Onboarding: Erika Washburn

[EWashb]

Welcome to the VFS-CMS Team! 👋

We're thrilled to have you join us on this journey! 🎆🎉🙌

Our vision is to build and maintain a best-in-class Content Management System that meets the needs of editors, application development teams, and consuming applications in order to empower our users to help Veterans.

The onboarding materials below are organized by 1) chronological time to complete (day one, week one, week two, month one); and main category (why, how, who, what). There's a lot to digest but don't worry, your delivery manager will guide you, you'll have an onboarding buddy to provide support, and we'll also introduce you to your workstream's lead to help with specific things related to your discipline (UX, DevOps, Drupal Engineering, etc). In addition, you'll have the support of the entire team, who have all gone through this process before and are eager to answer any questions that arise. Come back to this ticket any time to refresh your knowledge on a specific topic covered below.

Have fun and we look forward to getting to know you! 😊

Projected start date: <September 21, 2021>

Onboarding buddy (short check-in meetings the first week): @xiongjaneg

Day one

How?

• [x] Read through our team norms, which will also give an overview of how we apply the USDS playbook and VA.gov platform code of conduct.

  Who?

• [x] Who is on the VFS-CMS team? Read your team members' user manuals and copy the template to add your own. Discuss with your delivery manager.

  What?

• [x] Onboarding questionnaire (what do you already know in regards to tooling, context, history, etc)
• [x] Contract - Discuss with your delivery manager.
• [x] Read the VA.gov platform mission and goals.

Week one

The goals of this week are: 1) get background paperwork completed as quickly as possible and 2) start gaining context for what we're doing and why

Why?

• [x] Why is VA.gov using Drupal CMS and how is our success measured? Read the objectives and key results.
• [x] Why are Vet Centers important to Veterans? Watch the 2-minute YouTube video.
• [x] Why are VA Medical Centers changing their websites? Watch the 2-minute YouTube video.

  How?

• [x] How does the VFS-CMS team work in an agile environment?
• [x] How do Agile 6 and Civic Actions work together on this project? Discuss with your delivery manager or product manager.
• [x] How do you get secure access to the VA systems you need?](https://va-gov.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/VAGOV/pages/491554/Security+onboarding+process) Complete the following paperwork and submit them to the security officer.
  • [ ] Moderate Risk Position Questionnare- AQFPT
  • [x] Background Investigation Request (BI_REQ)
  • [x] Contractor Rules of Behavior
  • [x] Declaration of Federal Employement (306)
  • [ ] NDA Non-Disclosure Agreement
  • [x] PIV Fingerprint Request Form
  • [x] Request for New Special Agreement Check (SAC request)
  • [x] Self-Certification of Continous Service (SIC Self Verif)
  • [ ] 0710_Release of Information Form
  • [x] A6: How do you charge time or costs to the project? Discuss with your delivery manager or Finance AVP.

    Who?

• [x] Ensure that your info on the official team roster is correct.
• [x] Familiarize yourself with our team's shared calendar and add in any known dates. This is where we coordinate upcoming out of office (OOO). Choose "Calendar" = OOO and "Event type" = whatever is relevant.
• [x] Let's start introducing you to the team and key stakeholders. If you're on a meeting where you don't know someone, feel free to kickstart an introduction. Everyone in the ecosystem is friendly and interested in connecting.

Week two

The goal for this week is to get you set up with the tools you need to be successful. We will pair you up with a buddy on the project that is in your same discipline to help inform which ones are relevant and which aren't. The most important thing is to get set up is SOCKS as it will give you access to our systems so try to prioritize that.

When?

• [x] Check your calendar for invitations to team ceremonies.
  • [x] Scrums
  • [x] Planning sessions
  • [x] Refinement sessions
  • [x] Demos
  • [x] Retros
• [x] Update your time away on the team calendar on Confluence

  What products do we support?

• [x] Review the editor onboarding slides.
• [x] Read the product sheets (PDF download).

  All team members need to review the following:

  • [x] SOCKS proxy request to access VA network tools until you get a PIV card. This is the first priority for week two.
  • [ ] Optional Core Tunnel set up for SOCKS proxy on all browsers on Mac
  • [x] VA.gov tools overview
  • [ ] Slack for instant messaging. Your delivery manager should request this for you, but if not, view the SOCKS request instructions.
  • [x] Review Slack etiquette.
  • [ ] DM to add to appropriate Slack alias groups
    • [ ] @cms-engineers-group
    • [ ] @cms-help-desk
    • [ ] @cms-core-application-team
    • [ ] @cms-product support team
    • [ ] @cms-devops-engineers)
  • [x] Github for issue tracking and document sharing
  • [ ] VA.gov request instructions
  • [x] CMS team list - get added
  • [x] Zenhub extension instructions
  • [ ] Citrix Access Gateway instructions for after you get your PIV card
  • [x] Confluence for team resources and calendar
  • [x] Google Drive for team documents. Generally, VA doesn't use Google products. Use Github or downloadable files when sharing with VA.
  • [x] Trello
  • [ ] Tugboat demo environments
  • [ ] Tugboat for engineers
  • [ ] Tugboat for non-engineers SOCKS required
  • [x] What do I need to know about my discipline on this team (DevOps, Engineering, Helpdesk, ID, UX)? Discuss with your discipline lead.
  • [x] What applications or discipline-specific tools are needed? Discuss with your discipline lead.

Onboarding for UX members

• [x] Attend design onboarding call 1: You are here
  • The CMS and the products we support
  • Who are our users?
  • Research
• [x] Attend design onboarding call 2: Project history and opportunties
• [ ] Attend design onboarding call 3: Design processes
  • Wireframing elements
  • Airtable database
  • Required documentation for design at VA
• [x] Get oriented with the stuff of design
  • Log in to make sure you have access to the design tools used on this project
  • [x] Mural
  • [x] Figma
  • [x] Airtable
  • Review existing design assets to get a feel for where things are at
• [x] *once you have SOCKS: Build empathy with our users
  • [x] Complete a few VAMC editor training Use the training environment link to do exercises
  • [x] Complete a CMS simulation- health services (in onboarding deck) (you’ll need SOCKS proxy access first)
• [x] Attend 1:1 w/ Kauff (maybe Clarence and Kev too)
  • Let’s talk about your skillsets and interests and which project initiatives you might want to take over.

Month one

By this point you should have enough context and access to be able to start contributing. Work with your team to identify specific issues to focus on.

Who?

• [ ] Who are our VA points of contact? Discuss with your delivery manager or product manager.
• [ ] Who should we know on the platform teams? Discuss with your delivery manager or product manager.

  What?

• [ ] What is Drupal?
• [ ] Google Analytics
  • [x] Opt out of Google Analytics collection on VA.gov.
  • [ ] Browse the VA Drupal CMS Knowlege Base articles.

Month two

What additional tools do you need access to?

• [ ] Mainly for helpdesk folks: CMS Support distro group

[xiongjaneg]

Welcome, Erika! Feel free to edit the checklist to remove the discipline-specific items that don't apply to you (e.g., Onboarding for Helpdesk Members), but some people like to leave them on the list so they kind of know what other disciplines are learning.

[EWashb]

Welcome, Erika! Feel free to edit the checklist to remove the discipline-specific items that don't apply to you (e.g., Onboarding for Helpdesk Members), but some people like to leave them on the list so they kind of know what other disciplines are learning.

Thanks for the pointer! That's helpful.

[EWashb]

I have removed the other discipline-specific items that do not apply to UX.

[cmaeng]

@EWashb looks like most things are complete on this ticket. feel free to reference back to it but i'll close it out to clean things up.