Collaboration rules¶

(This document is currently just a draft waiting for feedback. There hasn’t yet been any group session to validate it.)

About this document ¶

(1) This document describes the rules we follow when working together as a community. It is not legally binding.

(2) When you observe that you fail to comply or agree with some rule, then be upright, bold and fair: share your observation with others and do your best to fix either the rules or the reality.

(3) We understand pronouns like he or his as gender-transparent. The sexual identity or orientation of a person does not matter for our work and rules unless explicitly specified.

About our team ¶

(4) We are a decentralized asynchronous home office team. There is no headquarter. There are no fixed working hours.

(5) Your salary does not depend on your working time. It depends on (a) the estimated value of your skills for our team, (b) the available money and (c) your needs. These numbers get evaluated long-term.

(6) In general we all work full-time. Your salary should be high enough for you to live a honest life. Do not waste your skills and energy and time to make more income. Do not sit behind your computer more time than is good for your health.

The purpose of our work ¶

(7) The purpose of our work is to increase the quality of the source code that we are maintaining. Every code change in a public repository counts, even the smallest one. Every idea, even the greatest one, is useless as long as it has not caused any visible change.

(8) Note that source code includes documentation files.

Work contracts ¶

(9) A work contracts is a legally binding contract between a worker and an employer.

(10) There is no timetable.

(11) Parameters of a work contract include

The worker works at least XXX hours per week.
The worker responds within at most 24 hours to every ticket assigned to him.
Responsibilities and duties

(12) The worker works because he wants to work for the employer, not because he needs money. (13) The employer pays to the worker a fixed monthly salary because every human needs money for living. (14) If the worker or the employer thinks that the salary is not just (either too high or too low), then he starts a dialog about this topic, suggesting a new number. (15) In emergency situations the worker does his best to be available as needed. (16) If an emergency situation deserves extra payment…

Working time ¶

(17) When you work for Synodalsoft, then you should register your working time in Jane.

(18) When you register your working times, then do it rigorously and correctly. If you are not online when working, then take care of registering them as soon as you get online again.

(19) If you are tired, worried about other things, needed by other people, etc… don’t feel obliged to sit in front of your computer pretending that you are working.

(20) Inspiration is not predictable. If you have an idea that fascinates you, then work on it. When you work on it, create a ticket in Jane to share your idea with the team.

Reporting ¶

(21) Reporting about what you did is more important than the result of your work. If you fail to explain why you did something, the result of your work is in danger of getting lost because somebody else undoes it.

(22) Don’t be afraid of doing useless work. The only useless work is work you don’t share with others. If you worked a whole day on a series of code changes and then realize that “this is bullshit” and decide to throw them away: don’t be ashamed. That’s life. Formulate your initial idea and how you discovered that you were wrong, share your experience with those who might read your story in some far future.

(23) Get the habit of reporting what you did today before stopping your session. Stop working 15 minutes earlier than needed and write down what you did. Keep in mind that tomorrow you maybe get some urgent task to do, which takes a week, and after that week you will have difficulties to remember what you did today.

(30) We share the result of our work because we consider it a contribution to the public common.