Rough out onboarding steps in Trello

[patcon]

One of the things we talked about in our July 24 meeting (notes under Meetings section) was onboarding, so that we can easily get new people onto the same page, ie read the same resources, watch the same videos, etc etc.

EDGI (inspired largely by the DemocracyKit project! h/t @cswc) has been using an interesting Trello-based onboarding process, with some cool properties.

Inspiration: EDGI: Web Monitoring - Developer Onboarding

Features

• asynchronous. People can onboard at their own pace, both with or without high-touch assistance. (Not a substitute for community warmth!)
• progress tracking. Unlike a readme, the checklists and tasks of trello-based onboarding allow mature community members to "check in" on where a person is, to better understand where they are when they reach out. This removes some of the "syncing" costs of decentralized communities, where everyone is at a different place, knowledge-wise.
• un-invisibilizes new people looking through the door. Trello plugins can be built that, on entering the onboarding pipeline (ie. "copying" the template board), a message is dropped in slack, showing a username and linking to the new board. This is different from reading a README, where people can silently read, and then wander away. (See Create Trello Powerup for copying onboarding boards edgi-govdata-archiving/overview#158)

Related

• Create Trello Powerup for copying onboarding boards edgi-govdata-archiving/overview#158
• Auto-backup onboarding trellos edgi-govdata-archiving/overview#171

To Do

• copy general cards from EDGI onboarding
• brainstorm critical resources to read/watch
• get everyone as trello team owners: @misscs @DZNarayanan @ebarry
• get board backing up to github repo (related: Auto-backup onboarding trellos edgi-govdata-archiving/overview#171)
• create trello plugin/powerup to streamline (See: Create Trello Powerup for copying onboarding boards edgi-govdata-archiving/overview#158)

[patcon]

Our board: https://trello.com/b/6MHFIpnA/g0vnyc-community-onboarding