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

Sat Jun 18 14:55:45 CEST 2011

Le dimanche 12 juin 2011 15:27:59, Samuel Verschelde a écrit :
+> 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 to all,
+
+First, thanks to those to offered to help.
+
+We had 3 candidates, plus one who offered help whoever will be in charge. 2 
+candidates were retained (Kharec has too many duties already to take the job), 
+who I interviewed on IRC to try to see who would fit best.
+
+The 2 candidates were good, which complicated my task because I had to make a 
+choice, but I finally came to a decision : I propose andre999 as a mentoring 
+program coordinator (or facilitator, if you think it fits the job better).
+
+What made me choose him over Daniel Kreuter (whose candidacy was good, I 
+repeat it) is the fact he already showed interest in this subject before the 
+"job offer", has been mentored (even if the mentoring has not been completed 
+for now), and I already had enough occasions to exchange with him in the past 
+to think that he will have the required communication skills and diplomacy to 
+do the job.
+
+Now, it doesn't mean he has to be alone, so I hope than magnus will help him, 
+for example to bring an IRC presence at hours where André is not available due 
+to his timezone, and if Daniel is still interested in helping for those tasks, 
+I'm sure André will be glad to receive his help.
+
+If you have any questions or remarks, don't hesitate to comment.
+
+To ennael and misc : do you want to take part in the boostrapping of André's 
+work ? I think it could be good to avoid any misunderstandings and be sure we 
+set the good direction.
+
+Best regards
+
+Samuel Verschelde
+