[Osmf-talk] +1 | Re: Working with Dorothea full-time
Rory McCann
rory at technomancy.org
Sat Nov 9 16:12:20 UTC 2019
Yeah, creating a new job needs proper discussion. But “This person has
been doing a great job, and officially is part time, but often does full
time. Let's make that official” is something much less radical, and
something I totally get behind. She's being doing a great job, this'll
only benefit OSM.
On 09.11.19 16:06, Nuno Caldeira wrote:
> totally agree. Dorathea does a great job.
>
> On Sat, 9 Nov 2019, 15:04 Steven Johnson, <sejohnson8 at gmail.com
> <mailto:sejohnson8 at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
> I applaud this move. It shows that having talented and dedicated
> individuals in paid staff positions can benefit the whole project.
> Frederik has made a good case _specifically_ for Dorothea because of
> her dedication to the operational success of the foundation and the
> wider OSM project.
>
> -- SEJ
> -- twitter: @geomantic
> -- skype: sejohnson8
>
>
> On Sat, Nov 9, 2019 at 9:28 AM Frederik Ramm <frederik at remote.org
> <mailto:frederik at remote.org>> wrote:
>
> Hi Christoph,
>
> I think the board should probably pay someone to come up with a
> concept
> paper on the implications of paid work on the OSMF and its
> position in
> the OSM community.
>
> This sounds like a joke but I am serious. We have in the past
> said that
> we should mainly consider paid work for tedious jobs that we
> cannot find
> any volunteers for. Your request for a detailed assessment is a
> prime
> example of tedious work that nobody in the board is burning to spend
> their volunteer time on, so if you feel that such work is
> needed, it is
> perhaps time to "go the Wikimedia Foundation route" and pay
> consultants
> to do this work for us.
>
> Now you could cry foul and say that if the board isn't even
> prepared to
> go through that little exercise they should not be trusted with the
> money in the first place, but this is not a "little exercise",
> this is a
> very wide-ranging issue of governance that would require us
> writing down
> lots of things, presumably revisiting our "mission statement"
> and taking
> it from there. In order to prepare a write-up of the kind that
> stands up
> to your level of scrutiny, many many person-weeks will have to
> be spent
> writing definitions and drawing the line between paid work and
> volunteer
> work.
>
> In contrast, the board is taking the approach: We have tried it, it
> worked well for everyone, let's continue on a more serious scale.
>
> I am fully aware that this means we are lacking the answers to some
> questions.
>
> The conflict comes mainly from the fact that you view this on a
> strict
> non-personal matter. In your eyes, the board is creating a full-time
> position to be filled by a suitable contractor or employee, and you
> expect there to be a job description that explains exactly what
> we want
> the person to do and how many hours to spend on what. Who the
> person is
> to fill that position, is something you will only consider later, it
> doesn't matter initially. Of course, rules need to be drawn up
> to ensure
> that whoever takes that position doesn't usurp volunteer work or
> makes
> themselves a willing instrument for the board exerting more
> control and
> muscling their way into parts of the project they couldn't hitherto
> reach, etc.
>
> The way I see it is totally different: It starts not with an
> empty slot
> to be filled be a replaceable contractor, it starts with
> Dorothea with
> whom I have worked together for a good 1.5 years now. She is not a
> random contractor. She has her own rules and ways of doing
> things, and
> she is very eager not to replace any volunteers (of which she, in
> addition to her paid work, is also one). Dorothea will be the first
> person to step aside as soon as any volunteer so much as lifts a
> hand.
> She is the right person to do this, and the opportunity to
> solidify our
> work with her is a chance I do not want us to miss.
>
> For me, this does not mean we are "creating a position" that, should
> Dorothea ever leave us, has to be filled with another person. It
> might,
> if someone equally suitable is available; otherwise, we'll have
> to do
> without.
>
> > The board has apparently discussed this matter more than half
> a year
> > ago at the f2f but have not shared the content or results of
> this
> > discussion in substance with the community
>
> True, this could have been done better.
>
> > until now while continuing
> > to make concrete plans and even hiring a consultancy for
> advise on
> > practical implementation of their plans - all without
> informing the
> > members.
>
> You're not exactly making "informing the members" any more
> enticing I
> have to say ;) the issue with this particular item is that it
> touches
> the contract/employment situation of a person, and it is always
> a little
> unclear how much of it should be considered personal
> information. For
> example, if this is discussed on the board, a certain assessment
> of the
> contractor's qualities will come into the discussion. Is it ok
> for this
> to be public? Is it fair? Is it more "professional" to keep
> everything
> that even remotely sounds like "payroll issues" under wraps?
>
> I agree that "extending Dorothea's hours" could have been discussed
> earlier, but then again, it would have led to exactly the same
> result it
> does now and did in the past - your demand that "you have to
> provide an
> exact job description and show that this cannot be done by
> volunteers".
>
> I say, if you have someone as good and respectful as Dorothea
> then you
> do not need an exact job description. It will work out to everyone's
> benefit. You will say that it is reckless, that we have to define a
> process that will work even if the person in the job is
> adversarial and
> cannot be trusted to make their decisions in a way that do not
> harm the
> community. I will say sure, but this is not about working with
> "anyone",
> this is about working with Dorothea! You will say that that's
> not the
> point. I will say nggggghghhhh.
>
> > Specific example: You now write:
> >
> >> [...] by helping with the
> >> administration of the upcoming microgrant programme, and others.
> >
> > But when you requested comments on your plans for the
> microgrants
> > program two weeks ago you did not provide any hint that you were
> > planning to administer this with paid staff.
>
> Yes, I am not involved in the microgrant discussions in the
> board too
> much. But it seems obvious to me that some management will be
> required
> and Dorothea would be well suited to do it. I think it is good
> if the
> design of the microgrant programme does not *rely* on there being an
> administrative assistant who can help (because if Dorothea
> should quit
> we might not have one), so any "concrete plan" that says "the admin
> assistant can do it" would have been dangerous.
>
> > How can you expect useful feedback from the community on
> plans like this
> > when you specifically hide your considerations on central
> aspects of
> > your plans from the members when you present those plans?
>
> This is a very good example of you suspecting evil plans when
> there is
> nothing of the sort. I don't know if those board members who
> worked on
> the microgrants programme thought in their heads that "Dorothea
> can do
> it", if they did, they certainly did not say it. It was me who
> listed a
> number of things that were *obviously* things that Dorothea
> *could* be
> doing. These are not "plans" and they were not "hidden" by those who
> worked on the microgrants stuff.
>
> > My intention is not to dress down the board for this - i am
> sure from
> > the perspective of the board there are reasons for this.
>
> Or not - as I said, it could just be some board members
> concentrating on
> one thing and others on another.
>
> > But i think
> > the board should understand that this is part of a general
> problem of a
> > culture of intransparency and exclusivity prevalent within the
> > organizational culture creating immense problems when
> interacting with
> > the broader OSM community who largely strongly despise this
> kind of
> > culture.
>
> There is a grain of truth in what you say but you are also whipping
> things up far beyond what is reasonable. By suspecting evil
> machinations
> where there is, at worst, a lack of diligence, and by using
> words like
> "despise", you are playing to an audience of outrage like so many
> populist politicians. We haven't deserved this.
>
> > What i strongly miss in your announcement is any reflection
> on all those
> > matters that have been the core of the discussion when the
> idea of
> > hiring paid help for administrative tasks within the OSMF in
> the first
> > place. Specifically this is mostly about the relation and
> conflicts
> > between volunteer work and paid work.
>
> See initial paragraph about hiring professionals to do a month-long
> community consultation and provide a 50-page full-colour
> brochure with
> the results.
>
> > One of the main points of the OSMF being based on and
> depending on
> > volunteer work is that it forces the OSMF - in particular the
> board -
> > to comply with the collective needs and wishes of the volunteer
> > community.
>
> In theory this is right, and I support that. In practice, of course,
> this foundation is already eaten away at by people who
> "volunteer" their
> paid employment time.
>
> > Volunteers tend to have their own idea on how they want
> > things to work they volunteer for. In a do-ocratic culture
> like we
> > have in the OSM community that is the base assumption we work
> under.
>
> ... and if people "volunteer" their paid work time, then their
> bosses
> are the ones in whose hands the do-ocractic power concentrates.
>
> > Now if you call for volunteers but don't want them to bring
> in and
> > insist on following their own ideas on how projects should be
> run that
> > will mean you have more difficulties getting qualified people to
> > volunteer.
>
> Of course a balance needs to be struck, you wouldn't want every
> volunteer to the sysadmin group to switch from Chef to Ansible
> to Puppet
> and back again. Sometimes volunteering requires to, at least
> initially,
> swim with the flow before you can assert your own ways.
>
> > You can then of course - using money collected from
> > corporations - buy in paid work to fill the gap and continue
> managing
> > projects to your own liking but this way you'd be digging
> yourselves
> > into a hole disconnected from the community you want to
> represent and
> > you could have difficulties getting out of this again in the
> future.
>
> Then again, collecting money from corporations and hiring
> someone to do
> work to our liking *could* still be preferable to being sent
> "volunteers" from corporations and submit to their "do-ocracy".
>
> Not saying you are wrong, just offering an additional data point. Of
> course, having lots of volunteers available for everything we
> need would
> be ideal. But there are many areas in which you cannot, as a
> volunteer,
> simply do what you please. For example if you had a volunteer
> writing
> board minutes, you'd have the community breathing down their
> neck to do
> it properly. If you were a volunteer in the SotM-WG dealing with
> scholarship arrangements, you couldn't suddenly say "you know what,
> we'll not do Visas this year" and so on, these things would
> still need
> to be discussed in the group and the volunteer would have to
> submit to
> the collective decision.
>
> > The motivation of the average hobby mapper to volunteer for
> working in
> > that project without being able to substantially shape it is
> therefore
> > rather low.
>
> I think if I were running SotM-WG and an average hobby mapper
> came to me
> offering their volunteer contribution for, in return, a chance to
> "substantially shape" the event, my response would be a cautious
> suggestion if they could perhaps start a bit smaller ;)
>
> > You will never be able to create a true
> > community conference this way that is carried and shaped
> collectively
> > by a large number of voluteers (like for example the CCC).
>
> I don't want to pre-empt Christine here but I think she's very
> fond of
> the idea of getting more people to make volunteer work
> contributions to
> SotM. The great thing about Dorothea is that if Christine manages to
> make this happen, Dorothea will say "great, then I can do something
> else" rather than try to out-perform volunteers.
>
> Bye
> Frederik
>
> --
> Frederik Ramm ## eMail frederik at remote.org
> <mailto:frederik at remote.org> ## N49°00'09" E008°23'33"
>
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