the missing years, please do not hesitate to share them with us. Following the check of our colleagues, they will be included in our library.

FEI Officials Working Group: Last but not least, I would like to inform you about a recent development. I have been contacted by the FEI to join the newly formed “FEI Officials Working Group”. While we are pleased to have been included in the group of experts, we are aware of the responsibility and the important topics that our officials are encountering on the ground. Therefore, we consider this step of the FEI as a very important action for future. We shall keep you posted of the developments along the way.

Finally, on behalf of our board, I look forward to seeing you all in Amsterdam. Kind regards

Glenn Maes

President IJOC

Dear Colleagues,

Earlier this week we’ve sent out the presidential blog, talking about 3 important topics.

  • Case study webinar
  • IJOC General Assembly in Amsterdam in 2025
  • IJOC Archive on the website

We’ve been informed by different members that another email was received, as if it was sent by myself, looking for help and/or money.  Please note this is a scam, a phishing attempt and please ignore this and/or similar messages looking as if they were sent by me and/or any other board member !  Earlier this week a similar attempt was already launched on behalf of another board member.  We will never be looking for money in such a way.  Please be cautious for such phishing attempts !

Kind Regards,

Glenn Maes

Dear Colleagues,

Time to plan ahead …

We are more than half-way through the year and we would like to share some important upcoming
activities with you. We will host the 2024 edition of our “Case Studies Webinar” in the near
future. We are working to ensure the format is as interactive as possible along with other changes. We
truly appreciate the invaluable feedback we receive and thank everyone for their comments.

If in the performance of your duties you have encountered an unusual or strange situation please
share them with us. Please send your potential case studies to Ali Küçük (sg@ijoclub.com). Your
cases can relate to judging, stewarding or course designing.

As we are approaching the end of the Summer, we also want to provide with information on the next
General Assembly. We have been exploring different options with different NF’s bringing us towards
another continent but we were not able to conclude this successfully. Finally, we have been able to
come to a nice co-operation with the Dutch NF and the OC of the Amsterdam World Cup. This means
we will be organizing our next General Assembly and In Person Maintenance Courses in
Amsterdam, from January 26th till January 28th, 2025. We hope you can start blocking your
calendars accordingly and save the date.

Another milestone, another legacy for our Club…

Approximately a year ago the Board decided to start an IT project which involved the retention,
preservation and presentation of IJOC documents since the establishment of the Club. The range of
documents included the previous general assembly minutes, agendas, various presentations,
statutes, members, board members, etc.

We knew that this would be challenging but resumed the efforts during the year and we are nearing a
successful end to this project. At our last General Assembly in Rome, we made our idea even more
concrete and included this item in our annual activity plan with a promise to finish in 2024. With your
votes, it was very much welcomed, and we went ahead.

Following approval in Rome, we formed a working group led by our board member Angele Svoronou
(GRE) who has personally provided many valuable documents. The group later reviewed some 250
documents to filter and correctly select the latest/official version of all these documents. Starting
from 2002, the relevant items have been taken onboard.

On behalf of our Board, it is my pleasure to announce the official launch of “IJOC Archive” which is
available to our members-only on the IJOC website. The use of our archive is very simple. You can simply select the “year” or the “type of document”. The
results will appear in pdf format which you can access directly. Needless to say, for the “Case
Studies”, please note that the rule applications refer to that year of the FEI rules which should be
considered within the context of that specific date.

Of course, we still have some items missing in this 22 years of process. Therefore, your involvement
is very much appreciated. If you happen to possess any of the missing documents on our site, please
do share them with us. We will be happy to include these items.

Finally, I would like to end my letter with heartfelt gratitude and thanks to my fellow Board Members
for their efforts in creating this milestone project. We are proud to establish this new legacy which will
further strengthen our institutional stance.
.
Kind regards as always

On behalf of the IJOC Board
Glenn Maes, President IJOC

Following the IJOC General Assembly 2024……

Dear friends and colleagues,

Another IJOC General Assembly is behind us. I would like to start by reflecting on this event and I am pleased to inform you that we’ve had a very successful organisation. Thanks to many stakeholders and the IJOC Board, our events ran smoothly, and the high number of positive feedback was quite encouraging for us. Following your responses to our survey, we have noted the status of observers. Going forward, we will make sure that this item is shared with the FEI (in advance) for our next event.

FEI Rule Revision:  Of course, we immediately started our annual activities and preparations. To this end, our first topic is the annual FEI Rules Revision process. As you might know, the FEI has already launched the process on the 6th of February and asked the NFs and MOU stakeholders to provide their input. This year is not a general rule revision period so we would like to ask you to share with us if you have any “urgent repair” status rule revision proposals. In such case, please do share them with us until latest 21 February.

IJOC Webinars: This year, we are planning to kick off the webinar series with FEI IT Applications. We shall soon share the details. The remaining topics are currently gathered and as such presented to the IJOC General Assembly in Rome. We shall not fail to share this provisional information on our website soon.

IJOC Online Archive: Our promise to our General Assembly is going forward already.  We have readily established a working group which will work in partnership with our IT colleagues to create an IJOC Online Archive or Library. Our members will have the chance to go back in time to learn more about previous managements, decisions, and visuals. As the IJOC Board, we are excited to create this “legacy” action and hope to report to you the finished product at our next General Assembly.

IJOC Statutes: It is already time to review our Statutes. To this end, we are the process of establishing a working group but before that, it makes sense that we return to our members first. Such that, we would like to share a survey with you to receive your ideas/input for them. Besides some other minor revisions, I believe our most important agenda item is the possible inclusion of the FEI veterinarians into our Club.

First question: Should the FEI Veterinarians be accepted into IJOC membership?

Second question: If yes, in which form?  a) standard member as others b) an associate membership category

All these questions/formats have various pros and cons. That is the reason why I wanted to share the process in advance with you. However, please note that you will soon receive a survey to this end.

Regional Representatives: Our Strategic Planning Working Group headed by our Vice President Eric Straus is continuing their commitment towards improving /developing future insight to our Club. Simultaneously, they are working in-tandem with our Regional Representatives on the site. Please note that we will soon share their names and contact details on the IJOC Website.

So, these were our short-term activity planning, and I am looking forward to yet another successful year of activities and improvements in our Club. Thanks for being with us. Finally, I would like to thank again the IJOC Board for their engaged and committed presence over the last year and I am confident this will be the same going forward.

Glenn Maes, President

Dear Friends,

As we are approaching the year-end, I would like to reflect on this year’s developments at the IJOC front.

As you now know, we are very happy to remind again (with the support of the Italian Equestrian Federation, FISE) our next General Assembly will be held in the historic city of Rome on 12 January 2024. This will be accompanied by our traditional “Officials Forum” and the FEI in-person maintenance courses on Saturday and Sunday for judges, stewards, and course designers respectively. The official hotel of our events will be NH Collection Hotel Rome. To this end, please find attached to this communication our “Save the Date” page where you can find the relevant information. Please note that we will soon announce the registration process both for our events as well as accommodation.
This year, we have so far completed 3 webinars and a case studies session where our members got to attend and review later our website. We are working on the next session of “Crisis Management” webinar. We continue to work closely with the FEI and other stakeholders on proposals for entry fees, prize money and the overall future of our sport. Though discussions are ongoing, we are playing an active role at all levels. We already had a meeting with the new FEI Jumping Director, Todd Hinde and I am pleased to inform you that he will be joining us in Rome so that you will have the chance to meet him in-person.

In March this year, we have circulated the FEI rule revision proposals, and your feedback was inserted to the system. We will be following the approval process at the FEI General Assembly and shall not fail to inform you accordingly.
Following up our to-do list from last year, we have been in contact with the FEI about the appointments, promotions and education of officials’ process. The FEI is already hands-on together with the new Jumping Director about these three areas. Especially the education system is finalised now, and we are happy that Frank Spadinger, FEI Director Education and Officials, will personally explain the new system to you at our “Officials Forum”.

As for the IJOC board elections, we had previously informed you about the 4-seat availability. Furthermore, our current board members, Teodor Sheytanov, Marysa Zoureli, and Monica Gomez Su were re-eligible. Unfortunately, Teodor Sheytanov has decided not to stand for re-election.
Please note that the deadline for the board election applications is the 10th of November.

We have continued our different sessions of the Strategic Working Group and meetings with the Regional Reps talking about challenges throughout the world. We have been receiving signals about number of officials at certain level of competitions which will be detailed in our last board meeting in Rome.

Looking forward to seeing you in Rome and kind regards,

Glenn Maes, President

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas …

When we turn on the radio or when we walk in city centres, it is becoming clear, Christmas and New Year are approaching. As a result, time has come to reflect on the previous year. A year where we as a club have worked hard and have been able to accomplish many things.

We are very happy about the numerous webinars and the high attendance of these educational sessions, proving they really add value to all of us. Thank you for the active participation and thank you for your help to realise them.

We are very happy with our growing membership base. Thank you to our regional representatives and all members. Each and every one of you are and have been true ambassadors for our club.

We are very happy with the approval of the revised remuneration policy that is part of the 2023 FEI Jumping Rules. It is an important step in our pathway to professionalism for officials.

We are happy to have many entries for our IJOC Officials Forum in Lisbon mid-January. We are looking forward to meeting you again in person as these social aspects are also a great value of being part of this big “Officials Community’.

Almost at the end of my first year as President of our Club, I am delighted to have been able to work with a highly engaged and committed group of board members. Each of them really makes the difference and together we are all looking back at a great year. At the same time, we are looking forward to another great year to come.

We hope you enjoy the upcoming days and weeks as we approach the New Year. We would like to wish you already all the best for 2023. We hope we can work with all of you to continue our pathway and we really hope to see you in Lisbon.

Happy New Year!

Glenn Maes

President IJOC

We need your help ! Working on the future

Dear colleagues officials,

As we are kicking off the summer period, we would like to highlight some key action points we have been working on as the board.

The past few months and weeks have been extremely busy as we have had numerous meetings, consultations and discussions on the remuneration of officials.  You all know that the discussion has started back in 2019  and we are proud to announce that we have come to an agreement with the Equestrian Organisers on a joint proposal for the remuneration of officials at the FEI jumping events.  This agreement was an important prerequisite from the FEI to support the proposal which we have accomplished.

In this proposal two principles are embedded :

  • Remuneration will be different for those officials that are taking the lead during events and/or have an important reporting role/responsibility .  Those roles are president of the ground jury, foreign judge, chief steward and foreign steward.  On the other hand, we have the “operating officials” (ground jury members and stewards).
  • Remuneration will be different depending on the level of the show (for combined events, the highest star level counts).  .

These two principles are reflected in the following proposed grid.

This proposal is already included in the current FEI rule revision process .  This means that all stakeholders (NF’s and organisations that have signed an MOU) are consulted about this proposal and can provide feedback.  We hope you are all supporting this proposal and suggest convincing your NF to support us in providing positive feedback towards the FEI and support our proposal..

On the 5th of July, both Ali Kücük as Secretary General and myself have been visiting the FEI Headquarters.  During our visit we also discussed this topic and FEI supports us in the vision that the current remunerations need to be modified.  Of course, we want a common agreement with all stakeholders and therefore more consultation might be needed to make sure that everybody is on the same page.

As we had different meetings with FEI Secretary General Sabrina Ibanez, Jumping Director Marco Fusté, Director Education & Officials Frank Spadinger and Legal Director Mikael Rentsch, we have been able to start discussions on other topics like the education system, appointments and reporting activities during shows.  We agreed we will be partnering together on proposals for these aspects as well.

Your input to strive for improvements are also more than welcome.

We need your help for the future of our officials !

Kind Regards,

Glenn Maes, President

45 days ago at our yearly General Assembly, I was elected as the President of our Club.  A big change in my personal world. Meanwhile, during these 45 days, our greater world has been changing a lot.  Whilst we were noticing around the world strong improvements in the pandemic situation and we all started cheering our “new normal”, a new uncertainty has entered our lives.  The situation in Eastern Europe is affecting the whole world now.  In our thoughts we support the people who are impacted by this new big crisis.  We are in direct contact with those from our club that are directly impacted, and we will support them wherever we can.

45 days after the election, it is time to reflect on our achievements and share plans about what we will be doing for our club.

The beginning was about getting organized.  As you all know, Teodor stepped down as Secretary General as he moved into a new role within the European Equestrian Federation.  Ali Kücük is taking over his responsibility with the support of Teodor who is still active as a board member.  We had two board meetings where we outlined some short and mid-term action points to start with.  Let me share some of the most important ones.

Remuneration 

  • I have been in touch with stakeholders and leaders within the FEI to discuss the need to have the FEI Officials’ remuneration reviewed.  We have proposed a line of actions to tackle this important focus area and are happy to see that the problem is recognized and will be discussed this year.

Continental Associations

  • We have been participating as an associate member in the European Equestrian Federation Roundtable to discuss strategically the future of our sport.
  • We are looking into creating closer relationships with other Regional Federations (like Asian Federation and Pan American Equestrian Confederation)

FEI Feedback

  • As a stakeholder we have provided the feedback we gathered about the Olympic Games
  • We also reviewed the rule revision proposal we received and submitted them to the FEI

Education

  • This is ever improving and increasing in quantity- IJOC Webinars. One of our main focus areas.  As a result we had some good seminars and we are planning new ones.  We will communicate shortly about our new initiatives

45 days is not that long, but it feels like we as a team accomplished a lot.  Please reach out to us with proposals, ideas or thoughts that we as a club can focus on.

Not 45 days ago, but more than 47 years ago, on March the 8th, the United Nations celebrated for the first time International Women’s Day.    International Women’s Day has been observed since the early 1900’s.  Our sport is one of the very few that is completely gender-neutral and we should be proud of this.  But please take some time today to think about the equal rights for men and women.  Things we take for granted within our sport, are not always the case around the world.  Let’s do whatever we can to work on this equality wherever and whenever.

Kind Regards,
Glenn Maes
President IJOC