The Multifaceted Nature of Mentoring in OSS: Strategies, Qualities, and Ideal Outcomes

TL;DR

This paper examines OSS mentoring as a multifaceted process combining task-focused onboarding with psychosocial support. It employs two surveys—a mentor-centered study mapping 21 challenges to 17 strategies (n=70) and a broader perception study on mentor attributes and outcomes (n=85)—to build an evidence-based framework. Key contributions include a six-category mapping of mentoring strategies, a 9-attribute/11-outcome framework grounded in Kram's mentor role theory, and practical guidance for OSS programs to improve onboarding, retention, and community culture. The work supports actionable toolkits, governance practices like Code of Conduct, and potential AI-assisted mentoring to enhance efficiency and inclusivity in OSS ecosystems.

Abstract

Mentorship in open source software (OSS) is a vital, multifaceted process that includes onboarding newcomers, fostering skill development, and enhancing community building. This study examines task-focused mentoring strategies that help mentees complete their tasks and the ideal personal qualities and outcomes of good mentorship in OSS communities. We conducted two surveys to gather contributor perceptions: the first survey, with 70 mentors, mapped 17 mentoring challenges to 21 strategies that help support mentees. The second survey, with 85 contributors, assessed the importance of personal qualities and ideal mentorship outcomes. Our findings not only provide actionable strategies to help mentees overcome challenges and become successful contributors but also guide current and future mentors and OSS communities in understanding the personal qualities that are the cornerstone of good mentorship and the outcomes that mentor-mentee pairs should aspire to achieve.

Figures (9)

• Figure 1: The vertical axis represents strategies, while the horizontal axis represents challenges. Each challenge could be linked to multiple strategies for mitigation. The size of each bubble reflects the number of responses mentors provided for a particular strategy mitigating a specific challenge, and the color coding indicates different categories of strategies as explained in Section \ref{['sec_method']}. Figures \ref{['fig:preparing']} to \ref{['fig:supporting_mentees']} provide a zoomed-in analysis of each strategy category.
• Figure 2: Mapping of challenges to the strategy category preparing mentors. The polygon axis points depict the survey participant responses of challenges that are mitigated by the strategy hold orientation sessions. Only challenges in the top 90th percentile of responses are shown, color-coded by their challenge category: lack of skills (pink), project climate (dark green), and lack of resources (gray). Subsequent figures follow the same layout.
• Figure 3: Mapping of challenges to the strategy category Rewarding. The colored polygons represent strategies for rewarding mentees (blue polygon) and mentors (orange polygon). See Figure \ref{['fig:preparing']} for color-coding and layout details.
• Figure 4: Mapping of challenges to the strategy category task recommendations. The colored polygons in the spider plot represent strategies: allowing task choice (blue polygon), tagging task complexity (green polygon), suggesting small tasks (orange polygon), and suggesting interest-aligned tasks (red polygon). See Figure \ref{['fig:preparing']} for color-coding and layout details.
• Figure 5: Mapping of challenges to the strategy category establishing governance. The colored polygon in the spider plot represents strategies: maintain updated documentation (blue polygon), establish communication methods (green polygon), and enforce a code of conduct (orange polygon). See Figure \ref{['fig:preparing']} for color-coding and layout details.