A question to Participation team regarding the global gathering selection

Mozillians
#1

I just have a few questions to clarify regarding the selection process and about the volunteer program with Mozilla. These questions were raised from members of the community I work with. The questions and concerns are mainly in regard to how many of the community members believe that they didn’t get the recognition they deserved.

  1. The Participation team and the Community Building team ( before Participation ) have been using the same excuse reason to volunteers who couldn’t be recognized is because their work don’t align with the Mozilla goals. So does this mean the volunteers should stop focusing on their current contribution areas (the one they are good at) and start doing tasks that align more with the Mozilla goals in order to get recognized for their efforts?

  2. What are the said goals, that have been used in all explanations for rejecting volunteer applications so far. Can you tell what these goals are and where one can read them?

  3. What if someone is doing a great job in his/her region, but can’t really express it at a global level by filling in pages of essay in English. Unless there are plans for greater inclusivity by allowing users to write in a language they are comfortable with, non English speakers and those who lack prose skills are at a disadvantage. Can the participation team tell how this problem has been addressed?

  4. Can you share the process used to evaluate and make sure that contributions from the selected Mozillians align with the goals set by Mozilla?

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#2

Some quick thoughts:

  • We shared this presentation explaining the selection process (linked on the FAQ topic).
  • Attending global gathering events was not a recognition, it was a way to support people that showed leadership in the past and committed to, with the help of the learnings they’ll get during the events, define a set of goals to move Mozilla forward next year.
  • I agree language barrier is a problem but we couldn’t find a good solution to offer to all languages. We asked people affected for proposals on how to solve it,
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#3

While going through the summary of selection phase slideshow I was also wondering about the same

#4

What about people who showed leadership skills in the past and are still leading the community in their region and trying to spread Mozilla mission in every corner? Why were they rejected?

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#5

I can’t comment on specific cases without more detail, but also have in mind that spots were limited and we couldn’t invite everyone.

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#6

The same question popped up in my mind.

#7

Words are important here. People were not rejected - this was not a rejection process. People were selected based on a very thorough process that involved blind review and the opportunity for coaching prior to application.

It’s simply not possible to select everyone, and while I know that it must be very hard for those who were not selected ‘this time’ to watch excitement and chatter about these events, please know that you are included in ways that will become clearer as we move forward. The participation in these events is not the destination - bringing what we learn, build and imagine back to our communities to reach for our leadership goals in 2016 is. This is not a recognition component.

We are doing our best to bring everyone along remotely, you can participate in the [same challenges][1], and [preparation activities][2] - you can even do as @asdofindia did and share how you can remotely level-up your leadership goals this year. And keep the ideas coming for how to solve for things like language issues - we are listening and are invested everyone’s success.
[1]: http://tiptoes.ca/mozfest-participation2015/
[2]: http://tiptoes.ca/mozfest-participation2015/

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#8

Hello Nuke,

Thanks for replying. The answer to these questions weren’t detailed in the presentation, these were things community members were talking about at the regional community meet and Anush framed it to questions.

So it would be helpful if you can kindly answer to each of the questions.

I am particularly looking forward for the question one and two.

#9

Hi @pmjcreations

Question: Regarding question 1: What contribution areas, do not align with Mozilla goals? Can you be more specific? I really don’t understand this.

Both Nuke and I mentioned this is not a recognition project, so I think that part of the question has been answered. Also it was not a rejection process, so we can’t speak on that either. I want to to emphasize that the destination is not the events but impact on goals for 2016 as clearly written in the wiki .

Joining this cohort of participation leaders will mean committing to an
ongoing effort to build participation throughout 2016

So let me flip this on you a little bit, would it be helpful for you, @anushbmx and others with similar concerns - to share and get feedback on you goals for 2016? I think this might be what can really help.
Also - how can we do a better job plugging you into the opportunity to be a part of and test what we’re building as part of this cohort? As an example, for Mozfest one thing we’ll be emerge with resources leading and learning - would it help you like to help test these? I would love to involve you if so.

Thanks for asking these questions.

#10

Re goals, https://wiki.mozilla.org/2014 is somewhat OK, the 2015 page OTH is embarrasing. I just sent an email to Dave Slater asking for the 2016 page to be useful in this context.

I’d also limit the expecations on the “sorry, you’re not invited” email. I think it’s a great achievement that we’re actually sending those out in the first place. I’m not too concerned about that reply being a stock reply. That’s one reply for people in California, Sweden, the Antarctis, Japan, and India. Sent to hundreds of people.

That stock reply is not a piece of mentorship, it just can’t be.

If you want to turn the outcome of this into an experience of mentorship, please reach out to a mentor of yours. Don’t put the individual words of that email in your heart and brain. Also, I recall that George offered detailed insights into the reasons why individuals weren’t invited, on a per-case basis. If you’re concerned, you should share your application with a mentor of yours, and discuss. If there are open questions, ask for feedback on your individual application from the participation team.

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#11

Alright. But then, I hear that some people got invited to more than one event (some, all three). If you wanted to be inclusive and give everyone a chance, you wouldn’t invite the same person to more than one event. You could’ve given another deserving person a chance.

Some people had staff recommendations (for the Orlando Work Week) and didn’t even get an invite. Am I mistaken that they were supposed to be sent invites by the participation team or were their invitations supposed to be sent by the staff themselves?

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#12

There will be a reason.

If there are specific cases, those people should feel welcome to investigate directly about their case, by reaching out to George.

Do understand invites were limited. A recommendation is different to a “this person will come”.

I imagine it’d be impossible to explain, generally, why people with such recommendations would not be selected, since each case was looked at individually.

#13

Let me jump in here with some quick thoughts.

  1. I want to reinforce the following points made above:

  • Selection was done by a small group who were assessing the ability of individuals to shape programs and activities that will involve many more Mozillians in having impact on Mozilla’s mission and goals organizationally – which is what we’re calling participation leadership. We were looking at past track records and future potential. Contribution was one dimension, but so were indicators of leadership (e.g. how much individuals had successful organized and enabled other Mozillians).

  • We aimed to select people from a range of communities and backgrounds.

  • This was a selection process not a rejection process.

  • These invitations are not about recognition. In fact, they are a big responsibility for future contribution and enabling many more Mozillians in 2016.

  1. To address the question of why people were invited to more than one event. This was actually designed: We wanted to have a small number of non-staff Mozillians to help bring continuity between the events. It’s fewer than 20%. Obviously this is traded-off with having a larger total number of different Mozillians attend. It will be difficult to judge this decision fully objectively, but it’s something I’ll report back on in late January/early February.

  2. Recommendation and nominations by staff members were one part of the overall considerations for selection.

  3. Let me finish this off with some new thoughts:

I will add, humility, self reflection and service are key attributes of leadership that will carry Mozilla. I’ve been really impressed by how many notes I received from Mozillians honestly asking “how can I use the fact that I wasn’t selected to learn and improve” and others who weren’t selected saying “I remain very committed to Mozilla’s goals, I won’t let up my activity, and I look forward to the next opportunity to improve my leadership.”

I’ll be honest and say that I’ve been equally disappointed by notes from Mozillians saying “I’m better than that other guy or girl who got selected and not me” or some version of that.

Let me flip this on its head: What if we had hundreds or even thousands of Mozillians asking “How can I support a person from my community/country who I know is attending one of these gatherings? How can I help them best bring what they’ve learned to strengthen our entire community and enable many more Mozillians?”

That’s the challenge I’d throw out to all of you, selected or not: What can you do to ensure these three gatherings have a catalytic effect on Mozilla and its communities?

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#14

I think you are assuming everyone did an application aligned with the events, and unfortunately that was not the case. Some applications were not eligible for any event having in mind the requirements we set for these events.

@george explained the process in the last Monday meeting (15:55)

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#15

Hi George, I appreciate the work you are doing to make the community better than now it is. The reason I asked these questions late is because I thought your presentation would be answering the volunteers having the concern. And actually it does in a way, but still leaves some unanswered.

So it would be extremely helpful if you can give answer for the concerns I posted in #1.

#16

@anushbmx I think we have been trying to reply all your concerns with the previous messages, please check them again and let us know what specific concerns you still have.

Thanks!

#17

(Sorry for forgetting to post this reply in time, I drafted this reply long ago but something distracted me away that I forgot to post the reply before leaving)

I know one person who did. But my question was why they were ignored in the first place?

When I say ‘recommendation’, I meant that the team said that “this person is supposed to be invited”, but the person didn’t get the invite.
(I might be wrong, maybe the team delayed sending the list over to @george. Maybe there was a miscommunication between the 2 parties. Was there?)

That is what you intended but did you fulfill it? I haven’t heard of any one from my community being invited to these gatherings.

No one here is crying, “I wasn’t invited to the global gatherings.” What we’re expecting is more clarity on what happened during the selection process.

I’d say 20% is large when considering the number of participants for each event. 20% of 500 makes it 100. I don’t think you’d need that kind of ‘continuity’.

#19

I’d urge you to follow up this directly with George.
As we’ve explained, nobody can explain what actually happened without being asked to do so

Sent from Outlook

#20

@rabimba we are not trying to be leaders, from the beginning the community I worked followed distributed leadership.

What I am intending with these questions is more clarity on what happened during the selection process.

#21

Instead of that, what you are achieving is more convoluted discussions. I guess @nukeador and @tad all have posted and urged anyone worried about it to follow up with @george in case anyone has more queries.

Most people here had distributed roles and nobody alone will be able to answer this(probably, I wasn’t even 1% involved in the awesome management and organization that resulted in mozfest. Just attended). @george has explained, in this post along with a separate call AND I guess in quite a few emails about this already.

I wonder do these question arise after every Mozilla event? In every country? In every meet?
Pardon my naiveté but this discussion makes me wonder :smile: