Standards Board Operations Manual – Clause 1

The organization and basic procedures of the IEEE SA Standards Board are covered by the IEEE SA Standards Board Bylaws. The following material supplements the provisions of the IEEE SA Standards Board Bylaws, which shall be the prevailing document in the event of conflict. The purpose of this document is to specify the procedures that shall be followed in the standards-development process in use within the IEEE.

Participants engaged in the development of standards shall comply with applicable federal, state, and international laws and regulations. In addition, for standards matters, the latest versions of several documents take precedence over this document, in the following order:

• New York State Not-for-Profit Corporation Law
• IEEE Certificate of Incorporation
• IEEE Constitution
• IEEE Bylaws (current edition)
• IEEE Policies (current edition)
• IEEE Board of Directors Resolutions
• IEEE Standards Association (IEEE SA) Operations Manual (current edition)
• IEEE SA Board of Governors Resolutions
• IEEE SA Standards Board Bylaws (current edition)

IEEE standards include but are not limited to:

• Lists of terms, definitions, or symbols, applicable to any field of science or technology within the scope of the IEEE.
• Expositions of scientific methods of measurement or tests of the parameters or performance of any device, apparatus, system, or phenomenon associated with the art, science, or technology of any field within the scope of the IEEE.
• Characteristics, performance, and safety requirements associated with devices, equipment, and systems with engineering installations.
• Recommendations reflecting current state-of-the-art in the application of engineering principles to any field of technology within the scope of the IEEE.

IEEE standards are classified as:

• Standards: documents with mandatory requirements.[1]
• Recommended practices: documents in which procedures and positions preferred by the IEEE are presented.
• Guides: documents in which alternative approaches to good practice are suggested but no clear-cut recommendations are made.
• Trial-Use documents: publications in effect for not more than three years (See 5.7). They can be any of the categories of standards publications listed above.

The IEEE standards development process may result in one or more of the following documents:

• New: A document that does not replace or modify another standard.
• Revision: A document that updates and replaces (i.e., supersedes) an existing IEEE standard in its entirety.
• Amendment: A document that adds to, removes from, or alters material in a portion of an existing IEEE standard and may make editorial or technical corrections to that standard.
• NOTE – An amendment to a standard may be prepared to maintain the state-of-the-art within the standard due to advancing technology or techniques. An amendment facilitates the timely change of an existing IEEE standard prior to its complete revision.
• Corrigendum: A document that only corrects editorial errors, technical errors, or ambiguities in an existing IEEE standard. A corrigendum does not introduce new material.
• NOTE – A typical corrigendum may contain:
  — Corrections to equations, tables, or figures, or their associated numbering or citations in the text
  — Corrections to technically incorrect sentences or paragraphs
• Erratum: A document that contains only grammatical corrections to, or corrections of errors introduced during the publishing process of, an existing IEEE standard. An erratum is based on the comparison of the final balloted version of the standard as compared to the published version.

IEEE Standards Project Editors can assist Standards Committees in determining whether an amendment or revision is appropriate.

IEEE standards may be in one of three states of activity:

• Developing: Standards projects that have not yet been approved as standards.
• Active: Approved standards that have not been transferred to inactive status.
• Inactive: Standards that are no longer being reviewed or assessed for accuracy, relevance to current practices, or further applications; these standards are removed from active status (i.e., these standards are transferred from active to inactive status). (See 9.2).

All IEEE SA draft standards, meeting minutes, Standards Association ballot materials, and Standards Association ballot comments shall be in the English language.

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Footnote:
[1] Mandatory requirements are generally characterized by use of the verb “shall,” whereas recommended practices normally use the word “should.” See the IEEE Standards Style Manual located in myProject for further information.

• Standards Board Operations Manual (PDF)
• IEEE SA Standards Board Operations Manual
• IEEE SA Standards Board Bylaws
• Policies and Procedures
• Boards and Committees