Proposal follow-up: Dedicated communication place for deputies – forming the guidelines

Months ago, I posted a proposal on creating a new dedicated SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. channel for deputiesProgram Supporter Community Program Supporters (formerly Deputies) are a team of people worldwide who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about program supporters in our Program Supporter Handbook.. After a long and really good discussion, the deputies reached a consensus and would like to give the channel a try, after a set of guidelines have been formed. If you don’t have an idea what I’m talking about, and the idea of a private channel sounds bad to you, I suggest reading the original proposal and discussion that followed that.

It’s now (finally) time to form those guidelines and embark on this experiment together!

These guidelines aspire to be encouraging and not discouraging. These are more to give an idea on the purpose of the channel, rather than creating an uncertain feeling around whether something can be raised to the discussion in the channel. My hope is to keep these as short and clear as possible.

To provide extra clarity on who will be in the channel, and how it will be used:

  • All deputies with “Active” status in this sheet will be invited to the channel.
  • The main purpose of the channel is to provide a safe space, and to improve peer support for all deputies, especially those new to the role. In this channel, deputies who are uncertain or hesitant can raise issues or ask questions with a smaller group first before doing so publicly. The channel can also be a place to discuss applications that need a second opinion, or for discussions about financial issues that require confidentiality. If some discussion that takes place could be public, it will be moved to a public forum (#community-team channel or this team blog).
  • No decisions that affect Community Team, event organisers or the greater WordPress project will be made in the private channel.
  • We’ll do a public review on the Community Team’s blog on how the channel has worked after three and six months

My proposal for the deputyProgram Supporter Community Program Supporters (formerly Deputies) are a team of people worldwide who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about program supporters in our Program Supporter Handbook. channel guidelines are:

  • As we all are busy and have an abundance of unread notifications, please avoid irrelevant chatter.
  • Help to create a safe and welcoming space for all deputies. Be empathetic and help answer questions when you can!
  • If you feel that the discussion should take place in a public forum, say it and help to move the discussion to the #community-team channel or Community Team blog.
  • Any decision making that will affect the broader community will be made in public. Help others be aware when they might be making a decision that should happen after public discussion.

Feel free to share your ideas, thoughts, additions and changes to these proposed guidelines before 2020-11-19. After that, I’ll move forward and ask Slack admins to create the new channel for us.

Thank you @angelasjin, @harishanker, @andreamiddleton and @courtneypk for helping with this post!

#community-deputies, #slack

Getting more Learn WordPress Discussion Group leaders and attendees

Learn WordPress is getting closer to its full launch and more workshops are being published, worked on and planned. One essential idea with workshops are discussion groups, that are a great way to share thoughts and ideas between others that have watched the recorded workshop.

Discussion groups can be held via Zoom or in #community-events SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. channel by original workshop presenter(s) or anyone who wants to be a discussion group leader. Virtually anyone interested in leading a discussion group on any of the workshops on the site is welcome to do so.

To make the most out of workshops and discussion groups, it would be great to have at least two discussion groups per each workshop. These discussion groups can happen anytime and even after the workshop has been published already months ago – it’s up to the discussion group leaders interest.

Currently, discussion groups are a bit hidden in the Learn WordPress platform. I’m proposing the following additions in order to raise awareness about discussion groups happening and more attendees and discussion group leaders:

1. Add “Upcoming discussion groups” section between “Recent workshops” and workshop idea submission CTA on the front page.

This new section would list three next upcoming discussion groups and link to the meetup.com page where all upcoming discussion groups are listed. This way also older workshops get some attention on the front page if new discussions groups for those are scheduled.

We already have code to get meetupsMeetup Meetup groups are locally-organized groups that get together for face-to-face events on a regular basis (commonly once a month). Learn more about Meetups in our Meetup Organizer Handbook. from meetup.com, so it shouldn’t be a big job to get scheduled discussion groups from there as well. Of course, it needs some dev time, but I’m sure it will be worth it.

2. Add “Interested in running a discussion group?” CTA next to current “Have an Idea for a Workshop?“ CTA on the front page.

I’d like to have many discussion group leaders, so running those won’t fall into the responsibility of a workshop presenter(s) and a small group of an active group of Learn WP deputiesProgram Supporter Community Program Supporters (formerly Deputies) are a team of people worldwide who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about program supporters in our Program Supporter Handbook.. With this new CTA in place, we make it more visible that virtually anyone can run a discussion group if they find a workshop they’re really interested in and there’s no scheduled discussion group for that workshop.

Quick mockup showing how upcoming discussion groups and new CTA could be places on the front page.

3. Add details about discussion groups in workshop pages.

Currently, the page of a single workshop only has a button “Join a Discussion Group” which is a bit vague. We should add a small blurb on top of the button explaining what is a discussion group. Below the button could be a small text, much like the CoCCode of Conduct “A code of conduct is a set of rules outlining the norms, rules, and responsibilities or proper practices of an individual party.” - Wikipedia notice, saying that if there’s no scheduled discussion group for this workshop, apply to be a discussion group leader to run one.

4. Create a new “Be a Discussion Group leader” page

As you might notice, two previous proposals contain a link to a page that doesn’t exist at this time on Learn WP platform. We should create a new page where it is explained what discussion group is, what it means to be a discussion group leader and how to apply. Currently, this information exists only in this make/community posts.

Tracking all the upcoming discussion groups and keeping an eye that each workshop has at least two groups

It would be nice to have at least two discussion groups for each workshop. These can happen anytime after the workshop has been published, even months later.

To keep track of upcoming discussion groups, we’ll use meetup.com where all scheduled discussion groups are being added.

In parallel to public listing on scheduled groups, I suggest that we create a new Google sheet with each workshop listed on it. In the sheet we can track if;

  • Zoom discussion group has been scheduled/held
  • Slack discussion group has been scheduled/held
  • Additional discussion groups have been scheduled/held

It would fall mostly under my lap, as I promised to manage discussion groups, but everyone who schedules a new discussion group in meetup.com should update this sheet.

With this sheet, we can track if a workshop hasn’t had any discussion groups and we can reach out to our discussion group leaders and workshop presenter(s) (not too) regularly asking whether they would like to schedule one. In future, the list of workshops needing a discussion group leader, could be added to the new “Be a Discussion Group leader” in Learn WP platform.

What do you think? Thoughts, ideas, comments, questions? How we could attract more discussion group leaders and attendees in your opinion? Please share your feedback before 2020-11-09.

#discussion, #discussion-groups, #learn, #learn-wordpress, #learn-roadmap

Announcement: Learn WordPress Orientations

Now that Learn WordPress is live and the Community Team is working towards a full launch to announce the platform, we want to help everyone understand how they can participate and help improve and build Learn WordPress! To that end, we will have orientations to introduce the different ways volunteers can contribute to Learn WordPress, and steps to get involved. The orientation will cover:

  • What even is Learn WordPress?
  • How to present a workshop and workshop ideas
  • How to assist with reviewing submitted workshops
  • How to update and contribute new lesson plans
  • How to become a discussion group leader
  • How to organize a discussion group

If you would like to learn more about Learn WordPress or have any interest in participating, please join us for these orientations! We will host them four times a week in the #community-events channel on Slack, on Mondays and Wednesdays at 21:30 UTC, and Tuesdays and Thursdays at 8:30 UTC. This is 30 minutes before our regular Office HoursOffice Hours Defined times when the Global Community Team are in the #community-events Slack channel. If there is anything you would like to discuss – you do not need to inform them in advance.You are very welcome to drop into any of the Community Team Slack channels at any time., so there will be lots of opportunity to ask questions. 

These orientations will start tomorrow on Wednesday, September 2, 2020. We hope to see you there!

Proposal: Recognition for event volunteers and attendees in WordPress.org profile

About two years ago Meta Trac ticket (note: please don’t continue in that ticket, this P2P2 P2 or O2 is the term people use to refer to the Make WordPress blog. It can be found at https://make.wordpress.org/. is the more correct place for it) was opened about adding a WordCampWordCamp WordCamps are casual, locally-organized conferences covering everything related to WordPress. They're one of the places where the WordPress community comes together to teach one another what they’ve learned throughout the year and share the joy. Learn more. volunteer and attendee badges to WordPress.orgWordPress.org The community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/ profiles. A few weeks ago Taco did bring it back to the discussion and I promised to write a proposal to move this forward.

Profile badges are graphics that do show users contributions towards WordPress project.

It is suggested that we should:

  • Give a badge for WordCamp volunteers
  • Give a badge for WordCamp attendees
  • Give a badge for MeetupMeetup Meetup groups are locally-organized groups that get together for face-to-face events on a regular basis (commonly once a month). Learn more about Meetups in our Meetup Organizer Handbook. attendees

Let’s dive into each badge for a second.

WordCamp volunteers

Technically giving a badge for WordCamp volunteers is probably the most easiest of the badges to give automatically. In coordination with WordCamp MetaMeta Meta is a term that refers to the inside workings of a group. For us, this is the team that works on internal WordPress sites like WordCamp Central and Make WordPress. team, we could find a way to track all volunteers and their WordPress.org usernames as we do for organisers and speakers too.

It’s also almost unarguable that WordCamp volunteers are contributing to the project, so they should get a badge. In 2017 there was a conversation about recognising volunteers in WordCamp websites, that ended up in conclusion that we should do that. At that time the discussion didn’t consider profile badges and as an end result using Admin Flags functionality was suggested.

WordCamp Attendees

This is technically more harder to do, because we don’t ask WordPress.org usernames when attendees purchase a ticket.

Sure we could add a field and ask that, but then comes the question when badge should be added to profile. When a ticket is purchased? Then what happens if that ticket changes owner, is refunded or attendee doesn’t show up. If we add the badge after attendee has marked as attended in Camptix, not all would get a badge because not all WordCamps do use the functionality to mark attendance.

It’s also arguable whether attending to WordCamp is actually contributing to the project and something from which they should get a badge.

In the Trac ticket @andreamiddleton pointed out that in 2014 WordCamp San Francisco worked out a way display event registration and attendance on the activity log. She suggested that we recognise attendees in that way instead of giving badges.

Meetup attendees

Technically this is the hardest thing to achieve, because MeetupsMeetup Meetup groups are locally-organized groups that get together for face-to-face events on a regular basis (commonly once a month). Learn more about Meetups in our Meetup Organizer Handbook. live totally their own lives in Meetup.com and don’t have strong connection to WordCamp.org or WordPress.org systems. We don’t have a way to link Meetup.com profile to WordPress.org username for giving them a badge. Surely it can probably be done if team invests a lot of time on developing this feature.

The same discussion as with WordCamp attendees on their level of contribution to the project also applies to Meetup attendees.

The proposal

I’m proposing:

Badge for WordCamp volunteers

We should create a new badge for WordCamp volunteers and recognise them the same way as we do for organisers and speakers. Technical aspects need to be decided with WordCamp Meta team, but I’d create a new post type and re-use same functionalities that are used for organisers and speakers.

Log note for WordCamp attendees

We should start asking WordPress.org username during ticket purchase with an optional field in preparations to recognising WordCamp attendees.

I’m in favour of Andrea’s suggestion on showing the attendance on profile log instead of giving them a badge. Log note could be added after the WordCamp, in case the ticket changes owner on the first event day. Logic could be that everyone with a ticket does get the note unless there are at least a certain amount of attendees marked as attended when log note would be added only to those attendees.

What about Meetups and other event formats?

For Meetup and our other event format attendees, I would say it’s a too low-level contribution towards the WordPress project and technically too complicated to implement. Hopefully we can start recognising them at some point, but not for now.

Feedback

Read the original proposal and discussion on Meta Track ticket, there are good arguments and points. Note: please don’t continue in that ticket, this P2 is the more correct place for it.

Please share your feedback on the topic and especially on:

  • Should WordCamp volunteers get a badge?
  • Should WordCamp attendees get a badge or a note in their log?
  • What things do we need to take into consideration in these cases?

Share your thoughts before 2020-08-13.

#attendees, #meetups-2, #recognition, #volunteers, #wordcamps #meetups

Proposal: Dedicated communication place for deputies

For some time I’ve personally have felt that deputiesProgram Supporter Community Program Supporters (formerly Deputies) are a team of people worldwide who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about program supporters in our Program Supporter Handbook. would need another place than #community-team SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. channel to discuss some topics. Mary’s proposal about monthly virtual calls is a great one to create a place for deputies to see each other and share how they are, though it has a slightly different function than I’m proposing here.

To keep it short, my few arguments why deputies would need dedicated channel:

1) We have 51 active deputies and the #community-team channel has over 1 500 members

2) During exceptional situations, like recent COVID-19 response and things caused by that, deputies needed to communicate realtime a lot while working with fast actions to help organisers. And in other hand, deputies stepping in to help with the response work needed to get (at that point) internal instructions. Sharing and creating internal instructions on a channel that has over 1 500 members, means that community members will see an incomplete and in some cases information that is subject to change. This means that #community-team channel is not space place for deputies to draft some posts, changes and guidelines in urgent or controversial situations.

3) Currently, some discussion that is internal for deputies for a reason or another (like how to respond in sudden situations/cases, how to handle this thing we haven’t faced before or issues that are delicate) are hepping in small(ish) deputyProgram Supporter Community Program Supporters (formerly Deputies) are a team of people worldwide who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about program supporters in our Program Supporter Handbook. DM groups. For transparency this is bad.

4) The dedicated channel could encourage deputies to ask help when they need it during their work.

This is why I’m proposing: creating a new private channel for active deputies. Active deputies would be defined based on this deputy sheet we have.

Yes, the private channel is somewhat against the transparency we as a team and as a project in general cherish. At the same time, it should be remembered that some discussions that could involve all deputies happen in smaller DM groups. Creating a private channel for all deputies would hopefully reduce the need for that kind of DM groups and add transparency amongst deputies.

Also, the CoreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. team has a private channel for some discussions mainly related to releasing new versions, because it’s more convenient to have a smaller channel instead of trying to have the discussion in the public channel where a lot of conversation happens. (Someone who is more familiar with the Core team can correct me if I’m wrong).

And the last argument in favour of the private channel is that we are already good in directing discussion from Slack to P2P2 P2 or O2 is the term people use to refer to the Make WordPress blog. It can be found at https://make.wordpress.org/. when needed, so why we wouldn’t be good on moving some discussion from a private channel to public #community-team if the topic is something that can be discussed publicly.

When pitching this idea to some members of our deputy team, it got objections and a counter-proposal of creating new public channel for this purpose.

Please leave your feedback on the topic and particularly in the following questions:

  1. Should deputies have another place than the #community-team channel to discuss among themselves if needed?
  2. If deputies should have a dedicated channel, should it be private or public?

Leave your feedback on 2020-07-31 latest.

WordCamp and Meetup application vetting sprint (January 2020)

We currently have a backlog of WordCampWordCamp WordCamps are casual, locally-organized conferences covering everything related to WordPress. They're one of the places where the WordPress community comes together to teach one another what they’ve learned throughout the year and share the joy. Learn more. and MeetupMeetup Meetup groups are locally-organized groups that get together for face-to-face events on a regular basis (commonly once a month). Learn more about Meetups in our Meetup Organizer Handbook. applications. We would like to request the help of all deputiesProgram Supporter Community Program Supporters (formerly Deputies) are a team of people worldwide who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about program supporters in our Program Supporter Handbook. to help us stay responsive to community members, and to help keep our queues moving forward. To that end, we’ll be holding few vetting sprints 🙂

Each sprint will last for two hours, and we will collectively vet as many WordCamp and Meetup applications in that time as possible. If you are a deputyProgram Supporter Community Program Supporters (formerly Deputies) are a team of people worldwide who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about program supporters in our Program Supporter Handbook. and would like to coordinate a sprint at another time, then please comment on this post and I’ll add it to the list.

All deputies are welcome and encouraged to join! Please comment on this post if you think you can take part.

What is a Vetting Sprint?

A vetting sprint for WordCamp or Meetup applications is a scheduled session where all available deputies meet together in the #community-team channel in the WordPress SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. group. Over the course of the sprint, we will all work on vetting applications and use the Slack channel as a central place to discuss what we’re working on and support each other.

Who can take part?

Any deputies who have access to the WordCamp centralWordCamp Central Website for all WordCamp activities globally. https://central.wordcamp.org includes a list of upcoming and past camp with links to each. listings and/or the Meetup central listings can take part. That means people who have completed the deputy training, signed the deputy agreement and been given access to the dashboard.

If you are a deputy who has been active in the last year, then you should have access to this. If you don’t have access and still want to take part, please comment here or ask in #community-team and we’ll sort out your access.

How Does it Work?

We will be going through the open WordCamp and Meetup applications that still need vetting – you can find WordCamp listings here and Meetup listings here. We also have some handy notes to help you with the vetting process.

As always, deputies can work on these things at any time that suits them, but these dedicated sprints help to provide some direct, focused time for it.

#vetting-sprint

Community Team Reps: Submit Your Votes

In December we opened up nominations for new Community Team Reps to replace myself and @francina. Due to the end of year rush, we’ve been a bit delayed with getting the voting poll out, but it’s now ready and open for voting!

You can find the poll below. Since two reps are elected each time, you can select up to two people to vote for.

What Are Team Reps?

In the WordPress open sourceOpen Source Open Source denotes software for which the original source code is made freely available and may be redistributed and modified. Open Source **must be** delivered via a licensing model, see GPL. project, each team has one or two (or more!) representatives (“reps”). The role goes all the way back to 2012.

Initially, it was a six months tenure, but most reps end up doing this for at least a year. The current Community Team Reps have been serving in the role for three years now.

Folks who serve as team repTeam Rep A Team Rep is a person who represents the Make WordPress team to the rest of the project, make sure issues are raised and addressed as needed, and coordinates cross-team efforts. are responsible for communicating on behalf of the group to the other contributor groups via weekly updates, as well as occasional chats and such. 

It is not called “team lead” for a reason. While the people elected as team reps will generally come from the pool of folks that people think of as experienced leaders, remember that the team rep role is designed to change hands regularly.

This role has a time commitment attached to it. Not a huge amount, but in my experience, it’s around one hour a week.

Here are the main tasks:

  • Writing the agenda for the biweekly chat
  • Running the community team chat (or finding another deputyProgram Supporter Community Program Supporters (formerly Deputies) are a team of people worldwide who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about program supporters in our Program Supporter Handbook. to do so)
  • Writing the recap and posting it on the Updates P2
  • Keeping an eye on the moving parts of the team to be able to report for quarterly updates (example).

Over the year, the team might decide to add one or two people to help: some teams have up to five, six people, depending on how much work there is. For now, we’re going to be electing two team reps and, if the need arises later in the year, we can elect further people to serve in this role.

Where Can I Vote?

You can vote in the public poll here. You can vote for up to two people at the same time, but once you have submitted your vote you won’t be able to vote again.

This poll will remain open until the end of January 2020, after which team reps will be selected based on the votes received.

WordCamp Application Vetting Sprints | 23 & 25 October 2019

We currently have an abnormally large backlog of WordCampWordCamp WordCamps are casual, locally-organized conferences covering everything related to WordPress. They're one of the places where the WordPress community comes together to teach one another what they’ve learned throughout the year and share the joy. Learn more. applications that need their initial vetting (27 at the time of writing this!) and we need the help of all deputiesProgram Supporter Community Program Supporters (formerly Deputies) are a team of people worldwide who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about program supporters in our Program Supporter Handbook. to get this sorted out. To that end, we will be holding two WordCamp application vetting sprints this week:

Each sprint will last for 2 hours, and we will collectively vet as many WordCamp applications in that time as possible. If you are a deputyProgram Supporter Community Program Supporters (formerly Deputies) are a team of people worldwide who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about program supporters in our Program Supporter Handbook. and would like to coordinate a sprint at another time this week (or any other week), then please comment on this post and I’ll add it to the list.

All deputies are welcome and encouraged to join! Please comment on this post if you think you can take part.


What is a Vetting Sprint?

A vetting sprint for WordCamp applications is a scheduled session where all available deputies meet together in the #community-team channel in the WordPress SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. group. Over the course of the sprint, we will all work on vetting applications and use the Slack channel as a central place to discuss what we’re working on and support each other.

Who can take part?

Any deputies who have access to the WordCamp central listings can take part. That means people who have completed the deputy training, signed the deputy agreement and been given access to the dashboard.

If you are a deputy who has been active in the last year, then you should have access to this. If you don’t have access and still want to take part, please comment here or ask in #community-team and we’ll sort out your access.

How Does it Work?

As mentioned above, we will be going through the open WordCamp applications that still need vetting – you can find all of those here. We also have some handy notes to help you with the process.

As always, deputies can work on these things at any time that suits them, but these dedicated sprints help to provide some direct focussed time for it.

Handbook Working Group – Let’s do this, take two!

Despite a banging start, with a lot of talented people showing interest and willingness to make the Community documentation better, I failed at keeping the group going, due to biting on more than I can chew.
It happens.

What is so great about having things published in the blog and in TrelloTrello Project management system using the concepts of boards and cards to organize tasks in a sane way. This is what the make.wordpress.com/marketing team uses for example: https://trello.com/b/8UGHVBu8/wp-marketing. is that other people can adopt the project, so here we go again!

Rocìo @_dorsvenabili has kindly offered to continue with the project and enrich it with another layer that will make it even more impactful for our global community.

I won’t spoil anything, but I ask you please to re-commit to the group if you can or join it anew if this is the first time you heard about it! Leave your SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. name in the comments, thank you!

If you want to read more before raising your hand:

Thanks!

#community-handbook, #handbook

WordCamp US 2019 – Community Team Plans

We are less than a month away from WordCamp US 2019, which means it’s time to get organised!

WordCampWordCamp WordCamps are casual, locally-organized conferences covering everything related to WordPress. They're one of the places where the WordPress community comes together to teach one another what they’ve learned throughout the year and share the joy. Learn more. Europe and WordCamp US are what we consider flagship events and are always a great opportunity for teams to get together, contribute and onboard more people. There are going to be a whole lot of us present and we should take advantage of that and maximize our time together.

Please add in the comments ideas and suggestions for tasks we could work on together while in Saint Louis.

We also need at least two, three Team Leads to coordinate the different activities:

  • Deliver the Team initial presentation
  • Onboard new contributors
  • Help coordinate work during the day
  • Deliver the end of day recap of what was achieved during the day

Please raise your hand in the comments if you are available for this.

Deadline to comment is October 17 so we can discuss this during the next two Community chats: after that date I will summarise in a “squad goals” post (like the one we had last year) and we will go from there!

#contributor-day, #wcus