#FOSSBack: Ruth Cheesley – Let's make this the year of the contributor experience!
Channel: Plain Schwarz
Date: 2022-04-04

Slides and Speaker profile: https://pretalx.com/foss-backstage-2022/talk/PCFLPB/

The users of your open source projects are (probably) not mountaineers .. but often we expect them to scale dizzying heights to move from being a consumer to someone who is actively supporting the project - from a ‘taker’ to a ‘maker’.

Whether that be through Everest-style on-ramps for new contributors or something as simple as not making it clear what skills are needed and how people can get involved, there are many roadblocks in the way of people trying to answer the question of ‘how can I help make this project better?’. Of course, this ends up frustrating potential contributors, and results in open source projects losing potential contributors before they even get started.

In this session we’ll explore practical ways we can make this process less like mountaineering and more like a pleasant walk in the park with the sun shining and the birds singing! I’ll draw on my experiences as a contributor to several projects, and in my role as Project Lead for Mautic where we have a Strategic Initiative this year focused on improving the contributor experience.

We’ll also look at the less traditional but extremely valuable non-code contributions, and ways to nurture and recognise contributors (individual & organisational) across your community.

We’ll cover the 40,000ft project-wide level down to the level of teams, local communities and the individuals within the community. Fasten your seatbelts and let’s take off on this voyage of discovery!

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