[PROPOSAL] Implementing a periodic "Maintainer Review" process

[AMoo-Miki]

What/Why

What are you proposing?

I propose implementing a periodic review process for maintainer status in our project. Instead of maintainer status being indefinite, it should be subject to regular review and renewal at predetermined intervals.

This proposal directly addresses the clause in our project's RESPONSIBILITIES document that states, "Maintainer status never expires." While this clause aims to provide stability and continuity, I believe it is important to consider the potential drawbacks and risks associated with indefinite maintainer status.

The proposed review process would involve an evaluation of each maintainer's ongoing contributions, engagement, and alignment with the project's goals and community expectations. This evaluation could be conducted by a committee comprising fellow maintainers, core contributors, and community representatives.

By implementing this review process, we can ensure that our maintainer team remains accountable, skilled, and responsive to the evolving needs of the project and its community. It would also provide opportunities for renewing perspectives, fostering skill development, and facilitating a more equitable distribution of responsibilities.

What users have asked for this feature?

While no users have directly requested this, the proposal aligns with broader community expectations for transparency, accountability, and sustainable project governance practices that foster long-term success.

What problems are you trying to solve?

1. Solving the lack of accountability: Without periodic review or expiration of maintainer status, there is a risk of maintainers becoming complacent or unresponsive to the project's evolving needs or community concerns. This lack of accountability can lead to stagnation and potential mismanagement of the project.

2. Addressing uneven distribution of workload: Over time, the distribution of workload among maintainers can become imbalanced. Some maintainers may become less active or disengage from the project, while others carry a disproportionate burden. Periodic review or expiration of maintainer status can help ensure a more equitable distribution of responsibilities.

3. Fostering active participation: Without the possibility of maintainer status expiring, there may be a reduced incentive for maintainers to remain actively engaged and contribute consistently to the project. This could result in a core team that is less responsive to community needs or project requirements.

4. Introducing fresh perspectives: A stagnant maintainer team can lead to a lack of diversity in perspectives, ideas, and approaches. Introducing new maintainers periodically can bring fresh insights, foster innovation, and prevent the project from becoming insular or resistant to change.

5. Mitigating potential conflicts of interest: As maintainers' personal or professional circumstances change, potential conflicts of interest may arise. Without periodic review or expiration, these conflicts may go unaddressed, potentially compromising the project's integrity or direction.

6. Facilitating succession planning: A policy that allows maintainer status to persist indefinitely can hinder effective succession planning. It may become challenging to onboard and empower new maintainers, leading to potential knowledge gaps or disruptions when long-standing maintainers eventually leave the project.

7. Building community trust: Without a mechanism for reviewing or renewing maintainer status, the community's trust in the project's governance and decision-making processes may erode over time. Regular reviews or expiration can demonstrate transparency and accountability, fostering greater community confidence.

8. Preventing stagnation and complacency: Without periodic review or renewal processes, there is a risk that maintainers may become complacent or resistant to change, leading to stagnation in the project's development, adoption of best practices, or responsiveness to user feedback.

9. Promoting transparency and community involvement: A policy of never expiring maintainer status can be perceived as opaque and exclusionary, potentially undermining the project's credibility and community engagement. Regular review processes can foster greater transparency and community involvement in governance decisions.

10. Addressing potential power imbalances: With no expiration or review process, there is a risk of certain maintainers accumulating excessive influence or control over the project's direction. This can lead to power imbalances, which can stifle dissenting voices, healthy debate, and democratic decision-making processes.

What is the developer experience going to be?

1. Increased transparency and accountability in project governance.
2. Opportunities for fresh perspectives and innovative approaches.
3. Improved alignment of maintainer expertise with evolving project priorities.
4. Potential for increased collaboration and engagement with the maintainer team.
5. Smoother transitions and knowledge transfer during maintainer changes.
6. Renewed focus on skill development and staying up-to-date with best practices.

Are there any security considerations?

By fostering transparency and community involvement in the review process, potential security concerns or issues can be more readily identified and addressed. Regular communication and collaboration with the broader community can act as an additional layer of security oversight.

What is the user experience going to be?

1. Improved project responsiveness to user feedback and requests.
2. Continuous improvement and innovation driven by fresh perspectives.
3. Increased trust and confidence in the project's governance and decision-making.
4. Long-term project sustainability through effective succession planning.
5. Alignment with community expectations for transparency and accountability.
6. Potential for increased user engagement and feedback opportunities.

Any reason not to?

1. Knowledge loss risk: Departure of long-serving maintainers could lead to losing valuable institutional knowledge and project context. Robust knowledge transfer mechanisms are needed.

2. Administrative burden: Implementing periodic reviews will inevitably introduce additional administrative overhead, such as setting up review committees, coordinating processes, and managing communication.

3. Fair evaluation challenges: Defining objective and consistent evaluation criteria for maintainer performance and alignment with project goals can be challenging, requiring careful planning to avoid biases.

4. Contributor attrition risk: An overly strict or harsh review process may lead to losing valuable contributors who seek more stable or recognition-focused communities.

What will it take to execute?

1. Defining the review process and criteria: Clearly establish the review frequency, evaluation criteria, and guidelines for self/peer evaluations and community feedback.

2. Establishing a review committee: Form a dedicated committee with experienced maintainers, contributors, and community representatives to oversee the process.

3. Documenting policies and procedures: Comprehensive documentation outlining the review process, policies, expectations, and potential outcomes.

4. Communication and community engagement: Effective communication strategies to announce, solicit feedback, address concerns, and keep the community informed.

5. Training and onboarding: Training sessions to ensure all stakeholders understand the review process, criteria, and their roles.

6. Technological infrastructure: Implement tools or infrastructure to streamline the review process, collect evaluations, and facilitate collaboration. This proposal will help immensely.

7. Pilot implementation and iterative improvement: Consider a pilot implementation followed by iterative improvements before full-scale rollout.

8. Ongoing monitoring and adjustment: Continuous monitoring, feedback gathering, and adjustment of the process to address emerging challenges.

[dblock]

I am sympathetic to the problems this proposal attempts to solve. I still like "maintainer access never expires", but I like the monitoring/accountability parts of it. There's a related proposal to automate a lot of what's brought up here in opensearch-project/opensearch-metrics#57.

[AMoo-Miki]

Thanks @dblock. The proposal you linked ties beautifully into the 6th point of "What will it take" from this proposal. I will add it as a reference.