Re: quantity of DPL candidates?
On 16/03/16 01:25, Ian Jackson wrote:
> martin f krafft writes ("Re: quantity of DPL candidates?"):
>> What sort of decision-making are we talking about? We require the
>> DPL to sign off on expenses, but this could be solved with
>> a (collaboratively generated) budget. What other decisions are in
>> the DPL realm? I don't mean the constitutionally assigned roles, but
>> those decisions which the DPL wouldn't defer to someone who knows
>> better already? For if there weren't many of those, another
>> consideration would be just to get rid of the DPL position and
>> spread powers wider and closer to where the work is being done.
> Well, I agree that it would be nice if the DPL were to delegate a lot
> more. DPLs have historically avoided delegating ad-hoc one-off
> issues. (Also there is not currently a convenient way for the DPL to
> find someone interested in and suitable for a particular ad-hoc
> delegation.)
>
> I don't think a collaboratively-generated budget answers the
> expenditure question in an effective way. Someone still needs to have
> the authority to approve an expense item from a particular budget.
> (This could be done with delegation.)
>
Looking at the issue of delegation from a fact-based perspective, a lot
of research has been showing
a) people can only make a limited number of decisions per day
b) this number of decisions is the same whether they are all big
decisions or if some are only little decisions
c) quality of decisions and motivation to make decisions depletes during
the day, a famous study looked at this in context of parole decisions[1]
In fact, even deciding whether to answer a phone call is a decision,
that depletes your daily "quota" of decisions referred to at (b).
What does this mean for the DPL and Debian? Delegating is not just good
but essential. E.g. instead of approving individual expense requests,
just allocate a fixed amount of money for some activity or class of
activities and let somebody else divide it up. To put it another way,
if the DPL can only make three Debian decisions per day without
impacting his quota of decisions for job, family, etc, what should they be?
Regards,
Daniel
1. http://www.wired.com/2011/04/judges-mental-fatigue/
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