2019/20 strategy

A list to spark debate:

• Agree a date and place for a long weekend mapathon (with accommodation).
• Improve our ties with other local chapters.
• Create a budget.
• A micro-grant programme to support those who want to help us grow the community via talks, workshops, etc.
• Establish an awards programme (freebies / vouchers).
• Help shape tagging guidelines.
• Buy new aerial imagery.
• Find an organisation willing to help us with street level imagery.
• Develop guidelines to work out when OSM UK should and should not support a mechanical edit / data import.
• Assist with conflating TfL Cycle Infrastructure Data into OSM.

Updates from the community as at 19 July 2019:

• Enhance / nurture the Talent Directory.
• Proactive outreach to businesses, organisations and academia to show them a front door to using and contributing to OSM.
• Focus on map fixes (e.g. a quarterly project on Notes, Fixmes).
• Organisation of a calendar of talks/workshops which we may want to find an OSMer to present at.
• Work with the community to investigate how we can increase the quality/safe discussions on Talk-GB (and other key UK channels).
• Pursue a role as a lobby group. That is, getting OSM on the radar of large organisations.
• Use the quarterly projects to partner with another organisation to leverage their membership/supporters.
• Paid advertising about OSM to reach out to new groups of people.

Comments and more suggestions please.

Great list @robjn :-)

From your list, I am definitely in favour of the micro grant scheme and also something around assisting with mechanical edits (I'd possibly skewed it more technical with some way to make it easier to use the tools we've previously identified).

I'd also suggest adding something around enhancing / nurturing the Talent Directory, as I think we've started well, but I'd want to make sure we maintain it well too.

Ties with local chapters and individual contributors in areas to ask them what benefits we could enable is a good objective.
Re: streetlevel imagery, somehow getting a local authority area's garbage collection trucks to run mapillary captures on all (or even some of) their vehicles for a month would be stupendously useful, especially if a camera on the side view is included.
Proactive outreach to businesses, organisations and academia to show them a front door to using and contributing to OSM.
Facilitate crowd sourced map fixes, because not everyone wants to fully dive in to editing the map, or just wants to get that 1 thing fixed, like the quarterly project on closing notes.
More specific to the map, trying to get the interface between streets and public transport hubs (train stations, bus stations, airports) much better recorded. No map does this very well right now, although the Rail delivery groups accessmaps http://accessmap.nationalrail.co.uk/ is something that we should strongly support if we aren't already, and seek out similar schemes.

"A micro-grant programme to support those who want to help us grow the community via talks, workshops, etc."

I would like to see more organisation of talks/workshops. Could we have a calendar to show what's happening in the UK and aim to keep filling it up with different locations and speakers/type-of-events.

I'm very happy to talk to groups, but lack the motivation to find groups and offer myself as a speaker. Maybe we just need a "get a speaker" page/post on the website, and make it clear that the Talent Directory can find free or grant-supported volunteers.

Just heard something at Ruby Brighton Conference about Google's re:work research into teams. They had something Maslow-like https://twitter.com/heathrmoor/status/1147082618594320384?s=20

Could be used to drive some activity.

E.g. the base is 'psychological safety' which is things like feeling that it's safe to ask any question without being shot down.

Sounds interesting Jez. How do you propose we turn that in to a strategy?

Not totally thought-out, as I only just saw it, but it seems to me that the whole of OSMUK is a 'team' and that the concepts apply to us https://rework.withgoogle.com/guides/understanding-team-effectiveness/steps/identify-dynamics-of-effective-teams/ . Similar to us saying, "which of our goals does this action lead to" about things we plane, a strategy would be to link to the things highlighted by Google: "how do we let people see that what they do on OSM really matters?", "How can we mobilise volunteers en-masse?", "How do we increase the quality/safe discussions on Talk-GB?", etc.

Just an idea at the moment.

There is a difference between working with employed teams and volunteer teams, most work has been done on employed teams but there is some on volunteers. The element which stands out to me is the Psychological Safety - imo applies to employed and volunteer. No so much in the UK but in some of the OSM tagging lists there is little safety and I can recognise that the UK is generally good in this
respect.
Meaning - People who are 'into' OSM appear to have it in abundance. People who start mapping probably have an idea - but I suggest they have to work hard to translate their start into volunteering with meaning. I suggest this is where some help could be given.

Longweekend mapathon
Can I suggest South Wales? Youth Hostel at Crickhowell - gives access to Brecon Beacons but also to Welsh Valley commuities like Tredegar, Ebbw Vale, Brymawr or indeed the fleshpots of Abergavenny. It's £660 per night for exclusive booking and has a capacity of 32

We should agree a publish date and stick to it. You could do this during Monday's Board Meeting/Chat). We don't have to name all activities that will be carried out in the year, but what we do name we must do.

We should think about BHAGs (Big Hairy Audacious Goal...it's a thing) but state achievable ones. I was asked the rhetorical question about the Geospatial Commission, "what would you do if you had £80m to spend?". Me, I would get a load of 3D cameras and electric bikes and tour the country paying students to ride round generating street view imagery. That's unlikely to happen, but maybe we can scale back a bit, and just maybe we could get funding. I want to be practical, but the thing about OSM is that it is the biggest, hugest, hairiest, audacious goal and I want to have dreams.

Last year, we performed pretty well in our role as a lobby group. That is, getting OSM on the radar of large organisations. I'd like to see us do more of this. Add an 'OSM sales pitch' video to the website, proactively talk to organisations, get sponsorship money.

We launched the Talent Directory and this year i'd like to see it start to perform. We need to ensure that service providers get a steady flow of work, that there are enough providers available to actually do the jobs coming in whatever the size, that potential customers know that it exists.