Introduction
Diversity and Inclusion is an acknowledged problem in many OSS communities. Software ecosystems have repeatedly failed diverse populations, falling short of aiding their productivity or encouraging contributions from some populations. Such failures are serious: they marginalize people who “don’t fit”—where “don’t fit” can simply mean being different from the people who are currently in the community software. Of the many forms of diversity for which this problem arises, its connection with gender diversity is well known. This lack of diversity is not only a social concern, but also a business concern---diverse teams are known to have greater potential for productivity and innovation, and open source teams have expressed a desire for more diverse teams (a sentiment expressed multiple times in the responses to the formative AST survey).
ASF is taking a leadership role among open source software foundations on the topic of diversity and inclusion. In 2020, ASF took a bold step to assess the state of diversity and inclusion within its communities. Bitergia executed a community-wide survey and in-depth follow-up interviews that provided great insights and resulted in several recommendations for addressing diversity and inclusion issues. In 2022, ASF is continuing this bold path by ensuring the continuity of the program with a subsequent survey round and the implementation of improvements to some identified barriers. This is a second steps, of many, addressed to improve the diversity and inclusion of the communitySee end of doc for tentative timeline.
Survey Design
Project
ManagerManager
Responsible for:
- Being the main contact for Bitergia's team
- Helping Bitergia team stay on track with project by removing roadblocks, answering questions, providing information, etc.
- Escalating decisions to V.P. D&I when needed
- Reporting Board reports, including project updates and progress to the V.P. for board reports
Estimate hours per week: 2h3h
Community Liaison
Responsible for:
- Writing and sending emails to connect Bitergia to the ASF community for input where needed
e.g. coordinating input in Survey drafts, coordinating survey pilots, etc - organize information collected in mailing list and pass it to Bitergia condensed in actionable feedback
Estimate hours per week: 3h
Survey Launch Lead
Responsible for:
- Publish Survey
- Work with Bitergia & V.P. D&I on strategy to increase response rate for survey
Estimate hours per week: 2h
Contributor Experience Research
Interview Coordinator
Responsible for:
- Help Bitergia find people to interview
- Coordinate interviews with Bitergia
- Collaborate with Bitergia to schedule interviews
Estimate hours per week: 5h
Friction Log Coordinator - who did this?
Responsible for:
- Design the process to collect friction logs
- Work with Bitergia & V.P. D&I to launch it
- Ensure friction log proper collection
- Deliver friction logs to Bitergia & V.P. D&I for review & analysis
Estimate hours per week: 3h
Tentative Timeline
Month | Contributor Survey | Improvement | |
Feb 2021 - Feb 2022 | Contract negotiation. Project Start Date: [February 7, 2022] | ||
Feb 2022 | Revise Survey Design: Modify “challenges” to make survey shorter and less open-ended | Establish contact with the Apache Beam project and align everyone Scope out improvement plan and complementary research project Draft dashboard with PMC and other project members Deploy dashboard software and train project team on use and administration | |
Mar 2022 | Get consensus with ASF and incorporate feedback into survey design Create a communication plan to promote survey | ||
Apr 2022 | Set up survey tool Incorporate feedback from ASF review of survey tool ASF approves use of survey tool | Collect pre-survey data to establish baseline Prototype dashboard and improve it with feedback from PMC Train Apache Beam members on using the dashboard | |
May 2022 | Run and promote the surveys (with the help of ASF) | ||
Jun 2022 | Implement improvement in the Apache Beam project; work with community; adjust as needed Document progress of implementation including field notes and archiving interactions Iteratively revise the improvement to better serve the Apache Beam project. | ||
Jul 2022 | Scientifically analyze new data and contrast with previous data | ||
Aug 2022 | |||
Sep 2022 | |||
Oct 2022 | Produce final report with | ||
Nov 2022 | Collect post-survey data | ||
Dec 2022 | Scientifically analyze data to understand the improvement and its implications Produce final report withrecommendations for scaling the improvement | ||
Jan 2023 | Present insights with ASF in read-out | ||
Feb 2023 | Contributor survey completed | ||
Mar 2023 | Present insights with ASF in read-out | ||
End contract: March 31, 2023 | |||
Description of Deliverables | Completion Date | ||
Milestone 1 - Survey Design
Note: contributions from the ASF community will happen through mailing lists in a period of 72h, and we’ll gather consensus on best times to host the 1h calls. This will be coordinated by the ASF. | Oct 20, 2019 | ||
Milestone 2 - Survey Data Collection
| Nov 18, 2019 | ||
Milestone 3 - Initial Survey Analysis
Note: All interactions with the ASF will happen through the ASF community members and will follow common engagement rules. | Nov 29, 2019 | ||
Milestone 4 - Interview Preparation
| Dec 6, 2019 | ||
Milestone 5 - Conduct Interviews
| Dec 20, 2019 | ||
Milestone 6 - Analysis of Interviews
| Jan 24, 2019 | ||
Milestone 7 - Quantitative Analysis
| Jan 24, 2019 | ||
Milestone 8 - Final Report
| Feb 21, 2019
Assignments:
Role | Name | Notes |
---|---|---|
Project Manager |
Community Liaison |
Luis A. Sanchez
Survey Lead |
Katia Rojas & Arianne Navarro
Interview coordinator |
Friction log coordinator |