Introduction
what this training does and doesn't cover
So much universe, and so little time.
— Terry Pratchett
- For every beginning there must be an ending
- But we don't like to talk about that
- Thousands of books in print about how to start a business
- Only a handful about how to pass one on or wind one down
- Preparing for the end can make it less likely
- It also helps make what happens before then more enjoyable
All of the material in this workshop is available under an open license. Sessions are not recorded, and we request that you do not share notes or exercise results with people who did not take part without the prior, explicit permission of all attendees.
No Abstinence Solutions
- An abstinence solution is one that requires people
to behave in ways we know they won't
- See also bullshit [Frankfurt2005]
- "Document everything" doesn't work
- People will always short-change writing descriptions of work in favor of actually doing work
- And fail to write down the parts of their work that they think are obvious
Threat Models
- Individual threats affect one or a few members of your team
- Can come from mundane career or life changes (illness, new job opportunity)
- Or external factors (international student having visa revoked without notice)
- Leadership threats specifically target the project's leader
- E.g., being personally targeted in the media because of their work
- Community threats affect large groups
- E.g., department being shut down
- Affect so many people at the same time that the community cannot buffer the shock
- Global threats affect everyone
- So other communities cannot help
Governments make emergency plans to deal with community threats (if they are willing to admit their existence). When governments themselves are in upheaval, people rely on civil society [Solnit2010].
Three Big Questions
- Can you act unilaterally or do other people have a veto?
- Not "have a stake in the outcome", but rather can disagree with you and make it stick
- Subsidiary question: are those "other people" your peers or your superiors (e.g., your employer)?
- Are you handing over or shutting down?
- We view shutdown as "succession to zero"
- Do you have days or months to prepare?
- The former is usually involuntary
- The latter allows for (some) structural changes before and during handover
Not Covered
- Community building
- Lots of good guides, including [Alinsky1989, Brown2007, Lakey2018]
- But for present purposes you are going to have to use the community you already have
- Communication skills
- We'll talk about what to say but not (much) about how to say it
- See [Kuchner2011] for some useful insights
- For-profit businesses
- Much less material on succession in businesses than on starting up
- But this workshop focuses on open source, open data, and open science