Value-Driven Projects Nick O'Neill QCon SF 2018 Hi, I'm Nick - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

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Value-Driven Projects Nick O'Neill QCon SF 2018 Hi, I'm Nick - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Dec 04, 2023 237 likes •718 views

Managing Volunteers for Value-Driven Projects Nick O'Neill QCon SF 2018 Hi, I'm Nick O'Neill Generalist UI Engineer Mobile team lead Political non-profit founder? A Short Prelude on voting, of course High Availability

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Managing Volunteers for

Value-Driven Projects

Nick O'Neill ⋆ QCon SF 2018
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Hi, I'm Nick O'Neill

  • Generalist UI Engineer
  • Mobile team lead
  • Political non-profit founder?
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A Short Prelude

  • n voting, of course
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High Availability

Consensus Algorithms

I.E. why voting is important
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5 Calls

Makes it easy to contact your representative on progressive issues you care about

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How'd we do?

  • ~2.5M Calls to Congress
  • 100+ Volunteers
  • 3 Platforms

A way to stay involved between elections

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Open Source as a software team

  • Figuring out how to "hire" and motivate people
  • Coordinating across vastly different products
  • Stories of failing under huge load
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Need help? Go boring

  • Purpose-driven projects don't need tech motivation
  • Bigger pool of volunteers
  • Boring ➝ Simple ➝ More reliable
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Lessons from

volunteers

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Mostly on github

(also some slack)

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Lowering the bar for

getting started

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Lowering the bar for

getting started

  • Readme with goals, expectations and values
  • Labeled starter tasks
  • Good getting started guides for each project
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3 types

  • f volunteers
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Experienced with

  • pen source
  • Lots of work in open source before
  • Know the thing they want to fix (probably technical)
  • Not a lot of time for your project
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Solid coders

for the mission

  • Solid, no-hands-held code
  • Needs only rough guidance on tasks
  • Will come back with ownership
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Fresh coders who

want to learn

  • Mission-driven, but inexperienced
  • Needs hand-holding for and review
  • Good contributors in time
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It's about time

  • "When will you have time to do this?"
  • Don't make it a meeting
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Anyone can

flake

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!

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Communicate

  • Lower the bar to entry
  • Get light committments
  • Check in often
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Work by your

values

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Can you be open source, but also against some use cases?

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* This has never actually been an issue for us

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Probably net-positive

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Have your strong opinion

But communicate it clearly to people working on your project.
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Decide on your strong opinion

And then communicate them clearly to people working on your project.
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Microsoft / ICE

Google / Defense Dept

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Contributors

Do you know where your software is right now?
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Maintainers

Do your contributors know what your values are?
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OK, we know our values

now what?

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No warranty

No limitations No responsibility

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At Minimum

  • What is the software I'm writing going to be used for?
  • Should my software be used in ways I disagree with?
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Review

  • Tech for some projects is just the means
  • Lower the bar to entry for new vols
  • Lead with your values
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Thanks

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Questions

nick.oneill@gmail.com

  • r @nickoneill

hello@5calls.org

  • r @make5calls