This talk was delivered as the closing keynote at the FOSDEM 2013 Conference. Video is available at http://video.fosdem.org/2013/maintracks/Janson/The_Keeper_of_Secrets.webm This content is licensed CC-By-3.0, so please use, remix and share widely! Abstract: Leaders in communities that value openness and transparency are faced with a difficult challenge: people confide in you constantly, but your role as a leader is to promote positive change in your project; change only proceeds where information flows. How does one negotiate the need to maintain trust and harmony in the human sides of our interactions in development communities, while still ensuring that the social problems that may inhibit community progress are mitigated? How does one manage to do all this while keeping one’s commitments to one’s friends and to project values like transparency and openness? In this talk, Leslie Hawthorn will explore the role of secrets and disclosure in our open development communities. Specifically, she will explore how good leaders know when to discuss secrets, when to remain mum and, in particular, how to tell secrets "the right way". Drawing on six years of experience working with 100s of FOSS communities, she will discuss some of the most contentious and hilarious social problems she’s encountered and how they were addressed, with names and details omitted sufficiently well to keep her own commitments to confidentiality.

1. The Keeper of
Secrets
Leslie Hawthorn — @lhawthorn
FOSDEM 2013

2. How to be an effective leader
when everyone talks to you
…but expects you not
to talk to anybody else

3. These are
my opinions only.
Your mileage may vary.
Greatly.

4. http://www.flickr.com/photos/birgerking/6908909031/

5. There is No Cabal

6. …but there are
a lot of people having
one to one
~ or ~
small group
discussions

7. Isn’t that a Cabal?

8. one to one
~ or ~
one to few
conversations
are not always harmful

9. When is something
a secret?

10. We are social
creatures, so it’s in
our nature to talk
about things that
matter to us.
We talk about
them a lot.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/29010088@N02/2711420294/

11. While we all
understand that
we’re not supposed
to discuss certain
topics, we do so
anyway because
we fundamentally
require the input
of our peers.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/vinothchandar/7675396528/

12. Some ‘Secrets’
are Really Great
Consider a donation
to the OSUOSL Beer Fund
[URL REDACTED]
Use your favorite search engine to find OSUOSL beer fund
Full disclosure: osuosl.org is my former employer.
I do not benefit from the beer fund for many reasons,
including my preference for whiskey.

13. Some secrets are
relatively innocuous…
http://www.flickr
flickr.com/photos/mamchenkov/448409220/

14. If we accept that discussing the things
that matter to us is human nature,
how can we tell if something
ought not be shared?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7914713@N05/3395188917/

15. What about the things
people don’t say
…but are still blindingly
apparent?

16. Ostensibly, if someone comes
to you with information about
something that bothers them,
chances are they want you
to do something with
that information.

17. Capable
leaders...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bjornmeansbear/4680634219/

18. Creating empathy and inclusion
requires understanding —
not just what to share,
but how to share it
the right way.

19. Case Study:
When You Have to Share,
but You Ought Not

20. Contributor
in critical path
is having
a bad time,
…but doesn’t
want to discuss it widely
http://www.flickr.com/photos/67776729@N06/6417063815/

21. Simple cases of difficult
circumstances start to feel
like deliberate discourtesy
http://www.flickr.com/photos/neilt/1631494/

22. Despite their irritations, few
folks are willing to be direct
about their concerns....
http://www.flickr.com/photos/howardlake/4850758742/

23. “ Why Your
Community
Leaders Deserve
Combat Pay”
…will be the topic
of a later presentation
http://www.flickr.com/photos/helloturkeytoe/4635903792/

24. How to ...
1) Encourage disclosure
2) Ask for permission to
disclose in such a way
as to keep all parties
comfortable
3) Encourage community
to be direct but kind
with their concerns
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bjornmeansbear/4680634219/

25. Case Study:
The Person Who Just
Doesn’t Get It

26. Some folks are
quite good–
hearted
…but their
actions harm
the flow of the
project

27. Project members understandably
get cranky and waste cycles if
they feel like they have to spend
much of their time herding errant
fellow volunteers
http://www.flickr.com/photos/23155134@N06/8023566962/

28. We have excellent and well
documented processes
for sharing code.

29. There is no manual
to teach us how to share
our emotions, frustrations
and concerns.
( This is not entirely true, see the Resources
section at the end of this presentation. )

30. Despite their irritations,
few are willing to be direct
about their
concerns…
http://www.flickr.com/photos/howardlake/4850758742/

31. This technique is
ineffective at best
http://www.flickr.com/photos/11742539@N03/5844531939/

32. Handling these situations
quickly and effectively is
messy,
uncomfortable
and incredibly necessary.

33. How to ...
1) Correct education
issues
2) Suggest other ways
contributor can be
effective
3) Be willing to ask
people to move along
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bjornmeansbear/4680634219/

34. In Brief:
Negotiation Theory
for Geeks

35. Negotiation Theory
for Geeks
~ or ~
How to avoid project bankruptcy
from community leader
combat payments
(a.k.a. leader burnout)

36. Having conversations with
your friends is easy
See http://hawthornlandings.org/2011/08/02/negotiation-avoiding-the-vale-of-suck-starts-with-you/

37. We needlessly assume other
conversations must be painful
See http://hawthornlandings.org/2011/08/02/negotiation-avoiding-the-vale-of-suck-starts-with-you/

38. Be Willing to
Ask
for What
You Need

39. ● Ask the other party what they need
to be successful
● Find common ground
● Reach agreement
● If you cannot reach agreement, find the
most optimal solution for both parties
● It is OK to not reach agreement

40. Practice Radical Honesty
Radical honesty
!=
being a tactless jerk

41. Behaving Diplomatically
…is not the fine art
of being disingenuous.

42. Do you want
to be right?
~ or ~
Do you want
to win?

43. A few bits of radical transparency from LH
● I learned how to use vi and ● I’m up to about 1,000 lines of
Unix at the age of 3. Python now and I still don’t
I remember precisely squat relish coding. I’d rather talk
about how either works, to the other humans so you
except ls and ls -a. don’t have to take the
context switch hit.
● Being an active listener,
effective leader, and ● This is my second FOSDEM
confidant is exhausting closing keynote where
and sometimes painful. someone else prepped
my slides. Thanks to
● Having difficult
Garrett LeSage &
conversations with people
Pawel Solyga!
scares the every loving
fsck out of me, too.

44. The Only
Secret
You Need

45. The secret to being an
effective community leader is
genuinely caring about the health
and well being of your project,
your community members, and
your fellow human beings.

46. …even especially when they
annoy the crap out of you.

47. Thank you!
Questions?
Leslie Hawthorn — @lhawthorn
hawthornlandings.org

48. The Legal Bits
This presentation is licensed CC-BY-3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Please reuse, remix and share widely.

49. Resources
● Randy Pausch’s Last Lecture:
http://www.cmu.edu/randyslecture/
● David Eaves’ Blog:
http://eaves.ca/
● The Center for Non-Violent Communication:
http://www.cnvc.org/
● The Harvard Negotation Project:
http://www.pon.harvard.edu/category/research_projects/
harvard-negotiation-project/
● Gabriella Coleman, Coding Freedom
http://press.princeton.edu/titles/9883.html