Interviewing WordCamp organizer applicants

The purpose of 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. organizer applicant interview is to determine:

1. If that applicant is an active member of an active local WordPress community
2. If that applicant is a good representative for 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
3. What event organizing experience s/he has
4. Whether the applicant’s goals for the event matches the goals of the WordCamp program

We prefer to have two deputiesDeputy Community Deputies are a team of people all over the world who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and generally keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about deputies in our Community Deputy Handbook. in each interview group if possible. If no second deputyDeputy Community Deputies are a team of people all over the world who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and generally keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about deputies in our Community Deputy Handbook. can make an interview, please ask Andrea, Josepha, Jen, Cami, or Rocio to join.

Before the interview:

• Pull up the organizer application(s) and review it/them.
• Pull up the meetup group site(s); look at how old it is, what kind of 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. they have, etc.

The questions we ask at a group interview: #The questions we ask at a group interview:

1. How did you get started with WordPress and how do you currently use it?
2. How long has the WP community in your area been active, and how did you get involved in it?
3. Tell us about your local meetup group — what’s the best and worst thing about WP community organizing, in your experience?
4. Why are you interested in organizing a WordCamp in your town, and what are your goals for the WordCamp you want to organize?

Top ↑

Things you might find out in the interview and what to do about it: #Things you might find out in the interview and what to do about it:

The applicant does not meet the expectations in the organizer agreement.
This can include violating the WordPress trademark, not respecting the license (distributing non-GPLGPL GPL is an acronym for GNU Public License. It is the standard license WordPress uses for Open Source licensing https://wordpress.org/about/license/. The GPL is a ‘copyleft’ license https://www.gnu.org/licenses/copyleft.en.html. This means that derivative work can only be distributed under the same license terms. This is in distinction to permissive free software licenses, of which the BSD license and the MIT License are widely used examples. themes/plugins/code), using discriminatory language or hate speech in the interview or elsewhere, acting like a jerk, etc.

If they are still interested in organizing a WordCamp, then ask them to please reapply when they have resolved those issues.

The applicant is not very involved in the local community.

Ask him/her to recruit more community members who *are* actively involved in the local community for the organizing team and then get back to you with that list before moving forward with approval for pre-planning.

The local community is not healthy.
(not healthy can be a lot of things but includes: meetup is not holding regular, in-person meetings; membership is restrictive or the group is not public; the group leaders think of the group as something they own rather than a group that they lead)

If the group is not meeting regularly in-person, ask the applicant to work on the meetup group before attempting a WordCamp. After meeting monthly 3-4 times, they can reapply to organize a WordCamp.

If group membership/leadership is restricted, ask the applicant to bring their meetup group in line with the 5 good-faith rules and either join the meetup chapter account or post the 5 good-faith rules to their user group site.

The applicant wants to organize an event that doesn’t work within the WordCamp model.
(This can be lots of things, but in an interview you might find they want to import a majority speakers from out of town, get an in-kind sponsorship for volunteering, use organizing to make money, pay for speaker travel, fold WordCamp into another event.)

Addressing this is usually handled best via email or direct conversation. Gather as much info about what the applicant has in mind when s/he thinks WordCamp, and then follow up by email about where their vision diverges from WordCamp program standards and see if they are ok with changing their vision to organize a WordCamp. Then assign them a mentorMentor Someone who has already organised a WordCamp and has time to meet with their assigned mentee every 2 weeks, they talk over where they should be in their timeline, help them to identify their issues, and also identify solutions for their issues. who can help them understand WordCamp guidelines as they continue planning.

Top ↑

After the interview #After the interview

If all signs point to “good organizer,” approve the WordCamp for pre-planning, send the organizer agreement, set up their tools, and connect them with a mentor.

If signs point to “not now” or “not a good fit” then send the nicest email in the world explaining what would have to change for that applicant to meet the expectations for a WordCamp organizer.

Last updated: January 28, 2016