[OSMF-membership] Managing OSMF membership using CiviCRM

[Jonathan Harley]

On 08/01/15 13:40, Jonathan Bennett wrote:
> On 08/01/2015 12:27, Jonathan Harley wrote:
>
>> However, if nobody else here agrees with me, I will shut up and get out
>> of the way.
>
> No, it's just we haven't got across how basic the issue is, and how 
> urgent the need for *anything* better is. Hopefully this message and 
> the others have helped with that?

I'm sorry, but I don't get why this is so urgent that we can't think 
before doing. If we plough straight on with what you've started, then 
think about the big picture later, there are two risks - that CiviCRM 
won't be able to do it and we'll throw away something that we've 
invested time and effort in - or that we'll decide that something won't 
be done because CiviCRM doesn't support it. What are the risks of 
planning first?

You've been involved with this for much longer than I have and maybe 
you're clearer what the long and short term membership issues are than 
me - I know I'm pretty unclear and still trying to get to grips with 
what happens now (whether it's held on google docs or not etc). If I'm 
just being dim, I apologise. I both want to understand better for 
myself, and want things discussed publicly on the list rather than being 
taken as read. I've seen too many projects go badly because of unstated 
assumptions.

To me, "we need a CRM urgently" isn't the description of a problem, it's 
a solution. "OSMF members think signing up is too slow" and "change 
requests get lost sometimes" and "potential members can't pay easily 
enough" are problems which a CRM is one possible solution to. Having an 
overview of the actual problems would help us prioritise them, make a 
roadmap that we can communicate to the board and the membership, and 
maybe solve some of them with a lot less work than it might appear - 
hence my suggestion that if using google is one of the problems, we 
could solve that one almost instantly.

When people start software-as-a-service companies, they sometimes start 
selling the product before it's all written. That's OK; when you only 
have a few customers, you can sign them up, edit their accounts and 
invoice them by hand. As you grow, you work out what is taking you the 
most effort, and automate those things first. You don't need a CRM until 
you get pretty big. In terms of OSMF's problems, that could look like: 
replace google docs with OSMF's server; then replace one person with a 
team; then maybe replace the email addresses with simple web forms that 
go to email, and get user feedback on those; then integrate the web 
forms into something more complex like a CMS.

Sorry if this seems long winded, but that's where I'm coming from; 
taking things step by step seems to me the low-risk way of doing this, 
and implementing a CMS first seems like the high-risk way.

If this makes sense to anyone, feel free to agree. If not, then as I 
said before, I will drop it; we don't need to discuss this endlessly, 
and I don't want to be a drag on the group's progress. Despite what 
RichardF thinks, I did not volunteer for this in order to sabotage it.

Jon.


-- 
Dr Jonathan Harley   :    Managing Director    :   SpiffyMap Ltd

jon at spiffymap.net     mobile: 07590 024028     www.spiffymap.com
The Venture Centre, Sir William Lyons Road, Coventry CV4 7EZ, UK