Core Team Rep Election Process

In summary, the process follows three subsequent Make/CoreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. posts for nominations, voting, and then announcing new Core Team Reps.

The Role

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 on average one or two representatives, abbreviated as reps.  Some teams have more than two, but for the sake of sanity sticking with two for now keeps things simpler.  And for the historians out there, the role goes way back to 2012.

Historically with the Core team, the 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. duration was around a year, though some reps stuck around longer if there was a particularly good fit.

Anyone who serves as a “team rep” is responsible for communicating on behalf of the Core team to the other contributor groups via weekly updates, as well as occasional cross-team chats.  Reps are also consulted on Contributor DayContributor Day Contributor Days are standalone days, frequently held before or after WordCamps but they can also happen at any time. They are events where people get together to work on various areas of https://make.wordpress.org/ There are many teams that people can participate in, each with a different focus. https://2017.us.wordcamp.org/contributor-day/ https://make.wordpress.org/support/handbook/getting-started/getting-started-at-a-contributor-day/., helping find someone within the Core team attending an event who can help lead a Core table.  Full details on the Team Rep role is on the Team Update site.

It is not called “team lead” for a reason.  While 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 at least one hour a week.

Here are the main tasks:

• Post the devchat agenda, host the chats, and summarizing them. More details on coordinating devchat are available in the Core handbook.
• Writing regular Core team recaps and posting it in Updates
• Write the Week in Review post
• Keeping an eye on the moving parts of the team to be able to report for quarterly updates (example)

More details on coordinating devchat are available in the Core handbook.

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Nominating

Nominations happen in the comments of a Core Team Reps nomination post (here are examples from 2020 and 2021 as well as a sample Community Team nominating post).  Self-nominations are welcome.  The deadline for nominations should be around two weeks.  

Preference is for nominations to happen publicly, but if someone wants to nominate someone in private, they can reach out to existing team reps and any other active contributors assisting the process via 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/..

An important disclaimer: if someone is nominated, they should not feel like they have to say “yes”.  The polls will only include the names of the people that respond positively to a nomination.  Anyone who is nominated should feel free to reply with a “Thank you, but no thank you”.

Once the deadline has passed for nominating, a comment will be added and pinned to the top of the nomination post:

Nominations are now closed and voting is open until <voting deadline>. Voting details and link here: https://make.wordpress.org/core/<voting-link>/

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Voting

After nominations have ended, a poll for voting will be opened and linked from a voting announcement post (here is an example from 2020 as well as a sample Community Team voting post).  It should stay open for around two weeks.

Once the deadline has passed for voting, a comment will be added and pinned to the top of the voting post:

Voting has concluded and the new team reps will be announced on <date> during the Core devchat.

Once the results have been finalized and announced, a comment will be added and pinned to the top of the voting post:

Selected Core Team reps are announced here: <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core//”>https://make.wordpress.org/core/<results-link>/

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Announcing

After voting has ended, results should be shared in an announcement post (here is an exmaple from 2020 as well as a sample Community Team results post).  Similarly, the new team rep(s) should be updated on the Team Reps page.

The outgoing team rep(s) should plan to be available for questions and consultation from the incoming team rep(s) as there will undoubtedly be a learning curve as new rep(s) get into the role.

Last updated: November 9, 2022