2016 was a success, but we need your help to make 2017 even better

I’m Tom J Nowell, and I’m the lead organiser for WordCamp Manchester 2017!

But a bigger, better conference means more organisers, and fresh blood. Our goal is to finalise the organising team ready for an application to WordCamp Central, and an initial meeting on January 16th 2017.

With that in mind, I’m looking for people to help fill and support the following organising roles responsible for:

• Speakers
  We need people to help run the call for speakers, make sure they have the support they need before and during the conference, and be their general point of contact
• Volunteers
  Volunteers give their time on the conference week, and need guidance. We need people to wrangle a call for volunteers, assign duties and make sure that the day itself runs smoothly
• Sponsors
  We need someone to take care of all things sponsors. A dedicated person or people to look after sponsors, and make sure all their questions are answered. They’ll also be responsible for sponsor needs on the day of the conference, and being a point of contact
• Communications
  Siobhan will be leading communications, but she needs help! Twitter, Facebook, mailing lists, blog posts, these all need planning and writing are a big part of this role, as well as the marketing side of things. If you feel you can contribute in this area, this is the role for you
• Design and Printing
  2016 gave us a fabulous logo and website design to build branding on, but 2017 will need lanyard badges, slides, posters, volunteer t-shirts
• Website
  This website may be pretty but we need somebody to maintain and QA the website, if you’re good at web admin and know how to write CSS, this is the role for you.
• Swag
  This year we had stickers and umbrellas, but wrangling those took a lot of time, enough that we’d like somebody to spearhead 2017 swag
• Venue and Catering
  We want somebody to be the point of call for the venue on the day. If something goes missing, or something is needed they’ll be the point of call. This person will work with the multiple venues and catering in the run up to the conference, wrangling food and rooms, and leading the Happiness bar
• Internal Docs and Coms
  I’m planning for weekly slack meetings, but these will need somebody to help run them, write up summaries, and make sure important things and processes are written down for the future.
• Finances
  Hugo will be leading finances this year, but he needs help! You’ll also be helping find hidden expenses and making sure people stick to the budget
• Contributor Day
  We need a contributor day team, they’ll be responsible for finding people to lead individual categories and teaching people how to contribute. We’re also interested in helping people set up beforehand via MWUG and the clinics they run

If you think you can fill a role, if you’re interested in shadowing an organiser to train up for the future, or if you can take a minor role in a sub-team, let us know in the form below! We don’t have an upper limit on how many people can take these roles, but each one will have a single lead position responsible for delegating.

Remember, all meetings will be open to the public, if you’re interested in expressing an opinion without a role you’ll be able to do this and ask questions on Slack. If you have any questions about the roles listed and what’s involved, don’t hesitate to contact us via the contact form, twitter, slack, or in person.

Experience?

While prior experience is a bonus, it isn’t required to apply. We expect that some organisers will be trained up to help with 2018, and we all have differences in skills and experiences. What matters is that you’re making a commitment and can help

Volunteers

We understand volunteers have shown a big interest, 2016 had so many volunteers approach before we put our call for volunteers out that we had everybody we needed. We have plans for a wider range of volunteer roles to help out on the week of the conference, but the call for volunteers will be next year once we have the 2017 website and approval from Central.

If you want to be keep in touch, watch the Slack channel, attend MWUG, and follow our twitter account.

Weekly Slack Meetings

Starting from Monday January 16th, we’ll be holding a weekly chat in Slack on Mondays at 6PM. The first order of topic will be future timing for all involved. We’ll be using the public #wordcamp-manchester channel.

There are details here on how to join the UK Community slack, but if you’re having trouble track us down at MWUG or any other local user group and someone will get you up and running.

2017 and the Future

As the lead organiser for 2017 I’m hoping to see a larger conference and a better experience for all. My hope is to be the counterweight in the north to a successful WordCamp London that I can hand over to our 2018 lead Hugo. As great as 2016 was, I feel that there’s a lot of polish to be done and I want to leave WordCamp Manchester with solid, thorough foundations.

I’m hoping to hold a conference of ~300 attendees in October 2017. We’ll be holding public weekly meetings in the UK Community slack in the #wordcamp-manchester channel, and we’d like involvement from across the north of England. We’re also moving to a .com P2 for internal communication, and writing a handbook.

I don’t want to say too much right now, but if you’ve any suggestions, or things you want to see in 2017, let us know in the comments or in the usual contact channels.

Thanks to everybody who attended 2016 and helped make this possible, and I’ll see you next year!