Jenkins Board & Officer Elections 2019

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Tracy Miranda

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Sep 4, 2019, 4:38:22 PM9/4/19
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Hi all, 

As you may or may not know Jenkins project is run by a Governance Board with support from a set of Officers. 

While a process has been set out for elections we are overdue an election. With Jenkins moving from SPI to CDF the timing is good to do this. CD.Foundation is a multi-project foundation with corporate sponsors and various oversight bodies. The nature of the foundation means we need to ensure good channels for communications and a robust operating model. 

With that in mind I am proposing the following set of dates for running a new elections. The election process will be bootstrapped by the existing board and we will request CDF run and supervise the election using the The Condorcet Internet voting system.

Please review the proposal below and links outlining the process for new board and officer elections. 

2019 Election Schedule

(Proposed):

13 September, 2019: Nominations open. To nominate someone, send an email to jenkins...@googlegroups.com

4 October, 2019: Nominations close

8 October, 2019: List of nominees posted to (mailing list)

11 October, 2019: Nominees’ personal statements made available

14 October, 2019: Voting begins

27 October, 2019: Voting closes 5pm Pacific Time

4 November, 2019: New representatives announced

For voting eligibility I propose we generally stick with the process outlined in the Board Election Process with the following specific modifications:

  • cut-off date for voter eligibility being September 1st 2019.
  • I would also like to propose that any Jenkins contributor who does not meet the eligibility criteria but is a community contributor can also register to vote by writing to the existing board of directors. (as I have been made aware of a subset of contributors who potentially fall in this category)

Please review the above and share your thoughts. Ideally we discuss now with the goal of reaching consensus by the next governance meeting on August 11th when we can finalize/ratify the proposal. 

If you are happy with the proposal I hope you will consider putting yourself forward for one of the positions. 

Regards,
Tracy




Oleg Nenashev

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Sep 5, 2019, 8:04:47 PM9/5/19
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Hi all,

Strong +1 from me for having an election. The board election issue was already a really visible issue in 2015 when we had a discussion of the board election process. The Board Election Process referenced by Tracy was an outcome of months of discussions in the community. The process was signed off by the governance meeting though many current key contributors were not in the community in 2015. The vote itself has never happened due to the voting system implementation issues, but there was a strong consensus that we do need an election. In 2019 it is even more needed IMHO, just few reasons:
  • The current Jenkins board includes 3 people, but one is completely inactive in the community. So we are down to two, which is a pretty bad bus factor for a project of the Jenkins' size. Kohsuke and Tyler have a lot of commitments in the project and IRL, so having more board members would definitely improve the board's bandwidth
  • Some critical processes in the Jenkins project are either stalled or defunct: regular Governance meetings, JEPs, officer reelections, etc. Having an active Jenkins board is instrumental to reviving these processes
  • Migration to CDF requires a lot of changes in the project: infrastructure and service accounts handover, trademark approval process, etc. It would require extra capacity from the board to coordinate the effort and to get it over the line. Jenkins has joined CDF almost 1 year ago, but there are still A LOT of open questions about the migration to CDF
  • Lack of Technical Steering Committee in Jenkins, it is one of the stories we were originally discussing for "Jenkins Software Foundation" at the at Jenkins World 2017. Having an active Jenkins board would be a precondition to make this steering committee happen. IMHO we desperately need it to work on the Jenkins evolution in the CDF environment where we will need to facilitate contributions from individual contributors and company contributors. A steering committee would be really helpful to make it happen
The proposed schedule is pretty tight assuming that the target Governance meeting will happen in Sep 11, but I believe we can make it work if there is a consensus. The  Board Election Process defined in 2015 still looks pretty solid in 2019, so we could start there. I also agree with the changes proposed by Tracy.

Some other questions to answer in the discussion:
  • How many board members do we want to elect? We are supposed to elect only 2 board members at once, but, If we follow the 2015 process, 2-year terms are long expired. So we can vote for 2, 3 (assuming that Dean Yu is inactive) or 4 (if Tyler wants to step down) board members.My suggestion would be to elect 2 or 3 board members so that we have a smooth transition from the current state
  • Allowing amendments? Do we want to use the meeting on Sep 11 to vote for suggested amendments to the process like it happened in 2015? I would vote for doing so so that all contributors have an opportunity to suggest a change and to integrate it into the final process.
Please review the above and share your thoughts. Ideally we discuss now with the goal of reaching consensus by the next governance meeting on August 11th when we can finalize/ratify the proposal. 

I think our main goal is to have a consensus about the elections happening and about the timeline.
For the technical implementation of the voting system and process we have a bit more time, because the system will be used only on Oct 14.
It gives us a bit more time to discuss options and to test the voting system (e.g. by voting for a best Jenkins logo or other similar fun tooic? :) ).

Best regards,
Oleg

Marky Jackson

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Sep 5, 2019, 8:08:15 PM9/5/19
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I also +1 this.

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Rick

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Sep 5, 2019, 8:09:08 PM9/5/19
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Marky Jackson

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Sep 5, 2019, 8:32:24 PM9/5/19
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Tracy,
I think this is a great thing. 
In looking at the election process I wonder if it would be good to have a meeting to discuss any confusion voters may have?


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Rick

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Sep 5, 2019, 8:35:19 PM9/5/19
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Yes, plus from me. It might be not very clear for everyone.

Mark Waite

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Sep 5, 2019, 9:03:32 PM9/5/19
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I like the idea and the timeline.



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Thanks!
Mark Waite

Lloyd Chang

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Sep 5, 2019, 11:28:55 PM9/5/19
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Hi, Tracy,

Ask — Would you kindly update Board Election Process at https://wiki.jenkins.io/x/lIHPAw and describe your proposal there?

Intent of my (meta-level) ask is to align (newcomer) people’s knowledge acquisition based on existing centralized information on wiki.jenkins.io web site with revision history.

Thank you,
Lloyd

Oleg Nenashev

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Sep 6, 2019, 11:09:10 AM9/6/19
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Hi all,

In looking at the election process I wonder if it would be good to have a meeting to discuss any confusion voters may have?

I suggest we run a discussion on Monday or Tuesday to discuss any concerns and to clarify missing bits. 
I have created https://doodle.com/poll/innt9x487f8wumkr with timeslots when I can run the meeting. Please vote there by Saturday EoD so that I get the session scheduled.
Let;s do it in Zoom + use additional Google Doc to record the feedback

Ask — Would you kindly update Board Election Process at https://wiki.jenkins.io/x/lIHPAw and describe your proposal there?

I'd guess the page is restricted to board members only, I am not sure who else have access to it. 
But we could run a new page e.g. in Google Doc which can be later converted to a JEP on GitHub

BR, Oleg

Tracy Miranda

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Sep 6, 2019, 11:32:50 AM9/6/19
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Hi all,

Thanks all for the great input!

Oleg - thank you so much for the detailed background and input, all very useful! Also yes, having a session next week for clarification will be amazing! 

Lloyd - great suggestion, thanks! I did notice the page is updated based on board resolutions so let's hold off on updating until we agree and pass the resolutions. 
In the meantime for clarity I have listed specific voting motions on the agenda for the next governance meeting: https://wiki.jenkins.io/display/JENKINS/Governance+Meeting+Agenda#GovernanceMeetingAgenda-September11
These may evolve before then but thought it would be a good start to list the concrete proposals.

 >>Jenkins has joined CDF almost 1 year ago, but there are still A LOT of open questions about the migration to CDF 
 If I could indulge one bit of nitpicking: CDF officially launched March 12 2019 and the SPI resolution for Jenkins passed on June 10 2019 and the project is still transitioning. All this to stress that while it may feel like a year (and it certainly feels longer than that to me!) it is all good and this is an excellent time to be running elections and all part of the process as Jenkins evolves within the framework of CDF. Please feel free to reach out if any specific questions - ultimately we all drive the answers to these questions together.

Looking forward to more election discussions and moving this forward!

Regards,
Tracy


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Parker Ennis

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Sep 6, 2019, 12:28:07 PM9/6/19
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Little late here but +1!



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Oleg Nenashev

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Sep 8, 2019, 4:49:09 PM9/8/19
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Tueday 2PM-3PM UTC is a Winner, Zoom meeting ID: https://zoom.us/j/792918819
Please see Jenkins calendar for the more information and links.

BR, Oleg

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Oleg Nenashev

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Sep 10, 2019, 11:43:31 AM9/10/19
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Hi all,

Just a quick update, we had a meeting today to discuss the proposal. You can find the meeting notes here (Advocacy and Outreach SIG meeting notes). There are some comments and follow-up action items, but basically there is a consensus that we would like to run the board election within the proposed timeframe. Next Thursday we will have another meeting, and we can use it as an opportunity for additional discussion if needed. The Governance meeting vote will happen tomorrow.

After the discussion, we have also updated the list of the motions which are tabled for the tomorrow's voting:
  • All officer positions will be voted on in 2019 will be voted on in 2020 (Team Leads)
  • 3 Board positions are elected instead of 2 in the base document (Dean Yu's seat + 2 new seats)
  • CDF will supervise the election and run the voting using The Condorcet Internet voting system instead of Single Transferable Vote
  • The election cut-off date for valid jenkins.io accounts for the 2019 election is 1st September 2019
  • The proposed election schedule will start on 13 September 2019 and conclude on 4 November 2019 with intermediate dates as per dev list thread
  • Adding new officer role: Documentation officer (content officer from the 2015 Proposal - Project sub-teams)
If you are interested to propose more changes, please comment in this thread.

Best regards,
Oleg

Kohsuke Kawaguchi

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Sep 11, 2019, 12:44:28 PM9/11/19
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Just wanted to chime in and say this is all great and much needed. I have discussed this offline with Tracy and I'm really looking forward  to it.

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Gavin Mogan

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Sep 11, 2019, 1:05:48 PM9/11/19
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It sounds like a solid plan to me, +1


On Wednesday, September 11, 2019 at 9:44:28 AM UTC-7, Kohsuke Kawaguchi wrote:
Just wanted to chime in and say this is all great and much needed. I have discussed this offline with Tracy and I'm really looking forward  to it.

Tracy Miranda

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Sep 11, 2019, 3:19:37 PM9/11/19
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Hi all,

I'm happy to report we have just concluded the governance meeting and there was unanimous support for proceeding with the Governance Board and Officer Elections proposal. 
All motions passed with some clarifications and additional information provided in the meeting.
Thanks Oleg for chairing the meeting. 

So for next steps, I will sync with the existing board to:
- get Board Election Process page updated
- kick things off by opening nominations this Friday - expect details to be posted to this dev mailing list. 

Thanks for all your support towards making this happen! (this is about the only election I will look forward to :)

Tracy

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Marky Jackson

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Sep 11, 2019, 3:21:31 PM9/11/19
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This is such great news and very welcomed in the community. Thanks for all the hard work that went in to this thus far and what is to come!

Alyssa Tong

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Sep 11, 2019, 3:24:03 PM9/11/19
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Agreed! This feels like a new chapter for the project. Thank you Tracy et al for leading this effort.

Michael Neale

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Sep 11, 2019, 7:17:17 PM9/11/19
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+1 makes sense and great timing. 
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