SIG Docs: New roles & leadership nominations

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Jim Angel

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Jan 10, 2022, 11:00:15 PM1/10/22
to kubernetes-sig-docs, kubernetes-sig-leads

TL;DR: SIG Docs is proposing the creation of new roles and moving folks around to support the docs k8s community. Your +1 or objection is appreciated!

Hey y’all, I sent an email in August saying that SIG Docs was in need of help.

After that email, Paris Pittman and I hosted a 12 week mentoring program to help introduce folks to open source leadership roles & responsibilities. We had amazing participation and discussions around the future of SIG Docs alongside our existing SIG Docs tech leads and co-chairs.

The group identified areas, such as localization, that could use more support. We also thought there could be a better way to onboard new contributors and encourage a healthier, thriving, docs community.

Natali Vlatko led efforts to formalize the localization team into a subproject and proposed a new role: Localization Leads. Localization Leads would be similar to co-chairs with a focus on localization. Arsh Sharma proposed a New Contributor Ambassador role that would help onboard and assimilate newcomers to SIG Docs. Arsh also volunteered to pilot this new role. By adding new roles and team members, SIG Docs can evolve into a sustainable community that allows members to lean into their strengths and support each other.

I’m proposing the following changes to SIG Docs:

  • Abbie McCarthy: Localization Lead
    • Abbie has been active in SIG Docs before I joined and is currently a Staff Open Source Technical Communications Manager at VMware. I have seen first hand the work that she has done in the community and feel lucky to have her involvement!
  • Arsh Sharma: New Contributor Ambassador
    • Arsh is a Developer Experience Engineer at Okteto and was extremely active in our mentoring program and took the initiative to create the New Contributor Ambassador role. I look forward to seeing what the new role brings to SIG Docs.
  • Brad Topol: Localization Lead
    • Brad, an IBM Distinguished Engineer, has been active in SIG Docs for quite some time and created the localization monthly meeting. It makes a lot of sense to formalize what he’s already doing with the localization lead role.
  • Natali Vlatko: Co-Chair
    • Natali joined our mentoring program and brought a fresh perspective to SIG Docs based on past experience working with SIG Arch. Natali leads the Open Source Program Office at Wayfair.
  • Qiming Teng: Tech Lead
    • Qiming is one of the most active k/website contributors of all time (if you don’t count Kubernetes Prow Robot). Qiming brings years of technical expertise to the SIG Docs team in a reliable and friendly way.
  • Rey Lejano: Co-Chair
    • Rey started his Kubernetes OSS involvement by contributing to SIG Docs and ultimately led the Kubernetes 1.23 release team last quarter. Rey has seen multiple aspects of the Kubernetes project and SIG Docs would be lucky to have his guidance.

Finally, I’ll step down as co-chair at the end of Q1 after assisting with the transitions. It has been a true honor and pleasure to serve as a co-chair to this community over the past 2+ years. I’m going to keep it real: I’m burnt out. I’m burnt out and not giving the documentation community the time, or leadership, needed to thrive. I encourage everyone involved in Kubernetes to evaluate their own mental health and capacity to make similar choices. The multi-year pandemic has impacted us all and it can be challenging at times. I plan on continuing to remain active as an individual contributor and would love to take on other leadership roles after I spend some time recharging.

As a result, the "full" SIG Docs leadership team would look like:

  • Abbie McCarthy: Localization Lead
  • Arsh Sharma: New Contributor Ambassador
  • Brad Topol: Localization Lead
  • Divya Mohan: Co-Chair
  • Karen Bradshaw: Tech Lead
  • Natali Vlatko: Co-Chair
  • Qiming Teng: Tech Lead
  • Rey Lejano: Co-Chair
  • Taylor Dolezal: Tech Lead
  • Tim Bannister: Tech Lead

I believe this new team structure, with additional roles, allows for SIG Docs to rotate more people in and out of leadership roles as needed. In addition, I encouraged the people listed above to think about their replacements and succession plan. The co-chair position remains the primary leadership role for SIG Docs and overall SIG direction.

So what are the next steps? This email is seeking lazy consensus to confirm / reject the proposed changes and role updates. After one week of review (1/17/22), PRs reflecting the above changes can be merged.

Thank you all for keeping kubernetes.io the best documentation site in all of open source! Cheers!

Jim Angel
SIG Docs Co-Chair

Jim Angel

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Jan 11, 2022, 11:09:33 AM1/11/22
to kubernetes-sig-docs, le...@kubernetes.io, d...@kubernetes.io
+ (the correct) le...@kubernetes.io & d...@kubernetes.io for awareness.

Celeste Horgan

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Jan 11, 2022, 1:58:23 PM1/11/22
to kubernetes-sig-docs
Congrats to all the new leads, and thank you so much for your service Jim! You've been a wonderful lead and thank you for your service!

Celeste

Taylor Dolezal

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Jan 11, 2022, 8:49:39 PM1/11/22
to Celeste Horgan, kubernetes-sig-docs
A huge +1 to all of these changes and THANK YOU, Jim!

I am looking forward to working more closely with all of you this year! :)

Sincerely,

Taylor Dolezal

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Tim Bannister

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Jan 12, 2022, 3:43:32 AM1/12/22
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+1

Tim

(and thanks, Jim)

Divya Mohan

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Jan 12, 2022, 3:55:09 AM1/12/22
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Huge +1 for all the nominations and welcome onboard 🎉

Thank you so much Jim for all your contributions and leadership!

Regards,
Divya

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Noah Ispas

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Jan 12, 2022, 5:09:34 AM1/12/22
to Jim Angel, kubernetes-sig-docs, kubernetes-sig-leads
+1 

Cheers 
Noah

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Leon N

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Jan 25, 2022, 11:45:23 PM1/25/22
to Noah Ispas, Jim Angel, kubernetes-sig-docs, kubernetes-sig-leads
Congratulations to the new members!

Regards,
Leon.

Jim Angel

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Feb 22, 2022, 9:23:54 AM2/22/22
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Hey,

Thanks all for your support of the Docs' leadership changes. This followup is long overdue, but I'm happy to announce that the lazy consensus period is closed and welcome the new team members to SIG Docs!

Next steps: The new members will open/merge PRs reflecting the changes and we'll start to ramp folks up!

Let me know if anyone has any questions! Thanks and congrats!

Jim Angel
SIG Docs

On Mon, Jan 10, 2022 at 10:00 PM Jim Angel <james...@gmail.com> wrote:
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