Choosing the Right Events for your Community, given by Kara Sowles at OSCON 2014.

3. one day
conferences
parties
user groups
enormous
conference
contributor
events

5. LET’S HOLD AN
EVENT
FOR OUR
COMMUNITY

10. CONTRIBUTORS AUTHORS
USERS CODERS BEGINNERS
LEADERS DESIGNERS
HIGH SCHOOLERS TESTERS
EMPLOYEES CUSTOMERS

12. purpose

13. teach people something new
gather marketing leads
celebrate
encourage beginners to keep learning
meet users face-to-face
share your discoveries
learn from others
collaborate
increase transparency
gather feedback
fix something
share knowledgebuild something

16. Not a User
User
Super User
Contributor
Beginner
Intermediate
Advanced
Using Enterprise
Using Open Source
Must know Perl
Must know Ruby
Must know Clojure
Must know Elvish
(Tengwar only)

17. Full Day Event
Half Day Event
One Hour Event
Evening Event
Co-located w/
another event
Independent
Day after other
event
50 people
100 people
200 people
500 people
Presentations
Open Hacking
Demos
Discussion

19. some specific
types of events

20. collaborate
compete

21. contributor
events

22. one day
conferences
parties
user groups
enormous
conference
contributor
events

24. ONLINE
EVENTS

25. small one-day
conferences

27. setting expectations

28. YOU CAN SET
BOUNDARIES
YOU CAN SET
EXPECTATIONS

29. Text
..
YOU ARE A WARRIOR
SLAYING
IMPOSTOR SYNDROME
YOU ARE A
WARRIOR
SLAYING
IMPOSTOR
SYNDROME
YOU ARE A WARRIOR
SLAYING
IMPOSTOR SYNDROME

30. CODE
OF
CONDUCT

31. Alcohol
and
Inclusivity

32. Solutions
Consider a party that’s not in a bar
Drink list with equal alcoholic + non alcoholic
Advertise that event will have delicious alcohol
+ delicious non alcohol
Simply having ‘Coke’ doesn’t cut it!
Water clearly visible
Treat caffeine similarly - have other options

33. EVENT PAGE
WHO SHOULD PARTICIPATE
WHEN TO SHOW UP
FULL SCHEDULE
HOW TO PREPARE

34. NAME BADGES

35. Re-energizing
stagnant events

36. one day
conferences
parties
user groups
enormous
conference
contributor
events

37. Finding speakers

38. Finding speakers

39. Finding speakers

45. Repeat
Improve
Scale

47. planning
on-site problem solving

48. Document
everything
Document
Everything

49. Plan with the ability
to hand it off
Create permanent
resources
Record on-site
details

50. FEEDBACK

51. one day
conferences
parties
user groups
enormous
conference
contributor
events

52. Set expectations - and make
them clear to attendees
Build your event with clear
purpose that you can improve on
Document everything so you can
repeat, improve, and scale

53. kara@puppetlabs.com
@feynudibranch

54. heyyy!!
Many wonderful people made this talk possible!
A few specific ones - thank you!
Puppet Labs - for sending me here
Dawn Foster - for encouraging me to speak
Briana de Jong - for all you’ve taught me about events
Carina Zone - for support at events as I’ve started speaking
Connie Berardi - for helpful insights on events wch I incorporated
Mike Stahnke - for showing me that handwritten slides are totally ok
People at the Community Leadership Summit - for helpful insights I used
Meg Hartley, Sherri Dover, John Smith, and Aria Joughin - For invaluable
feedback on an early version of this talk
<3