Open choldgraf opened 3 years ago
choldgraf
commented
3 years ago 
yuvipanda
commented
3 years ago While I won't be able to join, I'm excited to see this be formed!
rabernat
commented
3 years ago This sounds like a great idea! I would be interested in joining the team in the new year if you think I would be a good fit. (I can't take on any more this semester). I think I can bring an important perspective to the conversation as one of our guinea pigs for using sponsored-research funds (NSF, Moore) to pay 2i2c.
choldgraf
commented
2 years ago @rabernat I would highly value your contribution on this team, and would be thrilled for you to join :-)
Perhaps the next step then is to have an inaugural meeting of the sustainability team (even if it is just me and @colliand for now!) to figure out the right path forward.
damianavila
commented
2 years ago I would like to be part of these conversations/tasks and be able to help the team on this topic. In addition, I think having one representative from the eng team would add some different perspectives.
choldgraf
commented
2 years ago Hey all - I had a conversation with @damianavila about this today and I'd like to propose three modifications to the issue here:
damianavila
commented
2 years ago Thanks for the great summary about some of the things we have discussed, @choldgraf!
I think he'd be a good fit for this role.
And thanks for the vote of confidence!
colliand
commented
2 years ago Thanks @choldgraf for bringing us together. I created a draft charter for the Sustainability Team. I welcome feedback and improvements. The Sustainability Team will vote to approve the Charter at our first meeting (to be scheduled).
We convene a team to focus on ensuring the sustainability of 2i2c.
2i2c will be sustainable when the organization generates enough revenue to cover all operational costs.
2i2c aspires to generate revenue exceeding all operational costs so that the excess can be reinvested into a vibrant open source interactive computing ecosystem.
The term sustainability as used in the characterization of this team is not directly related to the Sustainable Development Goals identified by the United Nations. The larger 2i2c mission may address the SDGs.
The Sustainability Team (ST) develops strategies, and oversees and executes actions to sustain and grow the organization.
ST members are drawn from the Steering Council, employees of 2i2c, and colleagues form CS&S. The Chair of the Team will liaise the Steering Council. A Member of the Team will liaise with the Engineering Team. A Member of the Team will liaise with CS&S.
ST's responsibilities include:
colliand
commented
2 years ago I wrote some notes aimed at describing a launch plan for the Sustainability Team. The notes are available here on HackMD. An immediate need is to integrate sales + engineering to ensure that 2i2c will effectively deliver hubs we sell. I look forward to working with @damianavila and others on the engineering team to achieve that integration.
I will follow up soon with a request to find a time when we can meet. I understand that @rabernat will not be able to join us until early in 2022.
(Note: the flow chart below is displayed as a screen shot. It is rendered better with mermaid.js on HackMD.)
Initial Membership
Narrowing of focus: 2i2c has ambitious long-term plans. Some of this vision is outlined in these notes following a startup pitch format. Our immediate focus is a more narrow near-term building block: validate 2i2c's capacity to sell managed JupyterHub service. To achieve that outcome, ST will need to develop some shared understanding of business ideas, adapt those to the alpha, and implement some systems to sell and deliver managed JupyterHub service.
Immediate Goals
Time interval
Offerings
Two documents (2i2c Alpha Service Offerings, Rationale for hub offerings and management fees) describe and provide justifications for a collection of managed JupyterHub services with pricing:
| Type | Shared Cluster | Dedicated Cluster |
|---|---|---|
| Education | $1000/month | $1500/month |
| Research | $1500/month | $2250/month |
| Partnership | custom | custom |
Some background with useful ontology: sales process; sales operation; sales cycle; lead → prospect → opportunity, sales process engineering. A proviso: 95% of the writing on business, startups, sales, ... boils down to the author realizing that the scientific method works.
2i2c has already sold managed JupyterHub service. This milestone was achieved with a combination of luck, manual effort, and latent trust available through prior interactions. Through the alpha, 2i2c aims to transition through manual, luck-based, existing-connections-based, word-of-mouth, unscalable sales toward a robust scalable data-informed business.
Lead → Prospect → Opportunity → Close → Delivery → Expansion → Referral
The following flow chart shows the process. It's rather complicated!
`
flowchart TD
A((START email)) --> B{Set up service};
B --> C[Dedicated];
B --> D[Shared];
C ---> E[Customer's cloud]
C ---> F[2i2c's cloud]
E ---> Q{Set up cluster}
F ---> Q
Q ---> R{Set up hub}
D ---> R
D --> G[Cloud cost]
F --> G
G ---> P[\Cloud Invoice/]
R ---> H{Set up SSO}
H ---> I{Set up SW Env}
I --> J[Service Available]
J --> K((DELIVERED email))
K --> L[\Setup Invoice/]
L --> M[\Monthly Invoice/]
P --> M
M ---> N[Expand]
N ---> O[Referral]
We need to work together to streamline the engineering steps required to establish service for a customer.
we need to work with CS&S on the back office functions to build an effective business.
Description
Right now there are several issues related to sustainability that are largely being spearheaded by Chris. Because he is also working on many other parts of 2i2c (see https://github.com/2i2c-org/meta/issues/256 among other conversations), there are likely sub-optimal decisions being made and balls being dropped. Moreover, Chris prefers working with teams of people rather than alone, and believes this leads to better decisions and outcomes in general.
Suggested solution
I suggest we form a "sustainability team" within 2i2c. This is a team of people dedicated with overseeing 2i2c's strategy and execution of efforts to sustain and grow the organization. It includes topics like the following:
Who is on this team?
Anybody on the @2i2c-org/steering-council or @2i2c-org/tech-team is welcome to join this team. Being on this team means committing to attending most of the Sustainability Team meetings, and potentially working on items that are related to sustainability.
Who leads this team?
Initially, I propose that this team is co-led by @colliand and @choldgraf.
How does this team operate?
At its onset, this team meets once a week for a half hour, in order to triage and discuss major sustainability-related efforts and coordinate work. Over time this may change (particularly after the roll-out of the alpha service).
Long term vision for this team
If 2i2c grows its services and team enough, this team would have a dedicated lead paid via 2i2c's funds as a "Director of sustainability" or a similar title. It might also morph into a slightly different focus (and potentially name) depending on our experiences in this run-through.
Value / benefit
The goal of creating a team dedicated to this is so share knowledge and responsibility among several team members, as well as providing an explicit opportunity for more voices to be part of the "sustainability" conversation with 2i2c. This kind of work is important enough to 2i2c that it warrants dedicated thinking, and having a dedicated team to will help ensure that this happens. It is also potentially a nice pre-cursor to a persistent group that can work on these kinds of "businessy" things.
Another benefit is that this may be an opportunity to show leadership and innovation in the non-profit space. There aren't that many organizations that are governed and organized as a non-profit, but that also do things like "sales" and "customer service". This might be an opportunity for 2i2c to show leadership in how a values- and mission-driven organization can nonetheless achieve sustainability through a service model.
Tasks to complete
Updates