Grants talk:IdeaLab/put a teahouse on it

Comments

Hey Slowking4, I'm digging the framing for this idea. The Teahouse has worked pretty well for the use case of newcomers (and sometimes not-so-newcomers) getting general advising on contributing and, in some cases, helping to point out how to overcome some obstacles folks encounter while trying to get a new article written or resolve a dispute. One challenge to this idea is about building a dedicated team of folks-- what do you think that part of the toolkit would look like? Another idea is around what backlogs you might want to test this idea out. Certainly, there are a ton of them, but maybe there are a few good candidates you have in mind that another teahouse-like space could be tested out on-- these might be tasks where a lot of editors know how to help, but lack an organized way to make a dent in the backlog. Let me know if you want to setup a time to chat about this more, and how we might move this ahead, as I think you're right that the model has a lot to offer in terms of clearing up backlogs. I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 01:28, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

i am thinking about generalizing about the teahouse experience, as a template for handing process design to solve problems. if here is a backlog, put a teahouse on it - i.e. build a team of volunteers with a WMF point of contact / project manager. name your backlog - AfC? NPP? OTRS? look at all the broken processes. i would say they are broken because they do not use a teahouse methodology.

a standard methodology or practise addresses process, regardless of ideology, or fixing problems, or perfection. Slowking4 (talk) 02:13, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

There are some organizational challenges to implementing this model. For example, with the Teahouse there was not a clear plan in place to transition decision-making/management responsibilities from WMF staff/contractors to volunteers. Some elements of the transition went well, while others didn't. So part of the template should include clear guidelines for roles and responsibilities during the "launch" period (whatever that is; it was about 6-7 months in the case of the Teahouse), and how those will be handed off after paid participants step back. And of course, there's the challenge of wiki-communities resisting WMF involvement in community processes, even if there is a dedicated sub-community within that wiki that wants to partner. But I'm sure you know all about that Slowking4. Any ideas for strategies to address that kind of push-back? Jtmorgan (talk) 23:10, 17 April 2017 (UTC)