On Sat, 2005-12-24 at 06:44 +0800, Jacqueline McNally wrote: > Ian Lynch wrote: > > On Wed, 2005-12-21 at 13:26 +0800, Jacqueline McNally wrote: > > > > > >> I contacted Ryan privately explaining why we were revoking the > >> MarCon role. > >> > >> I cc'd Louis into my message for two reasons. 1. I feel > >> uncomfortable sending private mail when I consider all mail should > >> be on a list so that it may be archived for future reference, and > >> 2. In case my mail is not received or acted upon, storage is held > >> somewhere else than on my computer. > > > > > > So why not cc your co-lead? > > Surely, I can include anyone I wish?
Jacqueline, you can do anything you want to within the law. As marketing lead you have a responsibility to think about how things look to people outside. First, Ryan has a tiff with Louis in which you were not involved. Next, out of the blue you fire Ryan CCing Louis. To me that looks like its Louis not you that is making the decision. > I did not cc John as he was travelling. What has that got to do with it? He would eventually pick it up and have it in his records. You would also be doing things and be seen to be doing things by some reasonable procedure. > I chose Louis because Ryan > sometimes talks to Louis first, This sounds incredibly weak after what went on between Louis and Ryan. > > The fact that Louis initiated this action and when finding himself on > > sticky ground reverted to the Community Council > > If you are referring to DLS, I can quite understand Louis promptly > submiting the issue to the Community Council (CC). See II.b. on > http://council.openoffice.org/CouncilProposal.html For various reasons, > DLS has always provoked discussion. In this case I had a long E-mail exchange with Louis before you fired Ryan, trying to calm things down off list. His grounds for going to the CC seemed largely to be about funding and since Ryan did not say his visit to DLS was dependent on funding from OOo I can't for the life of me see how the issue warrants CC intervention. All Louis needed to say was "There is no OOo budget for DLS, unfortunately, if you go you will have to pay for yourselves". > > bypassing the marketing leads makes one think that it is Louis that > > runs the marketing project not the marketing leads. > > We are an international project and are fortunate that we have > volunteers that are able to carry out activities in different time > zones. Louis, John and I being in different time zones with a > significant overlap are able to respond promptly as situations arise. In this case with indecent haste it seems. I still think its bad management practice for the Project Manager to be diving into project issues like this. If its absolutely essential he should say why and pass the discussion over to a project lead at the earliest possible opportunity and certainly no action should be seen to be precipitated otherwise it undermines the authority of the project leads. I'm a management consultant, this is just basic stuff. Its like a coder seeing goto statements in a program justified because it looked like a quick fix at the time. Ok, What are the procedures for sacking a Marcon? I have been involved in disciplinary action against public sector employees in the UK and if this was such a situation an employment tribunal would definitely find against the project in this matter irrespective of what Ryan has or has not done, simply because the procedures to ensure justice are inadequate. Consult Sun legal and see what they say. In most countries there are rules protecting employees rights and while OOo does not employ volunteers as such, it seems reasonable that volunteers should enjoy the same rights of protection as employees with respect to things such as bullying, undue pressure and unfair dismissal. If the project aims to be associated with high professional standards, its management should reflect basic estalished sound management practice. This means that any post of responsibility should have associated procedures for disciplinary action. These need to be transparent and seen to be transparent. As a minimum there should be a warning with time for the subject to respond and improve his/her performance. The subject should also have the opportunity to be represented at any particular hearing by a nominated agent or friend. There should be an appeals procedure to the Community Council. The CC should check that the procedures have been correctly followed and that the action was justified. The grounds for Ryan's dismissal have not been made public but they should be substantial and not anything that could also be applied to other members of the project holding the same post where action has not been taken. Failure to observe such a condition would show the action to be vindictive bringing the project into disrepute. The timing and appearance of Ryan's dismissal appear strongly linked to his proposal to attend DLS and Louis' opposition. This is highly unfortunate since even if there were reasons beyond this for his dismissal anyone reading the lists would automatically assume that it was the result of what seems to be a very personal disagreement that did not involve either of the marketing project leads. Consider how this appears to an outside observer. All of this could have been avoided if there was a proper procedure for disiplinary action and without this the project leaves itself wide open to an ensuing flame war spliting the community. Finally, if the main reason for Ryan's dismissal was indeed his proposal to go to DLS, I find it incredible and I guess many others would too. Consider say the UK Marcon enthusiastically proposing to go to the BETT Show (Biggest educational Technology Show in the World) in a couple of weeks time at his own expense to promote OOo. Could that result in him being dismissed? If there is something beyond this, its not obvious so it would be helpful to the community to have this matter clarified. However this has now become dependent on Ryan who is no longer a member of the community. Why? Because there are no proper management procedures to deal with this situation. > > That just reinforces the impression that if Louis doesn't like it it > > gets vetoed no matter what. This seems very unlike any Open Source > > project I have been associated with. Its more like a centrally > > controlled dictatorship. > > > > I'm sorry that you feel this way. Observing and participating in other > OSS projects I have quite a different impression. OpenOffice.org has > very loose guidelines. That is precisely the issue. Too loose in important areas. To make a contribution you have to sign JCAs etc, to be fired you apparently just have to have a disagreement with the Project Manager. Make a donation to TeamOO and you have to just hope the money will be spent on something sensible - no published accounts. There is a difference between procedures designed to promote equality, fairness and management accountability and insufficient safeguards against disharmony. The community is a social system, not a bit of code, it needs procedures *and* their implementation in the correct blend to maximise the effectiveness of the resource. That is the essence of effective management. Centrally controlled dictatorships don't need many rules as the dictator just over-rules anything he doesn't like. In fact many OSS projects are benevolent dictatorships to at least some degree but if the leadership gets it wrong they die - and many have - because people just leave. If a lot of people leave a project, its a management failure by definition, its no good blaming those that leave. > I have been looking at the Gnome, Fedora, > Mozilla, Debian and Ubuntu guidelines and governance and they have many > more rules for engagement and codes of conduct documented. Perhaps it > may be worth while comparing and considering those. QED. I rest my case. It would be well worth looking at some of those and probably reading some basic stuff on what motivates people. At present people are the only real resource available to the marketing project so it seems rather rash to sack those that are young, enthusiastic and full of energy because they do something you don't like. Communicate with them and lead them to work to your agenda. That is what leadership is really about. Its much more difficult when you don't have a budget so I sympathise that its a difficult job. -- Ian Lynch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> ZMS Ltd --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
