Quim, thanks for writing that. I am happy about the conversations that are happening about this, and I'm finding people's thoughts and input useful. There have been (and are being) lots of face-to-face conversations as well as the ones on the lists and in other venues: it's all good.
There is of course no perfect ideal solution --it's a balancing-act among multiple considerations-- and there is zero likelihood that we'll come up with a result that is understandable for everyone, and fits their ideal version of how the org should work. That's okay: we don't need to be perfect (and there is no "perfect") --- we just need to be always evolving-towards-better, as the org grows and changes. I'm glad Erik kicked this off with a request for input: the input is useful :-) Thanks, Sue On Nov 9, 2012 11:05 AM, "Quim Gil" <quim...@gmail.com> wrote: > Thank you for the explanations. > > > On 11/07/2012 11:47 AM, Terry Chay wrote: > >> It turns out we use a lot of industry >> terminology, without realizing that we are poorly communicating what >> that means to most people. >> > > Actually I'm familiar with industry terminology, and also with the wrong > assumptions and prejudices it carries many times. I know *you* get it right > but a basic goal of any reorg is that *everybody* gets it right now and in > the future. > > While it makes total sense to organize Product Management, Design and > Analytics under "Product Development", it feels old school and odd to leave > out the software engineers fully dedicated to product development. It > enforces the old vision that software development is something that comes > apart and after the product definition. But being Erik (a software > developer himself) the proposed VP in that area I don't need to insist in > this point. > > The current proposal of having software developers working on products > (Language, Mobile, Platform...) together with Operations (sysadmins, not > directly involved in product development) feels just as old school and odd. > The common denominator seems to be "teams that know to code", "the command > line dudes", etc. I might be mistaken, but it feels as consistent as a VP > of Presentations overseeing Marketing, Analytics, Design and other teams > with high communications skills and able to produce great slides. :) > > And whoever leads the proposed "Engineering" team still would need to deal > at a high level with two very different agendas: those from teams actually > developing software features and those from the operations teams, the > latter probably still complaining that they don't get as much attention at > the top level. > > So... > > If the goals are "narrowing focus" + "scale the dept, and take seriously > our identity as a tech org (as stated by Sue)" (Erik says) then why not > flattening more all this tech structure? > > Something like > > - Product Management. > - Design. > - Software development. > -- Features > -- MediaWiki. > -- Language. > -- Mobile. > - Operations. > - Analytics. > > This would mean 5 tech managers (already leading their teams) where now > you have Erik alone, 4 of them focused on product development + Operations. > Erik himself could act as EVP overseeing the product development > activities, since this is the narrowed focus now. He should focus on > vision, strategy and glue between the tech teams and with the rest of WMF. > The reporting and leadership of each team would be done by those 5 > managers, now interacting with Sue & "non-tech managers" more often. > > Doesn't this sound like a more flat and scalable org, with a clearer tech > org identity? > > PS: yes, it's easy for an outsider to shuffle proposals without much > background and knowledge of the day to day. :) But since you asked for > feedback... I hope it's useful, regardless of what you decide at the end. > Thank you for listening! > > -- > Quim > > ______________________________**_________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list > Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.**org <wikimedi...@lists.wikimedia.org> > Unsubscribe: > https://lists.wikimedia.org/**mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l<https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l> > _______________________________________________ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l