Session name: Telecommuting & Remote Community "Management" Best Practices
Organizer: Jefro
notes: Jefro
best practices for remote offices[]
Thiago: webcam set up in front of coffee machines in separate offices, didn't quite work due to noise
Sonya: call times not good, 7pm US PDT = 7:30am India - everyone mutually screwed, but even
record meetings over Skype, careful not to ramble. 3-10 people show up, 15 mins max - set agenda
phone only is restrictive, add IRC, webex, google docs, etherpad - check out "Illuminate"
Thiago: rotate meeting times, try to cover 3/4 of attendees for each
Matt: had group in Mauritius - mostly asynchronous, email, google docs, task-oriented
cultural issues[]
Adam - Asia, conversational style - spaces between speaking
David Mandel - sometimes hard to get people in various cultures to show up
use meetings only as a level-set - one person had difficulties when several people were in a room, as it made others feel left out. language difficulties make it hard to understand on the phone as well.
do language-specific IRC channels or meetings encourage silos?
need IRC automated translation - can copy/paste from google translate, better than nothing
meetings[]
keep goals in mind
Thiago: meet only when an agenda exists
Adam: schedule 1:1s in addition to group meetings
Thiago: Monthly status reports very useful
bandwidth strategies[]
Michael: multichannel meetings - IRC has low bandwidth requirements, phone/skype audio only
adobe connect - screensharing
also try join.me (plus skype) for desktop sharing
gotomeeting, webex problematic
for Linux, try using screen and let others connect - also, VNC
tools[]
Jira for logging, not meant for community management but useful
big investment in custom workflows
calagator - great meetup tool
similar: http://www.voiceyourview.com/site/content_la_trial.php
dmoz - structured internet, similar to old Yahoo
personal interaction[]
langdon: I don't work with people in the office, walk coffee-shop to coffee-shop
Thiago: can rent office space