Better Communication With the Joomla Community

Comment by Amy Stephen on March 24, 2010 at 12:04pm

Time to improve on both sides: * Better communication from the Joomla team
* Less moaning and more constructive ideas from you guys

I'm all in for that, Steve. I will definitely take advantage of the opportunity to provide constructive feedback on this and to be a part of the improvements needed to move forward. I appreciate this and thank you and the "Communication Review Team", very much!

Comment by Amy Stephen on March 24, 2010 at 1:46pm

Another great idea presented by Robert Deutz in the Leadership Team list.

Comment by Mustaq Sheikh on March 24, 2010 at 1:58pm

Another great idea presented by Robert Deutz in the Leadership Team list.

+100 .

Comment by Robert Vining on March 24, 2010 at 2:25pm

Steve, I can't thank you enough for this initiative and to Cory and Jen for stepping up to help lead the process and to anyone else that participates and supports this communication channel and process.

This will be looked back upon as one of the best things you've done in your early OSM career Steve. Thank You Sir!

@Amy On the link you provided, I agree the need is there, but not sure that a chat is the solution unless there is a followup publication of the transcript for others to read and comment on.

It reminds me of the discussion we had the other day about too much being done with skype and not out in the open where others can partake in the same discussion. Not that the irc channel wouldn't be open, it's that it's limited to a timeframe that you must attend if you want your questions asked and answered.

I believe a written forum discussion with typed responses might work better is all. But hey, I'm not going to knock progress in the nuts.

Comment by Amy Stephen on March 24, 2010 at 2:49pm

Exactly, Robert, in fact one of the reasons I favor IRC over Skype is because it can be logged and floated out to some public place for later consumption. It's also easier for people to jump in and out of conversations and meetings. A little less intimidating than asking to be admitted to a group.

What I see happening is that the board is trying to pull this community back together using several approaches. That's a smart strategy since it's tough to find one approach that meets all needs. I agree with you that it's encouraging to see this outreach - and it *is* very early. Hats off to the CoC for selecting this board.

Comment by Robert Vining on March 24, 2010 at 3:30pm

understood Brian, but a dedicated forum post for this week's q & a would allow me to ask a question on a Monday and the said 'Team Member' set to answer questions that week/day/month whatever could swing by and answer several at their convenience.

That's all I was getting at.

Again, it's not my call, it's just a suggestion to think about since we can't post in a leadership discussion to give that input.

I love a community driven effort!

Comment by Robert Vining on March 24, 2010 at 3:30pm

Had to repost that above since I can't spell Brian.

Comment by Jo Snow on March 24, 2010 at 9:46pm

I like the idea of a week or a few days response. Immediate response requirement to questions will likely result in subpar answers or worse political sparring ....I would much rather - well thought out replies. Though for continuity's sake a question/answer cycle should be no more than a week.

If the number of questions become unmanageable then maybe a voting system to focus on the most popular questions

Comment by Mustaq Sheikh on March 25, 2010 at 12:05am

I am in favor of Skype with the resulting/outstanding Q & A's posted somewhere for reference.

Comment by Ewout Wierda on March 25, 2010 at 8:11am

This request for community feedback is great and well timed!

By way of feedback I wonder if communication should be all about consultation, and if it is only decisions that should be subject to community consultation. I think it would be great if relevant developments that are not decisions would be communicated. A topical example is the GHOP. One subject for communication was the fact that Joomla is not in it this year, and a second subject is the question what can and should be done about that. The second subject obviously lends itself for consultation, but the first subject could already spark suggestions. Communicating developments that as such do not need any decision making will later help community members to be informed enough to make good suggestions.

When consultation is being conducted, it would be a very bad idea to cynically criticise the suggestions brought forward, no matter how stupid, infeasible or inconvenient they are. When bad ideas are submitted, then instead of taking that as a sign of the hopeless idiocy of the masses, it would be best to take that as a sign that certain things need to be explained better to enable people to see for themselves why certain things don't work and others do. An example of how cynical treatment of feedback can have adverse effects is Dave's answer to Brian's comment on the GHOP news.

Furthermore, I believe it is counter-productive to treat people like dummies by perfunctory communication. I expect things will change further under the new presidency, but the point is still relevant for now. When things are communicated in a way that leaves any moderately intelligent person with the feeling that something relevant or pertinent is being left out, then people will not feel informed but fooled. Often this obfuscating technique is used in combination with excessive credit being given to inner circles as a distraction. At other times, it is done in the style of politically correct corporate-style communications that are near meaningless for the audience and really mean to communicate with other corporates. See the comments of Elin on the GHOP news and elsewhere for examples.

Moreover, consultation itself should never be perfunctory. People are not as stupid as some leaders may think, as proven by the many politicians who have pushed through irresponsible building projects in many places around the world to the detriment of their later chances in elections. When consultation is used merely to shut up opposition it is very hard to give people a warm feeling that something good is being done in which they had their say. Giving people the warm feeling of good communication comes at the expense of no longer being able to shut people up. See Jennifer Marriot's comment on the GHOP news for an example of how not to communicate that an initiative is in the making.

A further suggestion is to stay open and honest in what questions are being asked. It is well known from referenda held around the world, as well as from marketing research, that a request for feedback can be made in such a way that inconvenient ideas just never get a chance to become relevant and on-topic. If you were to ask how Joomla can organise its own version of GHOP, then you have already dismissed those who believe Joomla should not organise anything (this is just an example and it would be great if Joomla did something!). That would make it all too easy to dismiss well-argued views against organising something as not being constructive.

Another suggestion I would like to make concerns openness and transparency. Professionally I've often seen that all that was important in a board meeting was obscured. Some common techniques are lobbying prior to a meeting so that decisions are taken without meaningful discussion at the meeting itself, reflecting discussions in a way that prevents inconvenient views from getting any weight in the records, and simply ignoring the 'why' and 'how' by minuting only the 'what' to enable discretionary execution. For Joomla, all this would be a bad idea in most situations. Not everything can be public, and not everything needs to be spelled out in every last detail, but what can be public should be communicated comprehensively.

Finally, I have a general suggestion as to the questions that should be made subject to consultation. I wonder if it would help if Joomla's aims, purpose, scope, role, and what have you, are made more clear. If it is clear what Joomla is shooting for then it will also be clear in many situations when a shot will obviously be a miss or a hit. As an example, if Joomla aims to be used as enterprise software then hiring PR aimed at the corporate world is obviously a good idea (I said 'if' !). If Joomla did not aim to be a collaborative community, then obviously there would be no point in engaging the community in decision making. That is why I am extremely pleased to see the request for feedback about communication and feedback itself. That means to me that Joomla is perhaps back on the path of being a collaborative community.

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