 Yeah, sorry you guys. This is not the first time I've presented this tech going very well. Well, I hope everyone is doing well I appreciate the the folks that are up early on the east coast of the US It's it's Saturday. So I hope if you're in Europe, you're you're well past your first espresso and into a great meal or two And folks beyond. Thank you Marie very much for rescuing me on the presentation You can go ahead and go to the first slide so Just to introduce myself a little bit. I was going back through some old presentations trying to find a Screen with all the logos of all the things that I have done related to open source And my heart really landed on this picture because it reminded me of my deep roots and open source and The gifts I've been given over the years by people in the community that have helped me develop the ability to To be influential to make a mark to help people in the open source community I spent 35 years in Portland, Oregon Which was kind of ground zero for so much of open source the open source development lab Which later became the Linux Foundation started their IBM's Linux lab Which was the first significant commercial contribution to the Linux kernel was created there and I met a lot of people who were luminaries and Had a so influential and open source I had spent some time in in the private sector In startups it's where I met Ward Cunningham And I spent time in public service after becoming disenchanted with the implosion of Technology and in the 80s and later in the 90s I ended up in the public sector for a time and I really loved the work and I end up Testifying on a legislative bill about open source and so suddenly I became the world's Expert in the adoption of open source and government. Well, the people have met along the way the conferences I produced the network I did to help that space was really instrumental in Being able to do more work later on life and Ward was one of those folks that showed up when I did a conference I work with synodic foundation I work with Oregon State University's open source lab Which was at the heart of many community projects and hosted in fact the Linux kernel for a long time But I learned a lot about mentorship and and Generous sharing of information in that community that really became the heart of my tribe in the later years and go to the next slide Thanks, so today. I'm gonna hit on three things one is I want to share some highlights of the progress today You all have made I in mentorship. I want to talk about building mentorship into your community culture So it's not just spotty here and there because you're doing some of that now But it'd be great to weave it weave it into the way the community is built And then the last piece is really just personal about developing a mentorship mindset So that's how you roll and go to the next slide, please So let's talk a little bit about why The door has adopted this as part of their community strategy for this year every community has sustainability challenges and Sustainability has in part to do with who will do the work tomorrow that may that may be doing it today We know that burnout in both in community and in the tech industry is at an all-time high rate And we know there's a lot of reasons for that and part of it is the pandemic were more isolated and things have been challenging There's also a need to make sure that when you're done with the work You're doing because life changes and priorities changes and people like to grow and do different things There's a way that you can leave that work behind for someone else who's comfortable with doing it other really important reasons that mentorship is important in a community strategy is that mentorship isn't is another Arrow in your quiver of ways to make the community more welcoming and inclusive That one-on-one relationship really helps where there's a safe place to go answer questions Of course feed psychological safety which makes it a more creative and fun place to work And who doesn't want to enjoy working in an open source community So that's sort of the motivations from my experience and behind why it is important as a community strategy You can go to the next slide Marie So I'm going to give a couple of examples of the way Fedora is currently engaged one structure project Which is a program outside that you partner with is outreach. I'm pretty sure most of the folks on the call have heard about reach He but as you know It was designed originally as the gnome outreach program for women and then expanded to represent and support more underrepresented people and that program still runs today and there's a lot of Interns that come through I probably should mention that in my background my most recent position until April of this year was spending eight years at red hat Running their open source program office and and leading that team and so of course I got to know Marie well and work with with Matthew Miller over the years and had an opportunity to support both of the Fedora project As an executive in the company, but also to help with outreach. You can go to the next slide, please Now I really can't move off of talking about outreach. She without Saying hello and goodbye to a good friend many of you knew marina marina was Profoundly influential with outreach and that's how I got to meet her and know her when she was working in the platform Engineering team as an engineer it was using part of her time to support the program that she then helped change and rebrand as outreach II and moved it to the to the software conservancy to Help sustain its growth I adored this woman and she we lost her to cancer a few months ago but she was a brilliant woman kind heart and Had incredibly generous nature and I learned so much from her and I also learned that Contributions can come from places that you don't think are necessarily important So as an example when she and I worked together She had so much to offer and I and she knew so much about how do I work and how How to make those plans come true? But she had a brilliant vision that was limited by the amount of time She could put into it or how much funds were available. And so we worked together I shared what I knew about bureaucracies and budget processes and cadences and how decisions were made And so that way I was able to support her vision and what she was creating Through the things that I thought were mundane and not really that interesting But it made a difference. We worked on business cases together We made a case to provide more support and to help to grow that program So I just wanted to talk about marina a bit because one she's a beautiful human being and we thank her and And also because it was just a great example of how you can work with someone and share Fill in gaps to help them fulfill their vision By the way, there were nearly 900 people that have gone through the program by the time marina had left the program And and some of them are in the room now Thanks, let's go to the next slide All right, so one of the things that you've done for the first time this year Was the fedora mentor summit I got to go back and watch some of the that the talks that were given and Sorry, my dog is escaping of the spare room And it was it looked like a really wonderful Event you had great participation 73 of people actually showing up that were registered is as an extraordinary Number and As I mentioned I saw some of the content and I really salute you guys for pulling it off I understand that that is going to happen again next year So if you're interested in help organizing it or participating it, I would put your hand up now And start in on 2023 next slide, please All right, so I want to spend a little bit of time talking about moving this into your culture Now we talked about the overarching strategies as a community as a body of a community Let's talk a little bit about what it means to the individual The reasons that people typically become involved in an opportunity. You may not have think a thought of Or especially for people that are working on developing their own ability to manage or they're interested in a management path in their career it really does give you an early opportunity to kind of Hone some of your leadership skills in terms of of teaching and training And and structuring a formal relationship. It also sharpened your own skills I can't tell you how much I gained From the questions I was asked I have a lot of stuff in my head I've been around for a long time and there are things that seem obvious to me or just intuitive But not because I have a super sense of things but because I've had a lot of experience And when you're asked questions and you have to explain it to someone else you find that it deepens your own understanding You question your own understanding you organize your own thought process and it's really A great exercise To go through as as an individual it broadens your view I learned a lot about things I never knew about in my exchanges with with my mentees And that's super helpful And then it also at you it adds your cv. You can put it on your resume. There are many companies that consider mentorship as essential for a promotion curve track That's true at red hat engineers have to demonstrate as they reach through senior levels of promotion that they have actually Been a mentor and that goes on on their their requirements list For mentees, there's some obvious ones. You get to learn new skills It also provides a safe place to learn new things. It may be related to your job It may not be related to your job if it's uh, if it's a community work That's outside of your you know a day job description But it's really a nice way to learn something without having uh, Extraordinary expectations You're also if you you and your mentor work together successfully It's going to expand your network not just with the relationship You'll develop with your mentor over time But in a in the best perfect world The introductions that will come by the way of your mentor as they learn more about you And then of course it's nice to have on your cv too next slide, please So let's talk a little bit about some advice for setting up projects and people for success If you talk generally about starting programs and deepening your strategy in the community I think it's really important to provide some common guidelines and established norms And what I mean by that is that although the mentorship may come Focused on specific projects because you've organized the opportunity that way You want in a a community where you have lots of projects and fordora does You want the experience of being mentored to be consistent From opportunity to opportunity. It really helps It feels more comfortable. It feels a little bit more familiar and it also Provides establishes some norms. You're not really just leaving the mentors to their own devices to figure out how it should work So really really helpful to establish Uh, you do some of this now, but you organize and publishing your mentorship opportunities is really important To do that for transparency and so people can see what a range of opportunities might be Even if you have something in mind you and someone in mind you might bring that into the open forum Just to make sure people know it's going on creating some kind of a forum then to ideate and Come up with let's say mentees have something they like to learn but it's not on the list There should be a way they can discuss and float that And then always make it as easy as possible reduce the friction make it easier for the mentee and mentor to work together I'm going to put a plug in For keeping your project documentation current There is no project on the planet That has not had problems with documentation. It's really not necessarily the funnest thing We salute people that specialize in documentation. There are incredible community contributors But you really need to make sure that your documentation is the current So it's easier to be able to engage people and teach them as they go along And then I also recommend you do a surveillance here just to see how it went You'll you'll want to talk to the individual mentor mentees, but it's really good to get at that You know common look and ask the same questions of everyone to be able to further develop your program All right. Next slide, please Okay, so let's talk a little bit more about being uh being a mentor Uh, so these sort of practical considerations You really need to establish expectations Early on figure out, you know with transparency. What are you both hoping for? What is a mentee trying to learn or that may be established in a sense because they picked a project that you've put on the project board Uh, but also, you know a deeper understanding of why they're doing it where they really see themselves going and growing with the information And also it's really important for the mentor to share what they hope to gain Uh, it's probably hopefully not just going to be extra hands on the project I think every mentor wants to be able to learn something too and it's really important to share that it's part of the the the relationship building process which makes The mentor mentee relationship in a program so much more important and so more valuable than just sort of a draw Corporate engagement where people are signing up I also encourage the mentor to make a list as you go along of people in your network You think will be valuable for the mentee To meet maybe not in that moment, but by the time your engagement is over you should know now also mention Encouraging to time buying your engagement and what I mean by that is just set amount of time You're going to be working together on you know, whatever your list of goals is It's important to do that because the world is full of people you can learn from If you know how long you'll be working together it encourages some focus And it also gives a natural end state so someone can move on to the next thing without saying I think I'm done learning I need to go now so that I'm feeling all the hostage. I know that sounds silly, but it really does help and Also consider although I'm suggesting you're going to time bind that engagement that if if you're successful You'll end up with a relationship that will last in the years. I still have people that Worked for me years ago and I worked with it that that reach out from time to time for advice And it's really gratifying so so make that a long-term commitment But not a short but a short-term focus time commitment And then I really want to make sure you you convey to your mentee that you Acknowledge the trust they're putting in you by coming to you and saying can you teach me? Can I learn from you next slide please? all right, so Some simple things we already talked about creating expectations Be really specific about what you hope to learn. I mean you can be general also But there should be something that you can both put your arms around So with the end of the engage you can feel like okay. I address that I really feel I've raised my competency level here or I've raised my Uh my exposure here In between when you're having Having scheduled sessions write down the questions. I find it more useful rather than I mean I'm always hoping to have people email me or any time you think of things But I found that the best Conversations we've had is when we just wait until we can sit down together and then we walk through the questions together Also recognize that your mentor may be Uh Maybe tapped. I mean they they may be pretty busy And make sure that you acknowledge and appreciate the time they're they're putting in sometimes it will be you know Obviously if you're working on a project and you're contributing to their project It seems like to a degree it would be in their self interest But there is an investment in a time and so uh, it's really it's really nice to know that's appreciated And then also remember that there probably will be more mentors in your future If you have if you're in a mentorship relationship, which is not everything you hoped it might be That's okay. One of you is going to learn something from it But if you get through it successfully, you'll you know, be ready to go on to the next one And by the way, although I know a lot of us can't relate to Uh benchman franklin personally. I really I really do love this philosophy and in his comment about The way that you really learn by being involved So the the mentorship should not just be a talking head thing This is where you can actually go out and do something together and you learn a lot next slide, please All right, so now we're going to talk a little bit about developing mentor mind Mindset now the quote that just flew by from angela mylut talks about how we May not remember what people said and we may not remember what people did We always remember how they made us feel. This is a really important attribute of a of being a mentor Is being mindful that when you're working together that people will remember how you made you feel Did we lift them up? Did you lift each other up? Did you feel better about your skills and your your outlook on you know, whatever the topic is by the time you're done I you should be willing to mentor whether it's a formal program or not To be to share and my comment about living in gratitude. I know that sounds a little bit spiritual sort of kind of But it's an important mindset to have I did not have mentors when I in my early days and high tech my early days and corporate Especially in corporate startups were very positive But by the time I got into a corporate area There was just no one that really wished me to succeed I was a female VP among 12 male VPs and I found them cooking books and taking Taking credit for for my finances and charging It was just crazy unsupportive environment But even so I was grateful for the times that people trusted me to do things that trusted my word that took my advice And that helped me advance my career and when you are when you are Understand what your privilege is and what you've been granted It makes it more exciting and more gratifying and easier to share with other people When I say listen for the request what I mean by that is Don't be quick to ask Or tell people they need your help or ask if they want your help There's a really simple expression. You can't tell nobody nothing when people aren't ready to learn Then they're not ready to learn and so Always listen and wait for someone to ask for for help or to ask for an engagement and listen carefully to what it is they might want and then my last piece of advice for Assuming a mentor Intent and a mindset is to think like a super connector. I'm going to talk about that in just a minute before we close up But you're not just one person you need to think about Who else the this person that you're working with? today Can work with tomorrow to be able to help fulfill their vision and achieve their goals By the way, I am a total nerd Cult fan favorite of of kung fu if you've never watched the classic kung fu series that came out in the early 70s This is a western that started david karadine that introduced eastern thought into western into the western culture in the 70s and He was referred to by his mentor as cricket. So that's my comment. We're all crickets next slide, please So I I did a call out on twitter and asked if anybody had any questions and I'm grateful that justin florie Brought up networking, you know, so one-on-one engagements are great But what can we what can we do to do a better job of networking to introduce introducing our mentees into networks Because they're very empowering and I Completely agree our personal networks are our superpower And I think of that in sort of in in in two circles You over time you're going to build a small trusted quality network of people that you can rely on to tell you the truth when you ask to raise you up and Remind you that you can do things and you should do more And are encouraging and trusted and that comes through making commitments over time Even small ones keeping your word being a resource for other people But beyond that you're going to develop a professional Network of people similarly by you know Protecting your reputation by keeping your word By adding value in conversations by listening carefully to understand people's motivations A super connector is a term that was developed that came out in Harvard business review a number of years ago Describes an individual who you will find if you do a map you'll find they're sort of in the middle of everything I found myself in the middle of everything in a confluence of topics from open source public policy Cyber security and a bunch of other things that were Over the course of a 20-year career that came together and I helped launch Married projects in government in policy in community in non-profits and help people advance their goals But I wasn't doing it myself But I made it possible by connecting all those dots by listening and connecting So the the network effect is super important because people will have access to information And a platform For discussion they will not have just by solely working with you So networks is really good. How can we be better at doing that? We need to pay more attention to what people are saying and talking about be curious and asking All right, I think that is the end of my talking head Period and I'm going to call for questions and I'm going to go see how that happens. I think I can operate The question the q&a tab Thanks very much Where you can drop the Presentation if you'd like to we'll be sharing the presentation afterwards. I have a I'll have a I'll share some links to references and also Because I like doing photography I'll make sure everyone gets credit for any of the photos or images that we're in the thing Thanks to the ford or our community for a lot of that and to marie also Okay, so first question is mentoring communal exhausting any suggestions for a statement? Yes, well as I mentioned make sure that you you have a A defined time And also make sure that you're really clear on how you're going to communicate some of the exhaustion comes through through random stuff No, not not manage that having communication come in at a time that you can manage it easily Depending on whether it's above and beyond what you normally do So I would say you know pace yourself Make sure that the expectations aren't super burdened. You know, you're you're not providing Corporate training. You're just providing insight and help with a particular small thing. So If you feel that then just maybe renegotiate with your mentee and figure out a way to to lighten the load How do you get better at working with mentees that fall below Falling behind in expectations. All right, let me see this when you When you want to avoid being mean it's hard to tell them you can do better than this Well, that's really interesting. So So if if this is a case, I'm just going to get this is a case where your mentee Has an expectation that they're work working on a project or a deliverable Or or are they just not making it if if they're It is hard to say you can do better than this But you know what that's part of the value of the The relationship is you and what you can learn by saying that it's like I I think you can do better You know, have we missed anything? You know, be curious be be open If if you created expectations at the beginning that you both know about then go back and talk about them I mean, you're not going to fire them, but you but they do they They they are old that feedback that they can do better and I know that's hard that that's that's part of the reason that Companies like seeing people have mentorship on their resume because it's a learning experience. I hope that that's helpful Let me see let me go and I'll go let me go down to the bottom fields one first We have a couple minutes still What strategies do you recommend to encourage and build an inclusive cohort of mentors from underrepresented groups? that Is a great question. So I was really privileged when I worked at red hat. We had one of the more diverse groups in the company And we built diversity and the team by using all of our own Personal networks to reach out and underserved representatives So sorry, this keeps looking around just turning it so it was about the concussion, but so The strategy would be to ask for the advice of someone who's who's from an underrepresented group To help you build a strategy and plan to do that they they they have those networks You don't want to put all the burden on them to do that because that's not that's not what we want to do But you do want to seek their guidance and ask for their advice and how that can be done That's where you're going to get the answer that question Is from the people in your community from underrepresented groups every community is a little bit different That's where you need to we need to be asking the question What's a good strategy or consideration for matching between mentee and mentor? you're going to start with with what the domain expertise is to make sure that the person What the person wants is what the mentor can provide And then it's good to ask the mentee if they have any considerations Is there is there any any kind of anything they would be comfortable with or less comfortable with? In terms of a mentor are they okay? They're working with someone who's Has half the experience of the industry they have you just you know ask around according to the The profile and see if it meets their comfort but you're you're You're best off to try to match According to skill they're looking for and then give it a shot and and try not to filter it because you don't want Hidden biases to come into how you're matching people I Struggles into what mentors look like and how to make it work for the benefit. Okay Carolina, thanks for that question. Like there's there's more I have to pop that out recommend resources Yes, so resources which a person wanted to join a group as mentee could use that is My recommendation to create those that guidance for fedora That needs to be written down I you you absolutely it's fair to struggle with that if you don't know what it looks like It's going to be really up to the fedora Leadership to describe that for you. So you have somewhere to to go look at what that program is going to look like Uh matthew miller how close an experience is ideal for a mentorship mentee putting in tech job terms Should someone a little one? The period was on a level two. I I'm so not good with numbers But I would say based on my Experience where I became the world's preeminent expert in the adoption of open source and government Because I spent 15 minutes researching What open source was being used by the state of oregon and ended up having a slash dotted and in the news I would say the person just needs to have 15 minutes more experience than you do I don't think it's a leveling issue I think it really is about the the domain and the the uh the topic that you're you're trying to Achieve and that that's in a community project. I think that's what's what's important It's not about where you are in the hierarchy of promotion and engineering But rather where were you at in in terms of experience in the topic that they want to be mentored on Uh, let's see. Let's go up some more Jared Smith. Hi Jared mentoring could be mentally exhausting. Oh, we did that one We scroll more From ben cotton. My best mentoring experience has been project based. How can you approach the relationship when a mentee doesn't have anything particular? They want to focus on they'll always have something in particular. There's some reason they're showing up So when you say nothing in particular for me not a not a project what they are looking for so An example I've mentored people who Wanted to advance their career Um, I'll give you some great examples. I in uh in profession. I've worked with people who just said I don't know how to ask for a promotion or a raise. Can you help me? You know, so there are other reasons than uh than technical topics. I would say There there there's got to be some underlying reason they want to sign up as a mentee even if it's a general life experience Or just admiring the work you do. So just you just need to drill down and find out why they like to be there What they'd like to be there for rather, excuse me uh Funaruga I see you've experienced several things in several areas What are your present and future focuses for your work? Ah, okay. All right. Well, so I you know, I I loved working at red hat I had I used to joke about having the best job in the company because I was you know, working with community Uh, and I I left that work because I had I just felt like I needed to learn some new things I got pretty good. Yeah pretty good at what I did. And so I was ready for new things Uh, I am going back. So I'm going to have a public announcement in a couple of weeks on some specific projects I'm going to be working on But uh, my general area right now, I'm working back and working in the policy space Uh, I'm doing some work for a couple of software foundations after following the executive order In the united states on supply chain security. So now I'm back to thinking about public policy again and helping the open source ecosystem some foundations. I'm working But with osi to figure out what the world's gonna look like Both for like Europe's not talking about as much, but it's coming our way The world has become very dependent on open source software And there's an acknowledgement that they're not going to stop doing Open source software because we're having really serious problems with supply chain and cyber security But there is an interest in understanding how we can You know solve some of these problems without damaging our ability to keep open source Rolling the way it has in the years. So I'm focused on that. I get to draw on my network I created years ago when I was doing a contract with george tech research and I used to manage a A fund that came from the federal government to uh, to seed fund small Cyber security projects are open source And so when I left the red hat and I called the fence and said, you know what I'm like, I'm still I'm I haven't said what I'm gonna do yet, but I want to check in on this I was able to reactivate my network in washington dc We're at where I spend a lot of time and had a friend an old friend who had always stayed in touch with and helped him with his business You know and with his projects over time He immediately completely brought me up to speed on what was happening and who the people in the white house were and What the you know the legislative bills are underway that no one could talk about and I got to see that So those are some of the things they're working on and I just want to use that as an opportunity to say This is why Building a network and keeping a network over the years really important because everything I've done In my entire career has come to support something else I'm working on an internment helps they help people and also provides value to customers So the short answer is right now. I'm a consultant, but in the next couple of weeks I'll be talking a little bit more about more formal work. I'll be doing so. Thanks for that question Hope that was helpful Uh, what are some of the best things you've learned from your mentors? Uh, I There's some of the best things I just learned a lot about I've well a couple of things one I've learned that There are a lot of things I know that I just didn't think were that important Or I kind of took for granted That turned out to be really helpful And so I I've I've learned not to take anything For granted to really listen carefully to what people are struggling with or trying to achieve And to draw on things that I may have left behind years ago that are actually helpful Um, what are some of the best things I've also I've also learned to be a little bit more structured and disciplined and the way we set up Mentorship most of them very actually have all been very positive Some have been more fruitful than others the ones that weren't as fruitful or where we just we just you know failed Failed to meet because my mentee got got busy and uh, and so I've learned As a result to make sure that we're both really committed to to working on it together Yeah, I'm sure there's more but that's off the top of my head. I've learned a lot Both generally and specifically Harish has a question given the fragmentation and bifurcation of the open source community driven by political expediencies That's a five dollar word even when community members are driving to keep it coherence. What else do you think we can do to help? This reality on the ground While harish that is a very elegant question, but I you have to give me more words because I'm not sure what you mean By political expediencies. Are you talking about corporate politics? Are you talking about geopolitical politics? You got to give me a little bit more to go on there I'm waiting for it corporate and geopolitics Okay, all right. What can we learn so? uh So on the geopolitics, you know, I'm I'm absolutely staying the course on on open source Will we you know, well the companies who? The public sector companies and project the public sector relying on they're worried about cybersecurity concerns Need to sharpen up our you know supply chain Transparency and uh cybersecurity practices. Yeah, but that's okay The the uh, and I think that's what even the geopolitical concerns because some of that tension comes from companies that are embargoed And some of those comes into embargo like china are also part of our open source community So there's there's some geo politics at play But I think we need to keep our eye on the ball The philosophy for addressing the cyber security stuff has to do with uh with uh I'm sorry. I read the question and I got distracted the uh the cyber security concerns have to do with Uh with uh supply chains and that our philosophy is to treat a proprietary software way There's nothing unique all software needs to be concerned the concern with corporate politics That's uh again a really you know really broad concern. I think that my you know my The drum I am beating constantly Is for and this is going to go back to some of the geopolitical stuff at the end of the day My uh and the cyber security work is that we need to have fewer free loaders Free writers rather free writers in open source A lot of companies have built their their fortunes on open source And in a sense, that's okay Because we developed open source licenses for people to be able to do that and that's that's that's part of the deal But it's not sustainable To capitalize on that and then not reinvest not reinvest And so I think that uh, there may be some external forces that will influence corporate Politics and to get them to change their thinking about their relationship with open source communities I am I am optimistic. I don't think we're required there. I don't think it's gotten quite as bad as it's going to get But I I think it'll improve In the next four or five years I hope it's helpful. That's my best shot in the dark without having a conversation over a cup of coffee with you Thanks for the question Harish Yeah You're bad Okay, is there anything today? Did I oh look at that? This is so cool. It marks things that get answered is answered All the questions were answered. I hope it was helpful Uh, if there if there's nothing else, I just want to tell you I'm grateful you're here Fedora is such an amazing community and I know you'll be around for a long time Be kind to each other, you know help each other And if you do formalize a mentorship program to make it easier to help mentors from becoming Earned out. It's not necessarily a natural skill You know, it comes naturally to some of us because we're sort of lifelong learners and teachers But you know, if you've not done this kind of work before then make sure that The fedora leadership takes the time to invest in the kind of tools you need Let people know let people Know what you would need to be able to be a mentor. What are you uncomfortable with? What kind of guidance are you looking for? You know, have you had negative experiences in the past as a mentee that you would like to see not repeated? That's always good. Oh, we think the best lessons Learned are ones that other people have that they're willing to share with you So sure those will the fedora leadership and go from there And I think that's it. We're nearly to the end of our time. So how about if I give everybody 12 minutes back? Sound good Marie sound good All right. Well, thanks everybody really appreciate it