[Fg-general] Big Visible Charts

[Luke Closs]

If we want to do this, I suggest we pick some small number of charts to
try.  Perhaps one chart for each area of our org.  If there is interest, I
have a large pad that we could make these charts with, and I could bring it
to the meeting.  Perhaps after the meeting finishes we could create the
charts.

Luke

On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 1:12 AM, Ifny <ifny at freegeekvancouver.org> wrote:

> Thanks for suggesting this Luke, I think it's a lovely idea. It will give
> everyone who comes to Free Geek tangible things to feel good about.
>
> I've added some items, and there's now a wiki page here:
>
> <http://wiki.freegeekvancouver.org/article/Big_visible_charts>
>
> I remember a while ago there was talk of having a get together to draw a
> big beautiful timeline, going back to the beginning of Free Geek. We should
> do that at some point too.
>
> ~Ifny
>
>
>
>
> Luke Closs wrote:
>
>> There is a practice in a software development discipline called eXtreme
>> Programming[1] called Big Visible Charts.  You can find a big detailed
>> post
>> about Big Visible Charts here:
>> http://www.xprogramming.com/xpmag/BigVisibleCharts.htm, but the idea is
>> quite simple.
>>
>> Create simple charts that reflect activity in our team, post them on the
>> wall, and keep them periodically updated.  These "information radiators"
>> will show us trends over time, will communicate our progress to our
>> community, and will help us focus on improvement.
>>
>> I propose that we adopt this practice and create some Big Visible Charts
>> for
>> various aspects of our organization.
>>
>> So I need your help to come up with a few metrics.  I'll suggest a few,
>> and
>> look to the group's wisdom in suggesting a few more.  Then we can agree
>> upon
>> a few of these metrics at the next Monthly meeting, and create the basic
>> charts.
>>
>> Some suggestions:
>>
>> * Number of active volunteers in the past month
>> * Number of volunteer hours in the past month
>> * Number of systems built in the past month
>> * Number of systems sold in the past month
>> * Store revenue in the past month
>> * Skids sent out of the warehouse in the past month
>> * Skids of equipment received in the past month
>>
>> Obviously some of these need tweaking, and we could consider different
>> time
>> scales, too.  I suggest that the staff coordinators become the official
>> people for each chart (in their area), and then we have a little ritual in
>> our monthly meetings, where we review the updated chart, or perhaps update
>> the charts collectively and then discuss what we see.
>>
>> Over time, we'll start to have rich charts that reflect our progress over
>> time.
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Luke
>>
>>
>>
>> [1] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extreme_Programming
>>
>