Improving the Quality of DrupalCon Programming

DrupalCon, We Have a Problem

As a community that has experienced rapid growth in a very short time, we’ve very quickly gone from conferences that consisted of a couple dozen people getting together for a few beers to international events that attract thousands of people from around the world. As DrupalCons have grown, not only have their audiences become more diverse, but their reasons for attending have changed as well.

DrupalCon is no longer just a gathering for the core community, it’s also a place where new people come to learn more about Drupal from the best and brightest minds in the community. While these people aren’t necessarily as passionate about Drupal as the rest of us, they are nonetheless investing a lot of time and energy to attend DrupalCon, and when they end up in a session with a speaker who hasn’t spent enough time preparing the presentation, it reflects poorly not only on the speaker, but also on Drupal and the community as a whole.

For the last few DrupalCons, we’ve been asking attendees to not only fill out a survey rating their DrupalCon experience, but also provide ratings and comments on individual sessions. I’ve spent the last few weeks looking through the information we’ve collected, and the results confirm what many of us in the community have suspected for some time: while many DrupalCon sessions are great, there are also many sub-par sessions by speakers who are disorganized and unprepared. Here’s a few representative survey comments from the last couple of DrupalCon surveys:

"Get better speakers. Too many people did not plan their presentations, so I didn't get much out of it. Have them be more specific in advance about what they'll be covering."

"Many speakers seemed to have no public speaking experience at all. They rushed through presentations in a monotone, glossed over code when I wanted detailed examination of code, and generally just didn't explain themselves very well."

"I travelled from Singapore on my own cost. Some of the speakers adopted the attitude that since its open source they didn't need to prepare and present in an organized, focussed [sic] and clear fashion. That was a disappointment."

What’s even worse is that these kinds of comments are not just restricted to a few sessions; even some of the best public speakers in the Drupal community are getting dinged for insufficient preparation and disorganized presentations. This is clearly a widespread problem.

But I’m a Web Developer, not a Talk Show Host!

One easy way to solve this problem would simply be to only select presenters who are known to be good public speakers. But doing that would go against many of the values that Drupal and DrupalCon stand for; first and foremost that this is a community where anyone and everyone can participate. Futhermore, one of the things that sets DrupalCon apart from other technology conferences is the passion that our core community members have for sharing their knowledge with others, and many who of those who are widely recognized as some of the best and brightest in the community are not necessarily some of its best public speakers.

So we needed to find a solution that both encourages presenters who are already good speakers as well as provides support for those who are less-experienced or less-polished presenters who have knowledge and insights to share.

The Plan

At the beginning of this year, shortly after Chicago was formally selected as the venue for the North American DrupalCon in 2011, the organizing committee sat down to talk about how session selection and programming would be handled at DrupalCon Chicago. Our conversation was informed by numerous conversations we’d had with other people both in and out of the community, a frank analysis of what worked and didn’t work at past DrupalCons, and our experiences speaking at other large technology conferences.

Speaker co-chairs Matt Farina (mfer) and Greg Dunlap (heyrocker) then went back and created a “Programming Manifesto” that outlined the overall principles that would guide our process:

• Being more transparent about the process and principles behind session selection and voting;
• Providing better tools for attendees to evaluate in advance what sessions they should go to;
• Choosing sessions by a publicly announced combination of curation and voting (i.e., not all sessions will be subject to public vote, which means that lesser-known speakers won't have to compete against the "big names" for votes);
• Limiting the number of sessions that any single individual can participate in, so that they can focus on making sure their presentations are of the highest quality possible;
• Taking into account attendee feedback and ratings from past DrupalCons when making speaker selections;
• Making sure that less experienced or polished presenters receive mentorship and guidance earlier in the process, and encouraging them to team up with more experienced presenters for panel discussions
  Communicating better with attendees about which sessions are appropriate for different audiences (evaluators, developers, designers, etc.);
• Doing our best to ensure that introductory sessions are well-polished and presented by people with a proven track record, as this is where we make our first impression to people new to the community
• Recognizing that there are different expectations for sessions focused at existing Drupal community members than there are for sessions targeted at new or more casual attendees, and doing a better job of identifying which is which.

These principles, the session selection process, and additional information are explained in more detail in the Speaker FAQ that will be shared with all prospective speakers for DrupalCon Chicago. These principles have also informed everything from our venue plan to our marketing strategy for the conference: while there are many reasons to attend DrupalCon, we believe that quality content is one of the most important.

Making DrupalCon Both Bigger and Smaller

One piece of feedback that we’ve heard over and over again from recent DrupalCons is that the conferences have gotten “too big”, and that we’re losing the intimate feel that characterized earlier community gatherings. Given that Chicago may well draw more attendees than any previous DrupalCon, we’re keenly aware of this issue, and are working on ways to make sure that the the conference is fulfilling not just for a mass audience, but also for veteran community members.

One of the things that we’re working on right now is a special “Core Conversations” track where Drupal core contributors and community members can meet for more conversational sessions about the future of Drupal and its community, much as earlier DrupalCons where places where interested and engaged individuals could gather to share ideas and insights. Presentations in this track would be finalized much close to the date of the conference than those in the “traditional” session tracks.

In addition to these “Core Conversations”, DrupalCon Chicago will also feature its own exhibit hall Day Stage, which will be the venue for exclusive content such as lightning talks, Drupal author presentations, case studies, sponsor demonstrations, and other unique and entertaining programming that doesn’t fit neatly into the regular session schedule.

Being Prepared

One of the major common themes that we’ve seen in negative speaker comments from past DrupalCons is not that the speakers themselves were bad, it was that they were unprepared, or their presentations weren’t well organized.

We believe that this issue can be alleviated greatly with just a few simple steps. First, we will be finalizing the session schedule for DrupalCon Chicago much earlier than in past years; this not only helps out prospective attendees who would like to know what kind of sessions will be offered before they purchase their tickets, it also gives speakers more time to prepare their sessions.

Second, DrupalCon Chicago is committed to providing a high level of support for its speakers. Our track chairs will work with presenters in the months and weeks leading up to the conference to make sure their session preparations are on track and that the session content matches the description in the conference program. We will be available to answer any questions, provide any assistance, or connect speakers with other community members who can help out.

We’ll also have on-site resources for speakers to make sure that they have everything they need to give the best presentation possible. One of these will be the Green Room, a special speakers-only room that provides a place for presenters to go over their slides and make any final preparations before the start of their session. The Green Room will be stocked with refreshments and is located adjacent to the restrooms. We’ll be asking speakers to check into the Green Room a half-hour before their session starts to make sure they’re on-site, on-time, and have everything they need to hit the ground running.

Another way to ensure speakers can focus on being prepared is by making sure they’re not overwhelmed with having too many sessions to present. Limiting the number of regular sessions that speakers can participate in also has the advantage of enabling other, less well-known members of the community to have an opportunity to present at DrupalCon. Speakers who do want to do more will have the opportunity to participate in Core Conversations, the Day Stage, BoFs and more. Our goal is to provide more ways for people to participate in DrupalCon than ever before.

Where You Come In

These are just a few of the things that we’re doing to make sure that DrupalCon Chicago is a conference that works for everyone, regardless of whether they’ve been involved with Drupal since the beginning, or just found out about it last week. If you have ideas that you’d like to share with us, we encourage you to share them in the comments below or via the contact form on the DrupalCon Chicago website. While we won’t be able to take advantage of every good idea that comes along, we want to make sure that the community has a voice in the process to help make make Chicago the best DrupalCon yet!