The executive board invites program chairs (PC) based on the standing in the community, connection to the conference, and organizational ability. The appointments are for a single year only. The program chair is responsible for inviting a program committee of around 30-40 people with suitable experience and standing in the community to review submitted papers.
The selection process focuses on ‘rising stars’ in the community who have demonstrated success as researchers and organized workshops in ECRTS, RTSS, or RTAS in the past. Selected PC chairs have consistently published in ECRTS, RTSS, and RTAS and are often selected to be PC Chairs in RTSS or RTAS shortly after (and occasionally before) serving as an ECRTS PC Chair. The executive board strives for gender balance, but this is difficult given the distribution of male and female researchers in the community. The selection process also aims at balancing geographic locations, so as not to focus on one or two countries from which PC chairs are selected for successive years.
ECRTS is generally held at University facilities to reduce the cost to participants. With this in mind, the executive board invites the general chairs based on the selected location of the conference for that year and the reputation of the candidate chairs with respect to their research and organizational skills. As with PC chair selection, the general chair (and conference location) selection process considers gender balance and geographic location, so as not to focus on one or two countries from which general chairs are selected. And generally favors academically young candidates, rising in the community.