The governing of a large and successful Open Source project with a substantial user base presents a variety of challenges. The Mambo Foundation has strived to address those challenges by creating a formalized organizational structure that is efficient without being overly bureaucratic. There are three tiers to the structure:

The Membership

At the root of it all is the Membership. While you don't have to be a member to be part of the community, to develop modules, components or templates, or to download and use the code, you do have to be a member to participate in governing the project. Membership is open to anyone with the inclination to participate and the willingness to stay informed on matters of concern to the project. The Members nominate and elect the Board of Directors. (see also, Membership)

Team Mambo and The MSC

Those members who chose to become involved in the day to day affairs of the project are called Active Members and they are divided into 8 teams (we sometimes call this group 'Team Mambo'). Each of the 8 teams elects a Team Leader and those leaders all sit on the Mambo Steering Committee (the 'MSC'). The MSC is largely responsible for what most people think of as 'Mambo': From planning the Mambo Road Map, to development, to execution and advocacy, the MSC keeps the project moving forward.

The 8 teams and their leaders are:

• Advocacy PR & Membership: Ric Shreves
• Core Development: Chad Auld
• Documentation: Richard Ong
• Moderators: Mark Joyce
• Project Management: Chanh Ong
• QA: (open)
• Third Party Development: Alain Schmalz
• Translation: (open)

The Board of Directors

Like any corporation, the Mambo Foundation has a Board of Directors. The Foundation has created a structure that vests the balance of responsibility for day to day operations in the MSC, while focusing the Board's efforts on the administrative matters relating to governing the Foundation itself. The MSC, for example, controls the Road Map and the Release Schedules. The Board, in contrast, handles tasks like  IP enforcement and  corporate governance - tasks which tend to be time consuming and would in fact detract from development efforts if they had to be handled by the MSC.

More information about Board and General Membership Meetings can be found on the Meetings page in the Legal section of this site.