The Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) has three main bodies: a Governing Board (GB) that is responsible for marketing, budget and other business oversight decisions for the CNCF, a Technical Oversight Committee (TOC) that is responsible for defining and maintaining the technical vision, and an End User Community (EUC) that is responsible for providing feedback from companies and startups to help improve the overall experience for the cloud native ecosystem. Each of these groups has its own defining role in the Foundation. 

The TOC responsibilities and operations are defined in the CNCF Charter. The TOC is intended to be a resource of technical architects in the community that both guides the direction of the CNCF and acts as a resource to projects. Their role is also to help define what new projects are accepted to the CNCF. 

The Technical Oversight Committee elections for open positions are about to kick off, with nominations opening in January. 

We have one end user appointed seat and three governing board appointed seats open for the 2023 election cycle.

Nomination qualifications 

Nomination qualifications are defined in the charter. A nominee should be a senior engineer in the scope of the CNCF, have the available bandwidth to be invested in the TOC, and be able to operate neutrally in discussions regardless of company or project affiliation.

Process for nominations

Each Selecting Group may nominate up to two people, and the nominee must agree to be nominated. A one-page nominating statement should include the nominee’s qualifying experience and contact information. Following the nomination, there is a two week evaluation period for the Governing Board and TOC to review and contact nominees. After the evaluation period, the Governing Board and TOC votes on each nominee to pass a qualification vote, with a 50% vote to become a Qualified Nominee. 

We will publish the list of Qualified Nominees.  

TOC Election Schedule:

The nominations will open on the Public TOC mailing list on January 2, 2023!