Internet DRAFT - draft-rsalz-less-ad-work
draft-rsalz-less-ad-work
GENDISPATCH Working Group R. Salz
Internet-Draft Akamai Technologies
Intended status: Best Current Practice A. Farrel
Expires: 24 December 2023 Old Dog Consulting
22 June 2023
Making Less Work for Area Directors
draft-rsalz-less-ad-work-00
Abstract
Anecdotally, every IESG complains about the Area Director (AD)
workload, and says that it takes the first full term to understand
the job. Empirically, the AD workload is high sometimes causing
backlogs in processing of Internet-Drafts and stressing the ADs.
Empirically, the AD workload is high sometimes causing backlogs in
processing of Internet-Drafts and stressing the ADs. This is
evidenced by the limits applied to the number of pages on the regular
IESG telechats, and by the number of documents waiting in excess of
fifty days for initial AD review after a working group has requested
publication.
This document proposes a number of ways that the AD workload can be
reduced. It will be up to the IETF consensus process to determine
which proposals to adopt.
A major goal of this effort is to make it feasible for a wider
diversity of people to volunteer as candidates for AD possitions by
reducing the barriers and costs to individuals and their employers.
About This Document
This note is to be removed before publishing as an RFC.
Status information for this document may be found at
https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-rsalz-less-ad-work/.
Discussion of this document takes place on the GENDISPATCH Working
Group mailing list (mailto:gendispatch@ietf.org), which is archived
at https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/browse/gendispatch/. Subscribe
at https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/gendispatch/.
Source for this draft and an issue tracker can be found at
https://github.com/rsalz/ietf-less-ad-work.
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Status of This Memo
This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.
Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute
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Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference
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This Internet-Draft will expire on 24 December 2023.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2023 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
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Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. Conventions and Definitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3. History of IESG Job Descriptions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
4. Rationale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
5. Recommendations/Suggestions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
5.1. Only one AD to approve . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
5.2. No "revisit" documents open across change-over . . . . . 6
5.3. Documents, not scheduling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
5.4. Content not language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
6. Increasing the candidate pool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
7. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
8. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
9. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
9.1. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
9.2. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
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Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
1. Introduction
Anecdotally, every IESG complains about the Area Director (AD)
workload, and says that it takes the first full term to understand
the job. This implies that a successful AD will need to serve at
least two terms to be effective, making the role a commitment of at
least four years.
Empirically, the AD workload is high sometimes causing backlogs in
processing of Internet-Drafts and stressing the ADs. This is
evidenced by the limits applied to the number of pages on the regular
IESG telechats, and by the number of documents waiting in excess of
fifty days for initial AD review after a working group has requested
publication.
This document proposes a number of ways that the AD workload can be
reduced. These proposals are intended for discussion and adoption
either individually or in groups such that no one suggestion shall be
blocked by discussions of the others. It will be up to the IETF
consensus process to determine which proposals to adopt.
A major goal of this effort is to make it feasible for a wider
diversity of people to volunteer as candidates for AD possitions by
reducing the barriers and costs to individuals and their employers.
2. Conventions and Definitions
*DISCUSSION* Probably delete this section.
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "NOT RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and
"OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in
BCP 14 [RFC2119] [RFC8174] when, and only when, they appear in all
capitals, as shown here.
3. History of IESG Job Descriptions
The IETF Nominations Committee (NomCom) appoints ADs to the IESG
according to their judgement, but taking feedback from the community
on the suitability of the candidates, and considering the job
descriptions provided by the sitting IESG. It is useful to look at
the job descriptions provided to the NomCom over the years.
In 2013, the first year for which the job description is preserved in
the datatracker, the description said
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The basic IESG activities can consume between 15-40 hours a week.
In 2017, this changed to
The ability to contribute more time is useful, but if the NomCom
should pick a few ADs who can only do 15 hrs/week on a routine
basis, the IESG can cope with that.
Starting with the 2018 NomCom, this changed to the following
Many ADs allocate 15 hours or more per week...
This boilerplate has been unchanged in the five years since then.
At the same time (2018), the descriptiuon added text to say
Enough time must be allocated to manage approximately 10 to 15
working groups, [and] to read on the order of 500 pages of
internet-drafts every two weeks
This text has also not changed in the last five years.
*TODO:* Would be interesting to find out why this changed.
The IESG secretary says that this past year (ending in March), the
IESG has requested agenda's be limited to 400 pages.
*TODO:* Get pagecounts for the past several years; maybe from the
sodastream folks? From the datatracker? The Secretariat says
they do not not have access to this historic data.
4. Rationale
We want the IESG to be staffed with the best possible people with the
appropriate technical and management skills. In order to achieve
this, the job must be achievable, rewarding, and not an insuferable
strain on the ADs. But the high workload and constant stress mean
that this is not always possible.
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At the same time, the ADs must be funded, and this is usually by
their employers. But, although some companies consider funding an AD
as "paying the Internet tax," the companies are being asked to
release the time of one of their key engineers for no or little
direct return. At the least, they hope that some of their
employees's time will be available for work within the company; that
is, that the AD job will not be a full time job. Furthermore, as it
is often claimed that an AD does not become fully effective until
their second term, the role implies a commitment from the AD and
their employer of at least four years.
The current requirement is not sustainable, and leads to the
centralization of technical leadership in only the largest companies
-- those that can afford the costs and mitigate the loss of a key
worker. Of the 14 Area Directors in March 2023, eight (more than
half) work for the one of the 2,000 largest global companies [FORBES]
or a subsidiary. Of course, this is a generalization -- there have
been multiple ADs who came from Academia or worked for smaller
companies.
In order to make the AD positions (except for the IETF Chair) more
accessible to candidates from different backgrounds and companies,
the IETF needs to make the AD job less time-consuming.
*TODO:* Look at previous IESG membership.
5. Recommendations/Suggestions
5.1. Only one AD to approve
An Internet-Draft ballot should allow only one AD in each area to
vote. The other director(s) can either vote "no objection" or the
ballot tracking can be modified to handle this more directly.
Coordination between area ADs is left to them to handle; this
document suggests that the _non-responsible_ AD be the one to vote.
During discussion, all ADs should participate.
For any area with a directorate, the default ballot position should
be to accept that review, if one is given.
*DISCUSSION* I'm not clear on this idea. Is it based on a
misunderstanding of the current requirements? Currently, no AD is
required to ballot on any document, although it might be
considered as bad manners to not ballot. However, a "no
objection" doesn't require a review, and indeed many ADs trust
their co-ADs or the sponsoring AD. I believe that the IESG would
respond in the same way: that the reviews are not the problem.
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This might, however, turn into advice and guidance phrased as
"expectations and non-expectations for document review during IESG
evalutaion." It could cover: - trusting other ADs - sharing
review responsibilities between ADs - delegation of review to
others such as Directorates - the meaning of "no objection"
We might, however, look again at the number of "no objections"
required for a ballot to pass on a standards track draft because
it could be claimed that this puts additional pressure on ADs to
do reviews. I don't think this needs to be done, because I think
that ADs need to understand better that "no objection" can be
entered without doing a review.
5.2. No "revisit" documents open across change-over
Any ballots cast before an AD change-over should stand. Notably, any
DISCUSS issues, if resolved, should result in clearing and allowing
the former AD to ballot. This is similar to the NomCom term of
office, which lasts until the next NomCom is seated. Perhaps a time-
limit of a year or six months should be added, allowing a reasonable
time for the document queue to drain.
An incoming AD would have to review the in-process draft, and while
the number of such documents might be small, the potential impact on
the amount of effort on the document authors, not to mention their
morale -- "what, we have to do this again?" -- can be significant.
5.3. Documents, not scheduling
What is the rationale for the IESG setting meeting logistics? How
much time is consumed with scheduling?
We have professional staff, with Board oversight, and consultations.
The meeting venue requirements are being discussed as an update to
[RFC8718] and any policy changes will be acted on.
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*DISCUSSION* Isn't this an example of the issue rather than the
problem itself? Should we rephrase this more along the line of
"priorities"? That is, once the ADs have done "facilitating" the
work of the working groups, they are free to spend their time on
anything they like. But actually, the IESG would always say that
they are making daily decisions about the priority of what they
spend their time on. They would say that one of their jobs is to
look at the IETF and see what needs them to act, and that
sometimes this results in documents being delayed in favour of
other tasks. So what is needed is to give the IESG instructions
about priorities and what tasks to drop. This can go further by
listing the tasks that should be done by others, but it is hard to
make such a long list: it is easier to list the tasks that should
be done first.
5.4. Content not language
It is not an effective use of technical experts to review and correct
for things like typo's, etc. We recognize that many ADs will be
"unable to help themselves" as the personality trait of nit-picking
is endemic to our profession, and they should feel free to point out
nits, but they should be conscious of the time and effort involved.
If a document lacks clarity or has so many issues with English that
there is a risk of it being misunderstood, the AD should recognise
this and feel free to send the document back to the WG for the
authors to fix. This may be hard, particularly for contributors
where English is not their native language, but all working groups
have the resources to help with this.
*CITATION* I think it was the MPLS WG that instituted an English
language review team.
We also note that the existing RFC Production Center is already
highly focused on copyediting.
6. Increasing the candidate pool
This document offers a number of suggestions to reduce the workload
of an IETF Area Director, in the hopes that it will increase the
diversity of candidates.
The IETF has learned to accomodate to remote meetings, if in-person
attendance at IESG meetings is perceived as a requirement, perhaps
that should be explicitly discussed.
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7. Security Considerations
This document could change the IESG review process.
8. IANA Considerations
This document has no IANA actions.
9. References
9.1. Normative References
[RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119,
DOI 10.17487/RFC2119, March 1997,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2119>.
[RFC8174] Leiba, B., "Ambiguity of Uppercase vs Lowercase in RFC
2119 Key Words", BCP 14, RFC 8174, DOI 10.17487/RFC8174,
May 2017, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc8174>.
9.2. Informative References
[FORBES] Forbes Magazine, "The Global 2000", 2022,
<https://www.forbes.com/lists/
global2000/?sh=3d73be235ac0>.
[RFC8718] Lear, E., Ed., "IETF Plenary Meeting Venue Selection
Process", BCP 226, RFC 8718, DOI 10.17487/RFC8718,
February 2020, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc8718>.
Acknowledgments
None yet.
Authors' Addresses
Rich Salz
Akamai Technologies
Email: rsalz@akamai.com
Adrian Farrel
Old Dog Consulting
Email: adrian@olddog.co.uk
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