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Near the end of 2018 there were some discussions on TSC calls about having a Community Health Working Group or Task Force. Feedback at the time was that the idea needed to be developed further, so a group of people interested in this topic has been meeting since then and we wanted to come back with an update and proposal.The group members who have been meeting would like to propose to evolve the concept.
Following several months of work, that group proposes creating a community-led Diversity, Civility, and Inclusion (DCI) Working Group. Community health is a broad topic that covers many different aspects and that left the scope too open ended, so this new effort would be is clearly scoped to focus only on DCI issues. A formal working group is necessary to forward DCI initiatives for several reasons. Not least of which is without formal standing, the group does not operate with visibility. Lack of basic tools like a mailing list has limited the group's ability to make progress, gain new contributors, and provide visibility. In 2017, Hyperledger conducted a survey of the developer community to assess various attributes of the community and collect suggestions for improvement. Understanding the current state is critical for the success of the community and our ability to measure the impact of initiatives to create a more inclusive and diverse ecosystem. A follow up survey in 2018 did not take place - we believe in part because a chartered body like this one did not exist to drive that work.
Scope
The scope of this working group is broadly around Diversity, Civility, and Inclusion in the Hyperledger open source community.
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Based on the prior months of exploring what aspects we could address, the group decided to focus on one area first, gender diversity and inclusion, and then learn from that experience to expand into other dimensions of DCI. We recognize there are many reasons to select one group or another as a place to start, and we have settled on this area after lengthy discussions of the circumstances, possible approaches, and not blocking on making progress from optimizing for perfection. The experience with the 2018 TSC election having only men who were nominated also motivated the group to choose gender diversity as the initial focus. Further record of the groups group's progress towards this initial goal is captured in the Background and References section below. We also strongly welcome participation in this group from those who wish to focus their energy on other related aspectsdeveloping the next round of DCI objectives.
The community has already taken some steps to improve DCI, such as creating and using the All Are Welcome Here slide and focusing on increasing geographic and gender diversity in the 2019 mentorship program. Work products from the WG will build on those existing actions and will include new actions that address DCI issues identified as areas of improvement by the WG.
Understanding the current state: In 2017, Hyperledger conducted a survey of the developer community to assess various attributes of the community and collect suggestions for improvement. Understanding the current state is critical for the success of the community and our ability to measure the impact of initiatives to create a more inclusive and diverse ecosystem. A follow up survey in 2018 did not take place. We believe Initial work products include:
- A measurement plan to baseline demographics.
- Gender diversity and inclusion recommendations to the TSC.
Collaborators (other groups)
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This group will work with all parts of the community (the TSC, projects, WGs and SIGs, etc) in order to listen to what they say, learn from them about what has worked and not worked and to support their efforts with making their parts of the community more welcoming to more community members. Linux Foundation staff will also play an active role in supporting the activities of this group and helping to implement recommendations.
Accenture – who already has a team putting research into the field – to gather key insights on the current state of diversity, civility, and inclusion and in the Hyperledger community through quantitative surveys and qualitative interviews across the ecosystem and identify action items and focus areas to enable the advancement of DCI.
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