Governance
Inclusion

Inclusion is a core value for NASA and for our team.  Our team has several features to promote this value.  For example, we are collaboratively developing a Code of Conduct, which will be shared publicly after its adoption by the team.  The team also has an Ombud, who is based at JPL and has no leadership or managerial responsibilities over other team members; the Ombud will be available to all team members regardless of their affiliation.  Within the leadership structure of the team, there are two Inclusion Chairs (ICs), who participate in the team's steering committee and have direct access to the PI to promptly flag and address issues affecting inclusion within the team.  Among the tasks of the ICs is running annual climate surveys, the first of which has been carried out to establish a baseline early in the lifetime of the team; the ICs also develop a response to be shared with the rest of the team and with NASA.

Copies of the team's climate survey will be made available for reuse by other organizations upon reasonable request to the inclusion chairs of this PIT, Michael Troxel (Duke) and Rachel Mandelbaum (CMU).

To promote equitable and inclusive hiring practices when hiring into postdoctoral or other positions associated with our PIT, we have developed a set of principles underpinning the definition of merit to be used in hiring processes.

Publication, Membership and Other Policies

Our team structure aims to address decision making, reporting, and collaboration in an efficient, open and inclusive way. The main roles and groups as described below are the following: Principal Investigator (PI) and their deputy (dPI), Pipeline Manager (PM) and their deputy (dPM), Working Groups (WG) coordinated by rotating chairs, and the Steering Committee (SC).

The PI works with their deputy (dPI) to coordinate the team’s effort and ensure it is well-integrated into and aligned with the broader Roman effort, foster a collaborative environment and aim at broad consensus within the team. The PI is responsible for the overall success of the PIT. The team includes a Pipeline Manager (PM) and their deputy (dPM), whose responsibilities include coordination of the development of standards in consultation with other groups in the Roman computing landscape, ensuring standards are met, and tracking progress towards pipeline development milestones.

Work within the PIT is organized within topic-area working groups (WGs), each with two co-chairs who serve renewable two-year terms.  The WG co-chairs have overall responsibility for coordination among the deliverables in their areas and reporting on progress and concerns to the Steering Committee.

The steering committee is responsible for resource allocation and high-level planning and oversight, and consists of at least the PI, dPI, PM, dPM, an Inclusion Chair, and five WG Chairs.

Senior team members can, with the approval of their Institutional PI, propose new members who will work under their supervision at their institution, e.g., post-doctoral researchers or graduate or undergraduate students.  In addition, members of the broader community with research programs that align with the goals of the PIT may participate in selected PIT projects as external collaborators as long as they agree to follow the team's policies.

Once the team's governance, membership, and publication policy is adopted, it will be shared publicly.