2019 Election Campaign: Phillip Carter

Foundation
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Who am I

Well howdy folks, I’m one of the dorks who works on F# itself at Microsoft. My title is Program Manager, but that title is basically meaningless. I focus mostly on doing the other stuff aside from core F# development: designing our releases, some language design, some bug fixes here and there, community outreach, owning the “strategy for F#”, owning the F# documentation, and generally advocating for the community to Microsoft, and advocating for Microsoft to the community.

When not doing dorky Microsoft stuff, I’m often at the computer doing miscellaneous F# things. Fixing up language benchmarks, helping out newcomers, or brainstorming things with other F# community members.

When not at the computer, you can find me on a bike during the summer, a snowboard during the winter, and in the kitchen cooking cool stuff like Korean Kare from scratch.

Why I’d like to be on the board

I was initially apprehensive about running again, in part due to the fact that it’s impossible to separate my actions as a Microsoft employee focused on F# from an FSSF board member. Since my employer has me under salary, there aren’t any clear cut hours when I’m on “Microsoft time” vs. “other F# time”. I sought some advice and got it from Reed Copsey, who told me that the goal of the board wasn’t for people to clock in hours and do things specifically for the board (aside from meetings, helping answer questions the community has, participate in votes to sponsor conferences, etc.). In my case, if it led to more focus on community-oriented aspects of F#, then that could certainly count as a successful tenure.

I’ll leave the question of successful tenure to someone else, but I feel that I could help incite more positive change in the F# community by continuing to be on the FSSF board. Some specific areas I’m interested in are:

  • Continuing some user studies around getting started with F#
  • Helping people contribute more to Ionide + VSCode
  • More OSS contributions to F# ecosystem components
  • Helping the FSSF land a website redesign this year

As always, I intend on being responsive, transparent, and open about things. I also intend on being as present as possible in the FSSF slack for anyone to chat with about stuff.

Thanks for the consideration!

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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.

  1. 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?
  2. 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?
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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?

I’d be interested in being the primary person behind the Diversity program.

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?

I’ve expressed this in a way before, but I think programs established by people who leave have a strong risk of not transferring over, and that’s fine. A board that promises to care after programs that it cannot (for some reason or another) is worse off than a board that does not promise to care after specific programs. I’d much rather that the board set honest expectations around sustainability than promise to take on a particular initiative and not follow through at all. Say the Mentorship program were to drop from the board’s overview - if it’s explicit rather than circumstance, this allows someone outside the board to start the program independently of the board. However, if the assumption is that the board is running it (when it’s not), then that someone may not start it up at all.