In this talk called “How Open Source Projects Survive Poisonous People (And You Can Too)”, two founders of the Subversion project share their experiences and strategies for negotiating difficult personalities in an open collaboration environment. Most of the strategies apply to open collaboration of any sort, be it a bike repair co-op or a design collective. In such a project, the community is the most vital asset to your long term goals. Do not allow people with attractive talent or resources run roughshod over your community for short-term gain. It’s an interesting perspective on group and interpersonal dynamics from programming professionals, their terminology and metaphors are interesting and a bit amusing. Some of the advice includes:

• Have a defined vision for your project and stick with it. Know the boundaries of your project
• Documentation is key. Have a document concerning what you’re doing and how things work, so the direction is determined by what a few key people have in their heads. Also, this enables newcomers to learn about the project
• The Bus Factor: How many people would have to get hit by a bus for your project to come to a halt? In addition to untimely death, The Bus Factor also applies to people getting married, having kids, getting a new job, moving out of the country…there are a lot of factors that can take people out of the community. Are there knowledge monopolies or concentrations of responsibility so that if a person left tomorrow the project would screech to a halt? Try to avoid that.

Some might find this take on group dynamics too goal-oriented, different communities should agree on priorities and understand how members are expected to exhibit respect for each other. The key is to make that understanding explicit and consistent so expectations are fair.