This is the second in a series of blog posts that will summarize my experience and takeaways from the Mozilla Summit 2013 Planning Assembly that took place in our Paris, France office on June 14-17, 2013.
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Stereotype: something that may be true about some members of a group, but not all, and yet is applied to all members of the group without regard for the individual. While stereotype might be a scary word to some people, worry not – they are within your control to manipulate, eliminate, and examine thoroughly for holes in logic.
Debunk your internally held stereotypes, and not just once.
Unpacking a stereotype you’ve held for any length of time is not a ‘set it and forget it’ process. It came as quite a shock to me this past weekend when I became aware of the deep levels of distrust I had been holding toward new hires within the last 2 years. These are people who were in the ranks of our explosive growth spurt* and when I examined this feeling I saw that I didn’t believe this new bunch of Mozillians could be as hooked, committed, and passionate as myself.
It dawned on me over the course of our intensive 2 days of plenary activities that I held this belief while still going day to day believing what I care most about is bring new people into the community. And I do care about this, but I see now how my stereotyping might also be holding me back. When I bring someone into the community or get a chance to passionately wax on how Mozilla has changed my life I like to think I can tell if they are also catching the fever. For me, it’s been such a good pairing of challenging technical work and new areas to practice social justice activism in, so I’ll evangelize to anyone who’s interested while also inquiring with them to discover what area of Mozilla contribution might be a good starting place for them. I expect to see a similar spark of what is possible, working with Mozilla, for their passion. When I’m able, I try to help them network and make connections within the project to help clear barriers to their goals and find a mentor. Again, that’s based on my experience of coming on board with the help of a strong mentor as well as having social connections to leaders within the organization.
If it’s not apparent yet, I am trying to recreate for others what I saw as the perfect ‘hook’. I believe I have a strong set of core values that align with being Mozillian and I want to install them into others. Here’s the catch: becoming a Mozillian isn’t close to how, in a perfect world, one might install a binary package containing certain values into a person and we have no reliable test of whether it patches correctly and provides a guaranteed shared core with each other.
After this weekend, and talking deeply and at great lengths with people who have joined the community in the last two years, who have obvious passion & commitment to the Mozilla mission, I have started unpacked my stereotype of a what makes a new Mozillian passionate and what hooks them. It’s something I will have to keep reminding myself of. The reminder will look like asking people what their hook was instead of looking for mine in them. Knowing logistically that it was impossible for everyone to have my exact experience but trusting they had something to activate them in the ways I felt mattered were not aligning at all until I got to spend this time having what sometimes seemed like the same conversation over and over. I was with 60 people where at least half of them were brought on in the last two years and yet, the discussions were passionate, committed, and inspiring. I am thankful for our process that it allowed me to have this revelation that will help me be a better Mozillian and community leader in the future.
In the actions I have leading up to the Summit, one is to look closer at the ‘hooks’ of others and to work on how we might abstract & synthesize those into options for new Mozillians to have an activity to engage in where we can be as close as 100% certain as possible that they’ve been activated as Mozillians with the core values we’re wanting to trust each other has. A follow-up post will talk about the core values and their importance to several other big topics for Summit 2013.
* ~300 employees to ~600 employees over the course of 2011 and continuing to grow towards 1000 in 2012-13
You know, as a new hire… I think it is tough for some to get the mission driven work environment… coming as I did from another open source mission driven non profit (isc.org) maybe it was easier for me, dunno. But I do think that there is a real thing here… and that we can do so much to further Mozilla’s mission all together… as new and less-new Mozillians. I want to say how awesome it is that you found this shift and put it out there for everyone to see. Proud to be Mozillian with you!