Who am I?
I am Kunjan Dalal (kunjee for friends and tweeps). Founder of Fuzzy Cloud, F# Speaker / Worker / OSS Contributor from India. I am also a maintainer of not so awesome
awesome-fable project. I have also a couple of other OSS project in F#, which are sadly not so famous. I love the web, mobile and everything around it. Especially if those are in F#. Recently more focused on Machine Learning aspect of F#. If you find some weirdly written code in
ML.Net samples then it might be me
. It has been 11 years in the industry, have worked in many companies with different technologies. One thing I can say for sure that, F# is kind of sweet language with even more sweet community around it. And I am lucky enough to be part of it.
Why am I running?
I am part of the world’s largest democracy and we are currently having an election for next PM of India. So, I thought of pitching in, in this election season. Jokes apart, I see a lot of potentials to grow F# community in Asia or specifically South Asia region. And will love to work more towards that side. Jet recently started a center in Bangalore, which is having an opening in F#. There is some serious work going in Japan and they have their separate advent calendar as well. Also, there is a good DotNet community in Singapore. I totally agree that this side might not have stars like Westeros but we do have very good potential to defend the wall.
Why vote for me?
If I like to put it in one word, I can say diversity. F# community is always super awesome to a different culture, there is no doubt in that. There are many F# stars I know, who are secretly from this side of the world. So, in any case, I am pretty sure your vote will not going to waste. No matter whom you pick.
I have 2 questions I’m going to ask each Board candidate to begin - but first, a little background:
Historically, the programs managed by the F# Software Foundation have been managed and operated by a Board member. While it’s great to see Board members be actively involved and hands-on (something I highly encourage!), the downside to this is that sustainability of programs has suffered at times. For example, the Diversity Program has been very quiet over the last year, as none of the current Board members have “stepped up” into that role and taken it over since the previous member decided not to run in 2018. We run the risk of this again this year - Gien, who has been the core enabler of the Mentorship Program, has decided not to run for the Board this year, which will leave that program in limbo until somebody is setup to run it or a new approach is devised.
- Are there any programs, either existing or new that’d you’d like to see formed, where you would like to take an active role in helping coordinate or enable?
- Given the sustainability concern mentioned above, do you have any ideas for ways to try to keep more consistency in programs moving forward, particularly as Board members come and go?
Hi, @reedcopsey Thanks for asking. And I guess these are the two areas I always wanted to work with. Even in my campaign post I emphasize on diversity part.
These would be my plan of action. Not only for these two questions but also other programs runs by F# org. I like to move these programs out of single / multiple board members.
Just to give an example, mentor-ship program started by Andrea, pass on to Racheal and then Gien push it to new level. Hopefully new member will take it over. But isn’t it would be good to have their own team (including fix minimum number of board members in it). These way people who are interested in mentoring or managing education part of it can help without being part of election process. There are many who is already helping, but these way they get recognition and process would be more or less streamlined and focused. It also allows member of team or board to swap without worrying for the future of program.
I would go similar approach for Diversity Program. I learn more from my female mentors (girls can’t code myth is long busted and they do code better than male counter parts in most cases). And also know my female colleagues who likes F# but shy away for different reasons. If you are having a team of Female F#ers helping them, with talk, OSS projects, finding good work or even hand holding into F# / programming land. Isn’t would be very useful? And I m pretty sure to do that we will be requiring more female members then board is selecting every year. Same goes for different ethnic group. Be it black, brown or Asian etc. A small team handing and promoting diversity program to promote diversity would be great to have. They know the culture better, they know the problems better and I am hopeful that they also knows the solution better. Again as I said earlier a board member should involved in teams like these so things don’t go haywire.
Even I like to promote F# at college level. I am trying that for last 2 years with little success. But I am still persistent on doing that. As a board member I like to create proper plan, budget and team to do so. By events, certified trainings, competitions etc.
I personally feel that we should grow teams so good initiatives don’t die premature death. Growing number of board members can’t be answer but creating broader future proof road map where dependency on board member is very limited to board related decision making might allow us to run program longer.
Again thanks for asking questions which are very near to my heard.
