Author Topic: Bitshares community needs a project management tool  (Read 3585 times)

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Offline Crypto Kong

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This is a great idea, we are working on a trading bot worker proposal and if we can better organise and allow the community to give input easier I’m all up for it. We would like to get involved.


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Offline JaimeVargas

I hope you guys have found the right tool. Although I am a little late in replying to this thread, I wanted to suggest a nice team collaboration tool that would definitely help you on the way. Try the tool at Fluxes.com. It's completely free and no limitation to number of team members. They have live chat option, so you can get everything done at one place.

Offline Samupaha

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Thanks Fox for other alternatives! I've been testing Basecamp and looking also other possibilities but Basecamp is still my first choice.

Basecamp 3 is simple and elegant. Not much features, but those features it has, are designed very well. Simplicity FTW. It's easy to use and has also mobile apps. It has six core features:

- Campfire
Basically just a place to chat. Will be used probably for stuff that is discussed and created in Basecamp. Slack and Telegram are for more common chatting.

- Messages
Message Board for more detailed and longer discussions.

- To-Dos
To-Do lists. There is a lot to do, so this feature is essential for us.

- Schedule
For events. Hardforks, hangouts, etc.

- Check-ins
Not necessarily much use for us. This will create automatic check-ins for any kind of topic where regular feedback is needed. But it could be used to collect information like "what have you been doing this week for Bitshares", "what has been sucking in Bitshares development", "have you had any good marketing ideas lately", etc.

- Docs & Files
All kinds of documents can be saved in here. Good for saving all important information in one place and keeping them updated. Also can be used for designing BSIPs, marketing plans, press releases, etc.

First basecamp is free so there is no need for money now. But if we want more basecamps (like groups/projects) that will cost 29 USD per month. I think we can manage quite a lot things with one basecamp, we can start to add more if there is demand in the future.

It seems that users have to be manually added, so send me a private message either here or on Slack with your name (or nickname, whatever you want to be seen in Basecamp) and email address and I will add you.

Offline Fox

I too have been looking into a community lead project management toolset. 

Colonoy
A couple of days back I again requested an invitation to the Colony beta [1].  Their solution aims to reward members contributing to (our) project goals.  They call it Proof of Cognition.  Their platform integrates multiple communication and productivity services such as Slack, GitHub and others.  Unfortunately, it continues to be in closed beta, so it's vaporware to us.

Aha!
A ready to use toolset with great established integration is Aha! [2]. Aimed at product managers, it excels at visual roadmaps and quickly illustrating where a project is at by aggregating data from other tools. This allows business strategy (ideas) to inform project management (task management), to inform development (code), to cycle back to inform business strategy (community).  One can easily connect to Jira and GitHub for sprint planning and code tracking, Slack for team communication and has an open API to integrate others not already included in their extensive listing [3]. It's my personal favorite for this reason and I do have some experience utilizing the toolset.

Blueworks Live (IBM)
Business Process Management (BPM) is practice that may be a bit more mature than what this thread aims to accomplish in the short-run. However, I'd be remiss not to mention Blueworks Live, as it delivers a processes modeling solution far superior to Visio and others.  Beyond the intuitive modeling interface, it includes a feedback/propose/approve loop and an API to integrate with the above toolsets or others.

I'm happy to contribute in setting something up in coordination with a team of motivated community members.  PM with interest.

[1] https://colonoy.io
[2] https://aha.io
[3] http://www.aha.io/product/features/integrations
[4] https://www.blueworkslive.com/
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Offline gamey

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The only effort I've seen be successful in this arena was Methodx's creation of the NullStreet website. The key seemed to be making something exclusive sounding and people went to it.  Like how they make people sit around outside clubs forming lines in Vegas and charge a lot. I'm not saying do this, but my attempt at community building had limited luck. Methodx's attempt was far more successful in motiviating people to participate.
I speak for myself and only myself.

Offline Samupaha

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Ok, let's try Basecamp (or something similar). I have more time next weekend, I'll look closer at it then (well, actually I already created basecamp just to see what it looks like, if you want to test it too, send your name and email to me with PM here or Slack). Before that you can still suggest other alternatives.

If it doesn't work, maybe it will be still a valuable lesson. Basically this is about company culture. How should we do things? What actually works? DAC is a new concept and nobody has knowledge how to use it, so we are doing pioneering groundwork here. This is the thing that everybody should remember. We are in the unknown territory so we can be sure that things don't work out when we try them first time. But eventually, with persistence, we will establish a company culture that actually works.

Offline Thom

Seems to be a great tool. However, the any tool is worthless if not wielded by people who can use it.

Perhaps this tool will become the catalyst that will trigger the spontaneous / emergent project management skills inherent in this community. It sure can't hurt. In fact I see the potential for it really helping us to get organized and stay focused.

However, what I have observed in many cases is that people generally defer to the charisma and confidence of individuals that see a way to get goals accomplished and are willing to take the initiative to put that plan into action.
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere - MLK |  Verbaltech2 Witness Reports: https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,23902.0.html

Offline cube

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Basecamp does help to get things better organised.  There is no harm in trying it out.  It may turn out to be a useful tool to us.
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Offline Samupaha

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Whether we act as teams or individuals, we still have to be on the same page. We need to have a place where to store information about what is happening and what needs to happen. Without it it's really hard to see the big picture and to prioritize.

Everybody who wants to know what's going on right now should be able to do that easily. Now it's pretty much impossible, everything is scattered around. It's really hard to cooperate in an enviroment like this. Especially when people come and go as they please, because nobody is forcing them to do anything. We need tools to bring new people onboard as fast as possible and we need resilience in case somebody important decides to leave.

This is still somewhat centralized project. We have only one blockchain. When new features are produced or parameters are changed, it will have an impact on everybody.

Especially marketing has been huge failure. We need to learn how to focus on effectively marketing new features as they come. We need to learn how to market the whole system as a platform. We need to learn how to attract new developers.

DAC is a powerful tool, but we have to learn to use it. We have the best blockchain governance mechanism, but it doesn't give any meaningful results unless shareholders really understand how to use it.

Offline CLains

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Offline Thom

+5% That's an excellent point noisy and you covered it well.

I really agree with the small teams approach. Fuzzy has done it, svk has done it, wackou & I / gentso & I have done it. Your point about it being so much to take in to overwhelm an individual is so true.

This also brings to mind the idea of mentoring newbies too.
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere - MLK |  Verbaltech2 Witness Reports: https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,23902.0.html

Offline noisy

Some time ago I wrote a post about dilution in communication channels - https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=21637.0

I had a feeling, that we should have better tool for work (personally I like slack, but it doesn't metter)

And then @xeroc respond me:

Quote
How could we possible create a decentralized ecosystem if we have a centralized gathering point that has had outages already?
Can you guys remember what happend when bitcointalk went down?

I don't think it is a bad idea to have multiple communication channels .. every new user can pick whatevery they like most ..

And I think, this is true. This is decentralize project with a lot of aspects. Tool which can be good for talking about marketing can be terrible to talk about code, etc. I think we should change perspective. Instead trying to figure out what is the best for whole community, try to find what is the best tool to my team. In general I think, we should focus about teams.

It is very difficult to perform any serious job when you are just one. Projects like Bitshares require a lot of time and effort to even understand a basics. This is can be very overwhelming when you are working alone. I think we should try to build our community from the bottom. Choose a people who would like take some kind of leadership, and allow them looking on project from higher perspective.

Bitshares project from technology point of view is decentralized... but right now I fell that our community is distributed.



I know that this post become a off topic, so to summary my thoughts: sure... Basecamp can be used for one team, but I don't see a reason why this should become a tool for managing whole project.
Take a look on: https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,19625.msg251894.html - I have a crazy idea - lets convince cryptonomex developers to use livecoding.tv

Offline Thom

 +5% +5%

I couldn't agree more. Not only do we need the tools as you point out but we also need people like Bill Butler who stepped up to organize and manage the UI team to focus the human efforts to get things done. Some of us (speaking at least for myself) struggle to be self motivated, come up with a plan and then stick to it in the face of rapid changes.

Many people here are highly ambitious and productive and get shit done on their own without the need for external motivators. I am that way when I have a goal I'm passionate about and can envision a path to achieve that goal. Sometimes, and I consider BitShares as an example, I can become demotivated and loose that sense of urgency and importance amidst all of the different things that need to be done and the lack of obvious priorities each should have. The speed at which this ecosystem and the attitudes towards it change is also difficult to stay motivated in.

Perhaps it just me. One thing for sure tho is that BitShares as a community struggles to establish plans and stick to them while also remaining innovative and adaptable. Crypto is a difficult space to run a tech business in. What differentiates other projects from BitShares in terms of the public's perception of success? One item was identified by the OP. 

We know our tech is based on a solid architecture and excellent foundation, but that's not enough. btswildpig posted an interesting observation concerning reliability and various issues that impeach our claims we're ready to be the industrial strength blockchain implementation our rhetoric clams it is. This project has a history of over promising and under delivering. We say we have capability X but when that claim is put to the test it either isn't quite done yet or isn't even implemented. What kind of a message does that send to people who may be curious and come to sample our offering just to be disappointed?

It IS within our reach however. Huge improvements are happening at an increasing rate, but our approach to attaining them is not as organized and efficient as it needs to be to compete and persuade others our vision is worth supporting.

We need people like Samupaha to help us stay focused and on track.
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere - MLK |  Verbaltech2 Witness Reports: https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,23902.0.html

Offline DestBest

BitShares French ConneXion, le portail francophone BitShares.
BitShares French ConneXion, the BitShares french gateway.
www.bitsharesfcx.com

Offline Samupaha

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I've been thinking that this forum isn't very optimal tool for managing a DAC like Bitshares. A lot of topics will be forgotten very fast and probably many aren't seen by people who could or should be interested in them. Going offtopic is also common problem. Slack is nice, but it's mostly just for chatting.

Lack of communication is serious problem. Recently I tried to start a marketing campaign but it seems to be a failure because lack of communication/collaboration.

Decentralized organisation doesn't work without effort. It usually demands even more effort because there is nobody telling what to do. People have to do stuff on their own. If we want to succeed as a DAO we need to learn how to make plans and execute them in a decentralized manner.

My suggestion is that we start to use a project management tool. I've been looking for different possibilities today. Probably best choice would be Basecamp. It's widely used and praised and it seems to be suitable for our needs.

Todo-lists, deadlines etc. have to be collected on a same place where they can be found and updated easily. Jakub made a nice roadmap, but it hasn't been updated since january. We need to get information like this to a place where several people can update them when changes happen so they are not left outdated.

Roadmaps, hardforks, website updates, hangout questions, committee proposals, worker proposals, social media presence, marketing campaigns, etc. can be planned/communicated/discussed in there.

So, if I set up a Basecamp for Bitshares, would you start to use it?

We could try it for a few months to see if it gives any benefits for us. If not, I'd like to hear better ideas for organizing collaboration. We really need to get our shit together if we want to achieve something.