On 23 Feb 2021, at 5:56, Keith Moore wrote:
(Though I also remember that when I first started writing drafts, the notion of "shepherd" did not exist yet. I definitely had supportive comments and constructive suggestions from other participants via private email after I submitted my initial draft, and I had been on the working group mailing list since before the group was chartered so I was familiar with the conversation. IETF was smaller then than it is now, but not that much smaller. What's changed is that we have more bureaucracy, more rules, and a much wider and more diverse range of increasingly narrow interests.)
If the sort of “shepherd” you’re referring to is a Document Shepherd, by the time one is assigned many newcomers would have long since given up. My experience is that a shepherd is assigned once a document has reached WG rough consensus and wants to advance the document. Of course the document isn’t finished at that point and still has to pass muster with IESG, but a lot has had to happen to get to that point.
The various mentor programs do more to promote diversity and inclusiveness than document shepherds, IMO.
-Jim
