[Mageia-dev] "Job offer" : mentoring program coordinator

Sun Jun 12 17:43:38 CEST 2011

On Sun, Jun 12, 2011 at 3:27 PM, Samuel Verschelde <stormi at laposte.net>wrote:
+
+> Hello to everyone,
+>
+> I'm sure there's someone among you who wants to help Mageia but hasn't
+> found
+> yet the good way to do it. Today is your lucky day, because there's a job
+> that's available and can be really useful and interesting: coordinating the
+> packagers mentoring program.
+>
+> You know that one key point of success for Mageia is in the ability to
+> welcome
+> new packagers. The better we will be at it, the better the distro will be.
+> The
+> packagers mentoring program has been created for that reason and several
+> packagers have been or are being mentored. But we have some difficulty
+> knowing
+> who is being mentored by who and who hasn't found a mentor. And we need
+> also
+> to find more mentors and more apprentices.
+>
+> During a packagers weekly meeting, misc invited us to read the following
+> article about mentoring programs in open-source projects:
+> http://blogs.gnome.org/bolsh/2011/05/31/effective-mentoring-programs/
+>
+> I invite those who haven't read it yet, to read it. I'll quote one of the
+> mentoring best practices that were given: "In bigger projects, keeping
+> track
+> of who is a mentor, and who is mentoring who, and inviting new mentors, and
+> ensuring that no-one falls through the cracks when a mentor gets too busy,
+> is
+> a job of itself."
+>
+> I'm looking for someone who could fill that "job".
+>
+> Description of the job:
+>
+> - keep track of:
+> -- who's being mentored by who, how well it's going
+> -- who needs a mentor and hasn't found one yet (this is one of the most
+> important parts: no volunteer must be forgotten, volunteers are too
+> precious
+> !)
+> -- who can mentor more apprentices (and sometimes convince packagers to
+> become
+> mentors or accept one more apprentice)
+>
+> - be available for questions from apprentices or mentors, by mail, and if
+> possible, to be present on the IRC channel #mageia-mentoring on freenode
+>
+> - help mentors with gathering "junior tasks" (bugzilla is a never empty
+> reserve that can be used for that. Maybe ask the bug triage team to help
+> identify such tasks. Maybe a "junior task" keyword in bugzilla would do the
+> trick)
+> -- small bugs to fix
+> -- new small packages to import in the distribution
+> -- backports
+>
+> - promote mentoring (empower users into contributers. Working with the
+> marketing team would be great I think):
+> -- make the mentoring program known (MLs, forums, web, etc.)
+> -- look for new apprentices
+> -- look for new mentors
+>
+> Some useful skills:
+> - be autonomous (ie no need to check that you're doing the work)
+> - good written english (communication is very important in this job)
+> - knowledge about packaging is a plus but not mandatory (the key aspects
+> can
+> be taught to you)
+> - being or having been a mentor, or having been mentored would be a plus,
+> but
+> not mandatory
+>
+> More information about the job:
+> - does not require a big amount of work, but real committment to the task
+> and
+> regularity
+> - remember that you have a coordination role, not an authoritative role.
+> The
+> difference in that is that you're not here to give orders but to facilitate
+> the
+> mentoring program.
+> - you don't have to be alone to do this job if it's too much for one
+> person:
+> you can find other helpful people wanting to help you if needed and rely on
+> the
+> other teams (but finding them *is* part of your job ;) ).
+> -  this "job offer" concerns everything that revolves around the mentoring
+> of
+> new packagers, but if it's successful maybe other teams can follow the same
+> approach (i18n, QA, etc... ).
+> -  depending on your level of confidence, experience and will, you could be
+> helped in your work. Maybe someone from the council can supervise and help
+> you
+> at least at the beginning; or, if no one steps up, I can help you bootstrap
+> and organize your new "job".
+>
+> So, who's in?
+>
+> Samuel Verschelde
+>
+>
+Hello Samuel,
+
+the offer sounds nice. Maybe I can give it a try?
+
+What do I already have in my mind?
+
+- Creating a table on Mageia wiki where someone who wants to be mentored can
+put his name on, + the date he enters his name (so we can see how long he's
+waiting for a mentor)
+- A table with all available mentors and the actual apprentices
+- On a regular base asking the mentors if they can mentor someone new or if
+his apprentice is ready for a full membership
+- Regular meeting where everyone can vote for a full mentorship of an
+apprentice
+
+So what do you think?
+
+
+
+-- 
+Mit freundlichen Grüßen
+
+Greetings
+
+Daniel Kreuter
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