Retro notes

[lislis]

Workshop Oct 2017 Retro

November 16th 2017 at Travis CI upstairs

Participants: Dani, Franka, Johanna, Anna, Ben, Dave, Saskia, Lisa

• Going through feedback answers, writing post-its : 30 min
• personal post-its : 5min

Sorting, phase 1:

• website
• JDK, Installation night
• orga team
• lightning talks, demo
• retention, study group
• coaches, coaches intro, small groups
• curriculum
• gender thing, non-tech in tech person
• food
• venue, emergency exits, security staff
• child care, screaming in the kitchen
• schedule/ delays, rejection rate, registration, bi-lingual
• after party

Discuss sorting:

PROCESS

• "DE/EN" nobody cares
• "longer workshop" just do study group
• rejection rate / how many people to accept - send rejected people to study group? no bigger events, only more events
• stick to schedule

TALKS

• lightning talks - POSITIVE, tech is bad
• demos - worked well, more time?
• retention and study group

ORGA TEAM

• several hearts
• goals: is there too much gender stuff? are we here for community or coding?
• process discussion needs to happen

CHILD CARE

• child screaming
• child care person not looking for child
• good that we have it

COACHING

• intros
• snowflake
• small groups - POSITIVE, kind of a lot of coaches, we had spares, generally good
• floating - need social skillz, good that we had them

FOOD

• labels, tofu looked like bacon for christ sakes, labels were only in german, spicy stuff needs warning
• we like to eat and we do a good job

INSTALLFEST

• itself
• JDK
• get rid of it?

CURRICULUM

• ugh too long to discuss now

T-SHIRTS

• they exist, do it again, sponsor loved to give us money for them, ask them for money
• do attendees give a shit? maybe not
• clojure meetup they were a massive hit; also in sweden

WEBSITE

• people read it and seem to like it
• it actually does have disproportionate impact on how people view us
• nothing to discuss, you are the weakest link goodbye

AFTER PARTY

• beers
• good job 100% hooray
• yay

VENUE

• kitchen too packed / groups were all up in the break room
• mention emergency exits
• "security" franka doesnt want to discuss
• "kitchen area"

PEOPLE

• gender thing / queer friendly
• non tech in tech - that's where the beginners be
• atmosphere good job hooray

---

Actual discussion that hopefully leads to TODOs

• Coach intros:
  • need usable discussion
  • is it in slides?
  • allocate coach teams and assign them at coaches training or installfest
• Venue:
  • coordinate team assignment with venue knowledge to avoid groups being in loud space
  • prefer two groups sharing a room to a group in the kitchen
  • keep break room clear of groups working
• Child care:
  • need to be assertive to parent about disruptive children
  • consider placing kids next to parents
• Orga team:
  • One (ordered) Checklist to Rule Them All
  • the items that must be done now
  • meetings according to those
  • off who is handling a task in the github ticket
  • write up "coaches care" wiki
  • sure people have access to accounts that they need
• Lightning talks
  • make sure speakers know the audience are non-programmers
  • point of contact with speakers via sign-up form
• Schedule
  • be clear with coaches about timeline/schedule of the day by printing schedules for each group
  • just start on time -- but that's not cool to speakers -- maybe start with one of our talks? Jelle?
  • be assertive and yell with a megaphone or a gong
• "Gender Talk"
  • we do what we do yo and if they don't like it SORRYYYYY not sorry
  • 1-week-prior meeting should involve discussion of geek feminism checklist
• Snowflake
  • check in/sync up with coaches at lunchtime
  • delete snowflake link?
• Registration
  • everyone late as attendees arriving
  • pre-plan early tasks better (especially when different venue from installfest)
  • pre-print signs!
• Demos
  • would be nice if not rushed: change schedule to specifically say there's a full hour of demos
  • keep reminding people about the demo
  • afternoon snacks at the demo?
  • donut waitering instead of afternoon snack
• Workshop goals (what do we want to do/focus on with the workshop as a whole?)
  • "you won't be a programmer after one day"
• Study Group
  • send another email?
  • has this happened before?
  • we probably lost people from A) no location B) registration signup sheet suboptimal? C) clojure meetup caused longer break
  • maybe try to blast the news?
  • maybe a middle ground monthly 10 to 15 person study group event?

Future discussion

• security staff
• emergency exits
• food labels
• curriculum
• JDK
• installation night approaching