Thoughts About the Process Document

[Margaret Wasserman]

Hi All,

As most of you probably know, the Problem Statement WG
is tasked with producing two documents:  the problem
statement and a process document.

In parallel with reviewing and refining the problem
statement, we'll be starting work on the process document.
There will be presentation on this subject at Friday's
WG meeting, but I thought it would be good to get
people thinking about this in advance.  I'd also like
to get some mailing list discussion started.

Our charter describes the process document as follows:

"As a second work item, the group will also produce a
proposal for a process to develop solutions to the
problems identified by this working group."

In thinking about this document, there are a lot of
questions that come to mind...

Which of the problems do we consider to be the most
important and urgent to fix?

What type of process would make the most sense?  Do
we want an iterative process (pick a couple of
well-understood problems, address those, then re-asses)?
Or would we prefer to start work on all of the
problems in parallel?

As we develop a process to change the IETF, what are
the things that we _don't_ want to change?

What are the core values of the IETF that should be
reflected in our processes (openness, fairness,
community consensus, etc.)?

In this resource constrained environment, what balance
do we want to strike between working to improve the
IETF and minimizing impact on ongoing work?  How can we
solve our problems in a way that is minimally disruptive
to current work?

To what extent will our process choices influence or
constrain the solution spaces?

What process options are available (asking the IETF
leadership to make internal changes, forming design teams,
forming WGs, what else?)?  Do we think that it will be
possible to use the process of the IETF to fix the
higher-impact problems, solutions for which may include
fairly major changes to the IETF organizational structure?

I'd be very interested in your thoughts!

Margaret