Onboarding
The first things to do and be aware of when you join OpenUp
The organisation manual is the entry point and light touch documentation on how we do things. Since we learn from experience and change our minds, that’s always going to change a bit so the documentation tries to be as correct as possible, but know that it might not be perfect.
Keeping this manual up-to-date
Maintaining the Organisational Manual is everyone’s responsibility. When processes change, those responsible for changing it are responsible for ensuring the documents get updated. Since this is an imperfect business, there will be errors. That is why we are all responsible for ensuring errors get corrected when we find them. As far as possible, when you find the answer you were looking for, ensure that it’s documented in the right place. If there’s a mistake and the documentation led you astray, please fix it. That means you can improve the documentation even if it’s your first day!
Our Founding Principles
Our founding principles are the basis for who we are – they [reflect?] our culture. They’re available to everyone on our website, please read them: https://openup.org.za/about
We believe in Agile Principles to deliver value efficiently and reliably.
Agile methodology
We use Scrum. Read the Scrum guide. It’s short and clear. We adapt the process to our needs, especially when we are not producing software. Get someone to introduce you to Scrum using these slides. You don’t learn scrum by reading, you learn it by doing, but this is a start. Everyone involved with a project is responsible for ensuring that the project’s Scrum process is followed. One reason we use scrum is that the concept of sprints provides more predictable planning for ourselves and clients. It is also the most effective way we know to ensure clients eventually get attention: it’s easier to continually push ad-hoc scheduled work out, while a commitment of 1 week of implementation time in sprint n or n+1 is harder to push out without consideration. We can choose not to use scrum on a project, but we should be aware of what the tradeoff is.
Watch this video to learn more about how we use scrum and agile:
Structure of this guide
Anything that doesn’t have a better home in another part of our shared Google Drive folders lives under the Organisational Manual folder. The structure will always be evolving. If you struggle to find things, talk to the team and work together to try and improve discoverability.
Guides
Onboarding
Welcome to OpenUp! Here are some basic steps to get you started.
If you find broken steps or something that needs fixing, please use comments create a draft edit to suggest changes and ask your manager to review.
Everyone
Get a Google Apps account for @openup.org.za.
Use strong, unique passwords for every service.
Follow password best practises:
Never use the same password for two accounts.
Don’t use personal information.
Don’t use words from a dictionary.
Use at least 8 characters.
Use strong passwords - it can be easier than you think.
If you don’t want to follow this advice:
Use numbers.
Use punctuation.
Use a password manager to help you remember all those unique passwords.
Get invited to the OpenUp Slack workspace and get added to the #team channel and join #new-hires.
Fill out your contact details in the employee contact list.
Have someone share the root OpenUp google drive folder with you, and add it to your Google Drive.
Have Codebridge keys cut and sign the key register.
You'll need a photo and a bio for the website (example).
For interns a different format will be followed.
Ensure we have a copy of your signed contract and your ID.
Set up a fortnightly 1-1 session with your manager/peers.
Take some time to read through this manual and get to know how OpenUp works.
Have the operations manager add the daily standup to your calendar.
Technical Staff
Read up on our Development Guidelines
Get added to the OpenUpSA Github organisation by your manager.
Ask your manager to add you to the webapps@openup.org.za email list.
Get your SSH key added to the servers.
Get your GPG key added to the secrets store.
Sentry
Cloudflare
How we Communicate and Collaborate
We are a distributed, diverse and collaborative team. While no tool is a perfect replacement for talking face-to-face, when used correctly our tools can help us work together effectively.
We create a supportive environment that allows everyone to:
Do their work.
Be a responsible owner.
Collaborate.
Be accountable and hold each other to account.
Ask for and provide help and assistance.
We do this by:
Sharing as much as possible and keeping our team in the loop.
Being attentive to communications during the work day.
Asking when we don’t know.
Helping others when they don’t know, and we do.
Communicating clearly and regularly.
Being respectful of people’s time.
Guidelines
These guidelines help to make our goals concrete:
Our primary communication tool is Slack. Being on Slack is the same as being at work. If you’re not on Slack, you’re not at work.
Our secondary communication tools are email and phone.
If you won’t be available during the day (eg. an appointment), let people know on Slack.
There is no expectation of replies outside of 9am - 5pm business hours.
Be available during core business hours, much as you would be if we all shared a single office.
In a shared space, indicate to others that you’d rather not be interrupted by wearing headphones and snoozing Slack notifications.
Document project meetings using living minutes documents in Google Drive.
When asking for input, you’re more likely to be successful if you make it clear:
Who do you need it from?
What do you need from them?
When do you need it by?
What happens if you don’t get it?
Using Slack Effectively
Being on Slack is the same as being at work. If you’re not on Slack, you’re not at work.
Use Slack unless it’s critically urgent. This gives others a chance to reply when it’s convenient for them. Therefore, don’t expect an immediate response.
If it’s critically urgent: check that it really is, then talk to them in person or phone them.
“Urgent” means anything that will block you if it is not resolved. Use your best judgement.
Prefer channels over direct messages as far as possible, especially for projects
Helps share knowledge.
Greater chance of getting a reply.
Shared context (not everyone is always physically present).
Historical value.
Use Slack notifications effectively.
Turn on snooze if you don’t want to be interrupted.
Turn off notifications outside of business hours. Spend time with your family and friends. Enjoy the sunshine.
When you need input from a group, don’t expect an immediate response. Set a deadline and make the timeframe clear. Where possible, prefer general consensus over all-or-nothing votes. If it’s critical you get a response, use @mentions, talk in person, or phone them.
Using Google Calendar Effectively
Learn how to use Google Calendar, here’s a tutorial.
Be attentive to meeting requests and respond to them timeously.
Everyone can see each other’s calendars, learn how to do this.
Check someone else’s calendar before scheduling an appointment.
It’s okay to send a meeting request to anyone, they might ask you to move it to a more suitable time.
Using Google Drive Effectively
Learn how to use Google Drive, it’s critical for our business. Here’s a tutorial.
Always use Google Drive under your OpenUp (@openup.org.za) account. Never share OpenUp content with your private Google account.
All documents, except those that are personally confidential, must be stored in the appropriate location in the OpenUp folder. This ensures we can all find, view and collaborate on documents together.
Do not use Microsoft Office (Word, Excel and so on). Rather set up offline Google Drive access on your laptop for when your connection has problems. Using Google Drive consistently means everyone has access to the latest changes, and your special changes don’t go missing when someone else uploads another MS Office version.
We tend to agree with partners that we all work in Google Drive. That avoids people sending around multiple versions of Word documents that someone has to merge. Partners can create a Google account to use with Drive using their existing work email address at this link. This is unfortunately not always possible and we need to respect the client’s wishes.
Create new documents in the appropriate folder inside the OpenUp folder. This ensures permissions are set correctly and everyone can find things.
Add stars to folders/documents to bookmark them for easy access
Right click on the folder/document and click "add star". They will show up under "Starred" found in the left menu.
Create symbolic links with shift + z to put a document or folder in multiple locations.
The search function (as well as right click & locate) are useful to find documents if you are unsure of where they are located on the drive.
Writing documents
Please follow the writing guidelines recorded in this document.
Key folders in Drive
How we choose our projects
Projects generally come into the organisation via the Director's networking and partners. As ideas are mulled around, The Director and the rest of the Executive Committee share at Daily Standup and Sprintly Planning meetings. As potential projects near initiation, they get added to the project registry.
Projects taken on are chosen based on the expected impact, the alignment with our vision and mission, the availability of funding, and finally, whether there are people with the right skills in the organisation to carry them out.
Your project ideas
Anyone is free to propose projects for the organisation that align with the vision and mission. We all grow by developing ideas and getting feedback by talking about them and refining them. In that way the organisation grows as well, and improves clarity on our vision, mission and innovation.
Unless you were assigned to investigate a project by your line manager, your project research is something you have to do in your own time until the project is taken on by the organisation. There’s no guarantee that your ideas will be taken on by the organisation - it depends on the factors mentioned above.
Projects can be proposed informally, ad-hoc e.g. as you chat to people in the corridor. You can also email or slack people you think may be interested.
Who decides on projects?
The ultimate decision to pursue a project rests with the Director of the organisation, and in consultation with the Executive Committee and/or the Board where necessary.
What does “go-ahead” look like for a project?
It varies. Go-ahead looks like whatever is agreed with the Director - at an early stage of an idea, it might mean you get go-ahead to spend a few hours to write a concept document. Once the concept document is researched and written, the project can be re-evaluated and cleared for further work. It’s important to get a clear idea of what sort of go-ahead you have.
Working on a project is also subject to your line manager who is responsible for resource allocation (making sure we get the right people working on the right things to meet our commitments). You might need to facilitate some of the communication to get time allocated to your project if you got some form of go-ahead.
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