First Briefing Retrospective and Next Steps

This post summarizes the feedback received from media partners regarding the first Media Corps briefing and future sessions, along with suggested next steps. Thank you to everyone who completed the feedback form and contributed their thoughts.

Feedback has been synthesized for ease of reading. Full (anonymized) form responses are in this spreadsheet.

Overview

Attendance: 14 people attended the first briefing live. The form responses from media partners mixed live attendance and recording views. Due to time zones, finding a time that works for everyone is challenging, so this underscores the importance of recording briefings.
Overall briefing effectiveness: The briefing received an average rating of 3.8 out of 5, where 5 is the best effectiveness rating. On average, partners who completed the form found the briefing valuable, but there’s room for improvement.
Briefing organization: The average rating is 4.3 out of 5, which suggests that most respondents found the briefing well-organized.

What went well in the first briefing?

The demos were well-received and highly appreciated for understanding new features and changes.
A number of answers indicated that they found the information, the recap on the Media Corps blog, and the links/resources shared useful. These also helped as supportive resources for non-native English media partners.
It was easy to ask questions.
Anne’s participation, knowledge, and preparation of the source of truth were highlighted as significant positives.

What would you like to see improved for future briefings?

It would have been great to have the chief architect or lead designers available for questions to get firsthand knowledge of vision and ideas.
The briefing was very technical. What I’m hearing from subscribers is that they want to know more about what WordPress can do, not how it works.
Briefings shouldn’t go for more than 30 minutes.
Focusing on multiple aspects of the project beyond just the coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. updates.
Having someone other than Anne discuss important changes coming to WP would make more sense since Anne has her own initiatives with content creators and generally publishes her own content.
Understanding it was the first iteration, there wasn’t much in terms of the actual “media corps” content or evolving the idea of “media corps.”
Perhaps there could be email follow-ups after the event? That could be used to share the recording and transcript.

How often should we host the Media Corps briefings?

The majority of media partners prefer monthly briefings, which indicates a strong preference for regular, consistent updates that are frequent enough to stay informed but not overwhelming.

Topics for upcoming Media Corps briefings

The multi-topic briefing was the most voted choice, suggesting a majority preference among the media partners. Next in interest is a potential session on mid-term goals for WordPress with Josepha.

Additional suggestions from media partners

Complement video briefings with written statements and have access to assets (images, video, etc.) that can be referenced or shared by media partners.
Have a protocol for how to reach the team if there is something sensitive or questions about something that will be published so it can be resolved before publication.
Generally, less technical content and more “this is how WordPress is awesome” content so we can publish stories that showcase what WordPress is capable of.

Proposed next steps

Diverse briefings: For now, rotate the topics and formats for briefings (e.g., dedicated vs. multi-topic sessions) to help address media partners’ different interests and preferences. Keep improving them and iterating based on feedback.

Monthly briefings with 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/. updates between sessions: Hosting the Media Corps briefings monthly seems the most preferred approach. We can complement these with updates shared via Slack between sessions to help keep media partners promptly informed of any WP developments that welcome more amplification.

Media kits: When possible, help provide access to shareable assets (videos, images, etc.) and/or statements to support media coverage.

Plans for the next briefing

Based on the feedback from media partners, I suggest that the next briefing be tentatively scheduled for the first week of August, be shorter, and focus on a multi-topic format to cover the latest WordPress news and happenings, including a quick rundown of new entries in the Showcase.

After the briefing, we could open the floor for questions or discussion items about the Media Corps project.

While the briefing (the news portion) can aim to be concise, note that any subsequent Media Corps discussions may naturally go a little longer.

Share your thoughts

What do you think about the above proposed next steps and plans for the next briefing? Do you have questions or comments? Please leave them in the comments below.

Thank you to @bernard0omnisend and @bobdunn-trainer for the peer review and to our media partners for contributing their thoughts on the latest and upcoming briefings.

#retrospective

Rae Morey 12:14 am on July 26, 2024

Thanks for sharing the retro and next steps. It’s helpful to see how other media outlets align.

I think the plan for the next briefing sounds good. Looking forward to (hopefully!) joining in.
- Reyes Martínez 6:00 pm on July 31, 2024
  
  That’s great to hear! Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Rae.
Simon Kraft 4:07 pm on July 26, 2024

Thanks for sharing this overview, Reyes 🙌

Generally, less technical content and more “this is how WordPress is awesome”

I understand that all the media partners have their focus, but this would not work for every one of us. I, for example, am here to write stories, interview interesting people, and occasionally break news. I’m not interested in being a mere PR outlet.
- Reyes Martínez 5:58 pm on July 31, 2024
  
  I understand that all the media partners have their focus, but this would not work for every one of us
  
  Definitely! I found that piece of feedback interesting because I think 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/ doesn’t promote that many (product) success stories in its own content/posts, but I understand that this is not what works for all media partners. 🙂
  
  I also think it will be important to find a balanced mix of briefing topics and formats to help accommodate and support the diverse focuses of media partners.
Eric Karkovack 4:44 pm on July 30, 2024

I appreciate the efforts here!

Keeping briefings to 30 minutes would be great. But I’m not sure how realistic it is. Once the initial presentation is done, that wouldn’t leave much time for questions.

I think it’s reasonable to limit the presentation portion to around 30 minutes, though. That would allow attendees to leave and reference the video or transcript later on.

Otherwise, I found the first briefing to be informative and valuable.
- Reyes Martínez 6:07 pm on July 31, 2024
  
  These are all great points. Re: the length of the briefings. I also suspect that we will have to be flexible depending on the content of each session, but it’s good feedback to keep in mind.
  
  I found the first briefing to be informative and valuable.
  
  So glad to hear that. Thank you, Eric!