Steering Council Nomination: Mariatta (2024 term)

Core Development Steering Council Nominations
1

I’m nominating myself for Python Steering Council 2024 term.

Who am I

I have unique skill set which include technical skills with almost 20 years of experience in tech industry, worldwide public and keynote speaker, and community leader My expertise and specialty is community leadership with focus on improving diversity and inclusion of underrepresented group members in tech.

To learn even more about myself, please read/listen to several interviews that I’ve given in the past so you have a good idea of what my perspectives are with regards to the Python community, open source, and about diversity and inclusion.

URLs:

My work and contributions as Core Dev

  • Core developer since 2017
  • I’ve been the main maintainer of the GitHub bots which you came to depend on on daily basis: miss-islington, bedevere, and blurb-it. This year, the big progress I’ve made here is to convert the bots into GitHub App which will allow the bots to comply to requirements about 2FA
  • I authored PEP 581 and PEP 588 which kickstarted the migration from bpo to GitHub Issues.
  • I care about Python documentation and translations. I’m helping to kick-start the Python Docs Editorial Board. I’ve sponsored a couple docs-related PEPs.
  • I helped organized the Diataxis workshop, and the online core devs sprint 2020.
  • I co-chaired Python Language Summit 2019-2022 with Łukasz.

My work and contributions as Python Community Leader

  • PyCon US conference chair 2023-2024.

PyCon US is one of the most important event for The PSF, which brings more than 2000 Python community members from all over the world. PyCon US has seen a decline in attendance after the global pandemic, and sponsorship has been impacted since the downturn in tech industry. My role is to ensure the continued success of PyCon US: not only by simply making sure it happens, but also by introducing impactful changes and improvements to PyCon US, improving the experience of attendees, encouraging participation, and doing active outreach to new community members.

  • PyLadies Advisor and PyLadies Conference co-chair

As a longtime member and leader in the PyLadies community, I’ve been advising and helping other PyLadies members and to further grow the PyLadies community worldwide.
As one of the conference organizers, along with the rest of the team, we put a lot of effort in ensuring a successful first PyLadies conference that is inclusive and accessible to all speakers and attendees.

  • PyCascades Co-founder

I co-founded PyCascades and co-chaired the first conference. Since the inception, PyCascades become known as inclusive Python conference, with strong travel grant and support for new and first time attendees and speakers.

  • PyPodcats: Hidden Figures of Python Podcast series

We’re creating a new podcast series to highlight the stories from underrepresented group members of the Python community. Please read our blog post to learn more.

Relationship with PSF and Python Community

In my role as PyCon US conference chair, and as a core developer, I’ve had the privilege and opportunity of working very closely with PSF staff and infrastructure team members, and have built positive relationship with The PSF, which I understand is an important mandate of the SC.

Accolades

For my contributions to Python, I’ve received the Community Service Award from Python Software Foundation. I’ve also been nominated twice for
Google Open Source Peer Bonus program. I’m a PSF Fellow member since 2020. In honor of Ada Lovelace Day in 2020, my story was shared on GitHub ReadME project.

Goals

  • Diversity and Inclusion

We’ve made some progress in improving diversity within Python core devs team, but progress has been slow.

I want to acknowledge that it is great that we have more women in the Python core devs team now, compared to when I first joined. But the last woman who joined was in 2021, and we promoted 15 men since then. I do not believe that this is because women are not interested in contributing to CPython, or because they are not capable. I believe there are non-technical issues within the Python core team that push them away from continuing to contribute. For example, at the CPython core devs sprint in Brno, I heard of issues faced by several mentees from underrepresented group, issues that made them felt discouraged and did not want to continue contributing to Python. We need to understand and address such issues.

With my experience as a community leader and track record in building diverse and inclusive communities (as seen above), I will be able to further help improve the diversity of Python core team.

I also want to support the effort in having more contributors and core devs from outside of North America and Europe. I know this has been improved compared to before, and I want this to continue. It is important that we have representation from all different perspectives of Python community in the core team.

  • Communications, Transparency, and Outreach

I’ve seen comments from existing SC members as well as feedback from general Python community that communications and transparency from SC can be improved, and I’d like to help and support any effort in improving this. In my mind, this task will be similar to what we normally do in developer relations, which is a personal passion of mine, (and something I have professional experience doing). I think it’s not just about the note-taking and summarizing, but I also believe that we could do better outreach to the wider community, ensuring that news (and decisions) about Python reach the people who needs to hear them.

  • Delegation and Forming specialized WGs

I’m happy to see the formation of several new specialized workgroups and governance within the Python core team, i.e the C-API workgroup, and Typing council, and the Python Editorial Board. I’m supportive of all of this as I believe such workgroups will help lessen the workload of SC, so the SC’s work can be more focused, and at the same time empowering more Python community members, giving them opportunities to take active participation and leadership within the core Python team.

  • Python Documentation Translations

I believe translations of Python documentation is really important. I’m glad to see the existing work in translating documentation, and I have deep appreciation for those who has contributed to documentation translations. Though it seems that some translation language groups seem to be more “successful” than others. I would like to first understand the challenges faced by the different groups, and then to help and support them.

Employment status

I have a long career of almost 20 years in the tech industry, having worked at various tech companies including Google, Sony Pictures, Zapier, etc. I left my day job a few months ago for self-care. Right now I am self-employed as software consultant, and in the process of founding a company with two other prominent women in the Python community.

I am unaffiliated with any corporations/company, and I do not owe any of my past employers any “favor”. You can be certain that my decisions and opinions will not be biased/influenced by any employer.

Past nomination statements and endorsements

Past endorsements by Python community can be read in the above threads.

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