By Jaz Parkyn on 2020-01-26 20:36 in Joomla! Volunteer Engagement Team

Forum for the Future: Re-Engage & Re-Ignite

Stream Facilitators: Jaz Parkyn and Brian Mitchell

In Person Attendees: Darek Snieg, Ed Hathaway, Hilda Abbing, Vikas Pisal, Marc Dechevre, Tabata Martinez, Bruce Lawson, Christopher Justice, Tim Davis, Guillermo Bravo, Andrea Gentil, Puneet Kala, Chris Keen, Hagen Graf, Brian Teeman, Laura Gordon, Davide Messia, Luca Marzo

Virtual Attendees: SD Williams, Troy Hall, Brian Rønnow, Olivier Buisard

After introductions had been made, we started off discussions by reviewing where we have been in terms of our achievements and challenges, and why we think Joomla exists. We then continued to brainstorm possible topics for the remainder of the forum, before exploring each in more detail.

Why does Joomla exist? Who cares?

• Opinions from the stream attendees:
• Community. It is great software.
• Because others did not, could not, have not.
• It has morphed into a community with followers that have a common goal that has moved beyond simply the software.
• Joomla exists so that a non-developer could build a system for a public library without any expertise from start to finish. And it was good. It has become a lifestyle, a community, a career.
• Why it used to exist - people wanted freedoms in every sense of the word. Now - people still want their freedoms but they want more... to extend, to learn, to give access to people that may not have all the technical skills. It exists because we are here. Joomla is as much of a gathering of people as it is a software.
• We all own Joomla and we can all influence Joomla. With closed platforms I have so much feedback but to whom or to where would it go? With Joomla my voice is heard. If you use it and you have ideas you can shape it, you own it.
• Joomla gives those without technical ability to use features like multi-lingual, security, etc. The community is keeping it alive. It is open source.
• To provide software that empowers everyone - no matter their income, education, language to be able to produce a website as good if not better than one that was beyond their budget. It does this by bringing people together from across the world to work together on a common goal
• Joomla exists as a CMS because people need a free open source solution. After Mambo, a group grew the software to meet the needs of these people.
• There is a huge community behind the CMS. That community improves and encourages other people to get involved and improve the CMS. Also, it improves the relationship between members of the community. Without the CMS there is no community. Without the community there is no CMS. I came for the CMS. I stayed for the community. And that is coming from a man that does not English.

Proposal Brainstorm

• Advocacy areas
  
  • Business
  • Education
• Improving the joomla.org homepage by adding more call to action links for contributing
  
  • ‘Join Us’
  • ‘Meet Joomla’
  • ‘Find Help’
• Better utilising the volunteers portal
• Should we encourage people to visit the central repository of English documentation
• Not ‘You should’ but ‘I will’
• Resources in different countries - localised vs centralised
• Virtual user group events
  
  • May lead to attending a physical event, which then may mean that they become involved with Joomla
  • Better connect users with common interests and objectives
• Getting outside non-Joomla people to attend events
• Next generation of Joomla volunteers
• Better communication tools
• Making life easier for new volunteers - what is our onboarding process?
• Opening doors and breaking barriers
• There are sometimes technical barriers for people to get involved in different aspects of the project, for example PBF.
• Possibility of brand ambassadors (for professionalism stream?)
• Global nature is sometimes challenging

Proposal 1: Call to Actions on joomla.org homepage

Why: Tell people about our fantastic community. Engage them, and encourage them to find out more. Make it easier for them to find out about Joomla and where to look for the right source of help.

What: Two new call to action buttons on the homepage, each linking to a landing page containing a grid of images and a line of text, each linking off to that particular item

1. ‘Meet Joomla’ - linking to:
   1. Events
   2. Usergroups
   3. Teams & Leadership
   4. Multilingual Communities
   5. Social Media
   6. History & Future of Joomla

Show people what Joomla is about in terms of its community - show who we are. Engage them further.

2. ‘Find Help’ - linking to:
   1. Resources
   2. Forum
   3. Extensions
   4. Documentation
   5. Showcase
   6. Trainin

Better direct users to different sources of help in order to help them solve their issues.

Who: Andrea Gentil & Guillermo Bravo

How:

• Further define the concept through liaising with other teams and market research
• Liaise with the marketing team for media resources and how it fits in with their goals for the homepage.

Short Term Goals (when):

• By February 21, 2020
  
  • Coordinate with Sandra and Eric manage content updates to the joomla.org homepage
• By March 21, 2020
  
  • Further define the concept

Proposal 2: Reformat JUG rules to allow Virtual User Groups

What: To allow virtual user groups centred around areas of common interest to complement and not replace geographical user groups.

• Non geographic, but instead common Interest based, must be related to
  • Joomla
  • Skillset
  • Faith
  • Language
  • Educational
  • Institutional
  • Extensions
  • Developer
  • Design
  • Location
• Less restrictions, but still needs approval
  
  • No need for a standalone website
  • No requirement for their own logo
  • Must meet at least once a year
  • Must be 2 contacts
• Make it easy to list events
• Think about limits on how many JUGs a person can run whilst still maintaining quality
• Centralised list of all events, tagged with
  
  • Language
  • Virtual or in-person or both
  • Timezone
• Common Interest
• Centralised repository of presentations and videos
• Updated Getting Started guide for JUG leads

Why: If we can get people interested in a virtual event, they may develop an interest in attending a physical event. Attendance at a physical event can lead to many things - hopefully we can then engage them in our community by encouraging them to become involved in the project and its activities.

Who: Jaz Parkyn and Darek Snieg

How:

• Present the concept to the Events and JUG teams to help further define
• Find out if some of the current restrictions can be made optional
• Adapt the Event Directory to list the virtual events
• Work with marketing to a social media campaign to gain awareness

Short-term Goals (when):

• By February 21, 2020:
  
  • Present the concept to the Events and JUG teams to help further define
  • Propose a Glip chatroom for all JUG leaders
• By March 21, 2020
  
  • Find out if some of the current restrictions can be made optional

Proposal 3: Establish Content Creator Exam

Resulting from a discussion centered around advocating to businesses, the concept of an End User Exam developed.

What:

• A simplified version of the Administrator Exam aimed at content creators / editors within businesses who already have a Joomla website
• Encourage Joomla website builders to introduce the Content Creator Exam to their clients to help their business to remain part of the ecosystem
• Talk to businesses to see if there is a want/need for the new exam type

Why: Encourage businesses who have a Joomla website to get one of their employees to prepare for and then sit a shorter, simplified exam focused on editing and managing content. This would allow an employee of a company to gain a 'badge' to confirm to their employers that they actually know about the system that their website is built on and therefore have the knowledge to keep it running and updated. They then become the Joomla person of their company, which then might lead to them waiting to know more. In turn, this then means that it is much more likely that the company will continue to use Joomla in years to come because the barrier of not understanding will be reduced.

Who: Laura Gordon and Chris Keen

How:

• Define an Content Creator Exam concept with the Certifications team, complimented by the other departments
• Work with training providers to create exam preparation materials
• Encourage Joomla website builders to introduce the Content Creator Exam to their clients to help their business to remain part of the ecosystem
• Talk to businesses to see if there is a want/need for the new exam type
• Create a social media campaign with the Marketing Team to announce and promote this

Short Term Goals (when):

• By February 21, 2020
  
  • Further define the concept and present a feasibility study
• By March 21, 2020
  
  • Define possible timeline for implementation

Proposal 4: Educational Outreach & Engagement

What:

• Focus on the next generation of Joomlers
• Different age groups
• Create teacher training packs and resources
• Create materials for JLPs

Why: To help increase awareness of Joomla in the minds of the next generation. Show them that web development doesn’t have to be clunky, but can be cool, interesting and innovative.

Who: Brian Mitchell and Laura Gordon

How:

• Liaise with educational institutions
• Find out what teaching resources are currently being used and collate to develop a curriculum
• Work out how to incentivise
  
  • Lead into the Content Creator Exam
  • Link to Virtual User Groups
• Build a working group of mentors & stakeholders

Short Term Goals (when):

• By February 21, 2020
  
  • Reach out to community members who have already been involved in the education sector
  • Set first meeting time and connect with initial stakeholders
• By March 21, 2020
  
  • Hold the first meeting of initial stakeholders and roadmap delivery of initial educational experience

Next Steps

Arrange a voice call in approx 6 weeks time to review progress

Summary

Joomla is a community and a software product - one cannot exist without the other. The Re-Engage & Re-Ignite team brainstormed a number of topics centered around increasing people’s awareness of Joomla and encouraging them to get involved. This starts by making better use of the call to action links on the joomla.org homepage - ‘Meet Joomla’ and ‘Find Help’. It continues by encouraging people to get involved by attending a Virtual User Group, or by sitting a Content Creator Exam. Both provide advantages to businesses that use Joomla, as well as the Joomla ecosystem itself. The ecosystem can be further nurtured by defining and expanding Educational Outreach initiatives. Joomla powers people and people power Joomla - the balance needs to be restored.