AB/2019-TeamContactEffectiveness
This is one of the AB 2019 priorities. The goal of this exercise is to assess how well we match the working requirements of groups in assigning chairs and team contacts.
The humans who collect and collate the information need to be identified. There should be enough to ensure responders can pick one they trust, few enough to provide further anonymisation of the data collected.
Where we are / next steps
This is a proposed work item. If the AB wants to proceed given this outline, the next steps would be to identify the people who collect the raw data. I think there should be one or two team contacts, one or two chairs, and two or three people who are neither, and at least one person to collate the overall results - chaals will volunteer but maybe there is someone better to do that.
Proposed methodology
This is 'explicitly not' a performance assessment of individual chairs or team contacts, so the design is to ensure it cannot be effectively used as one, in order to minimise the likelihood of the information provided being biased towards such use.
The questions will be provided by email, with answers to be returned in email to someone chosen by the responder from the list of volunteer 'aggregators', who will provide anonymisation
The aggregators, people who collect raw data will be asked to keep it, securely and in confidence, until 3 months after the final results are produced, and then to delete it. This means there is a path to asking further questions for clarification, while ensuring a high level of confidentiality for respondents.
The anonymised results will be collated to provide an overview of the answers which will be made available to team and members.
Responses will be collated by a person who may be asked to provide further information and will individually contact you in confidence. You are free to choose who in the list you want to be your "contact".
[JJ input] CEPC is getting greater attention in our community and the roles of Team Contact and Chairs are not always clear to them. Do we need a set of questions about that?
Questions
It should take more than 10 minutes to answer the question for a given group. We are looking for thoughtful answers. If you are not sure of an answer please say so - the assumption is that otherwise you're pretty certain.
For all
q1. Which tasks required to run the Group effectively should be automated better?
Please answer all the remaining questions (including those on horizontal review) separately for each group. No need to identify the groups - just give them a number.
q2. Does the group understand and efficiently follow the Process?
q3. Is the team contact allocation about right, more than needed, or insufficient?
[JJ input] For those that do not answer "about right", I would ask a follow-up to characterize what more the TC should be doing or to characterize what tasks the TC should stop doing.
-[CMN] several of the questions for chairs/team contacts go into this further.
"Horizontal review": For the remaining questions please answer with regard to each of
- API design and developer ergonomics (TAG)
- Accessibility (APA WG)
- Internationalisation (i18n)
- Privacy (PING)
- Security
q4. Does the group have internal champions (you or participants) for each horizontal aspect?
q5. Does the group adequately address issues in each area, and how do you know?
q6. Do the groups responsible for Horizontal review provide adequate support?
q7. Are there improvements in tooling or procedures that you want for horizontal review?
q8. Does input from Horizontal review come in sufficiently early in the spec development process to address issues adequately?
For Team contacts:
qT9. For how many groups are you a team contact?
qT10. Do you spend about the allocated time, or more, or much more, or less or much less?
qT11. Do the group and its chairs provide about the right amount of effort, not enough, or more than should be required?
qT12. Do you allocate regular work time to the group weekly, monthly or less regularly?
qT13. What are the tasks you have to do?
qT14. What tasks do the chairs / participants do?
qT15. What tasks should the chairs/participants do, that you have to cover?
qT16. What tasks are being done manually that should be automated?
For Chairs
qC9. Do your team contact(s) effectively allocate the time specified in the charter?
qC10. Do you and other group participants provide about the right amount of effort, not enough, or more than should be required?
qC11. Do your team contacts allocate regular work time to the group weekly, monthly or less regularly?
qC12. Do the group and its chairs provide about the right amount of effort, not enough, or more than should be required?
qC13. What are the tasks you have to do?
qC14. What tasks do the team contacts do?
qC15. What tasks should the team contacts do, that you have to cover?
qC16. What benefit does the Team Contact(s) provide to the group? Please reply with respect to the time actually available as well as the time formally allocated
qC17. What would be the impact of not having the team contact
qT18. What tasks are being done manually that should be automated?
==
Input received
on methodology
- [JJ input] It is unclear to me whether this is proposed to be a WBS survey (or similar) or collection of the raw data via interview. I could go either way, but would favor the first. In that case, the questions need to be more crisp and mostly mutiple choice in nature. If it is intended that the survey be via interview, then 10 minutes is a gross underestimate of how long such conversations will take. In a discussion with 20 "leading" questions, I would expect it would take more like an hour.
It is meant to be done in email - see methodology
- [JJ input] I would recommend a team of people collating the overall results to prevent any biases. I would be pleased to serve on such a committee.
you would be a poor choice for collating results given your role as CEO and the explicit intention to avoid this data being used in any personal performance assessment
- [JJ] Fair point.
[From Léonie Watson by email: don't ask about other groups people participate in. Done]
on general questions
[From Dave Singer by email: ask about what tasks should be automated. Done]
q. Does the group adequately address HR review issues that are raised
CMN: This question appears to be the same as q8
[additional JJ input] Do we need to separately ask HR groups (e.g. i18N, APA, PING) what they think of the HR process?
CMN: No, that is a separate priority project being led by Léonie (which is ahead of this one)
== on questions for chairs
[NR] Questions and options are given below:
q. How would you rate the amount of work time your Team Contact has to work on assisting with your group? (The group requires a lot more time, The group requires some more time, About right, The group requires less time, The group requires a lot less time)
[cmn] Adopted as qC12 (should have been there already)
q. How would you rate the benefit of the work your group receives from your Team Contact, in the time they have available? (Extremely beneficial, Beneficial, Average, Not beneficial, Causes a disadvantage to the group)
[cmn] adopted as qC16
q. If your group did not have a Team Contact, how would this affect your group? (The group would not complete the work and close, The group would be at a huge loss but would continue, The group will run the same, The group will benefit)
[cmn] adopted as qC17
q. What level of technical assistance do you get from your Team Contact? (Essential guidance, Provides some guidance, Same as a group participant, Provides no guidance, Provides incorrect or illogical guidance)
q. What level of managerial (meeting booking. webex sorting, Process advancement) assistance do you get from your Team Contact? (Completes most of the managerial work, Completes a moderate amount of the managerial work, Completes the necessary managerial work only, Completes no managerial work, Is more unhelpful than helpful)
[cmn]These two questions are covered by C14/C15 and corresponding questions about chairs for team contacts.
[/NR]