As we’re really close to open our Call for Speakers, to encourage more applicants to WordCamp London, we have brainstormed some of the most popular questions about applying to speak and we’ve done our best to answer them here for you.<\/p>\n
If there is anything you feel we have missed, or something you think is worth adding – please leave us a comment below.<\/p>\n
YES! The stage is set for a wonderful variety of speakers. We are open to the full spectrum of\u00a0session formats and encourage you to submit anything from standard slide\u00a0presentations to panels, demonstrations, and more.<\/p>\n
Whatever your idea, we’d love to hear it.<\/p>\n
We encourage a variety of session formats, which include, but are not limited to;<\/p>\n
Don’t hesitate to get creative and submit a session format you think might be interesting!<\/p>\n
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All speakers will receive a complimentary ticket to the entire event, including the Social and free use of the cr\u00e8che.<\/p>\n
We want to be flexible about creating our schedule so we’re really willing to look into a session you suggest that falls outside these categories. To encourage a diversity of submissions we’ve included the following in the speakers application:<\/p>\n
Yes! We love to support our speakers, and all invited speakers will be asked if they would like to participate in the speakers\u00a0mentoring programme<\/strong>. The mentor’s role is to help and support the speakers leading up to the event. This can include support overcome nerves, reviewing presentations, as well as providing general support and encouragement.<\/p>\n Every speaker who chooses will be assigned a mentor in advance of the event, and will be encouraged to be in touch with their mentor for feedback, advice and support as they prepare for their presentations.<\/p>\n Although we encourage speakers to hangout with attendees and enjoy the event, we also understand that sometimes as a speaker, you need space. We\u00a0have arranged a green room<\/strong> where you can relax and go through your presentation at any time during the course of the event.<\/p>\n We are thrilled to have our organisers, Diane Wallace<\/a>, Annabelle Woodger<\/a> and Gary Jones<\/a> taking care of our speakers. Diane will be the speakers’ main contact to the entire WordCamp London organising team and any questions should be directed to the Speakers team\u00a0by email<\/a>.<\/p>\n Not in the slightest<\/strong>! If you have a topic that is interesting, then we would love to hear from you.<\/p>\n We are committed to helping you share your experience, idea or knowledge; we hope that everything we’ve put in place will serve to support our speakers in contributing to an incredible WordCamp.<\/p>\n Anything you like! The WordPress ecosystem and community do such a variety of different things with WordPress\u2014whether that’s designing, writing content, building businesses or adding features and functionality\u2014we want to hear it all!<\/p>\n Tell us your stories of success and growth, but don’t be afraid to also tell us of your worst experiences and how you turned them around. We can all learn from each other!<\/p>\n All the talks we’ve picked in the past\u2014and will be picking this year\u2014are all about helping the WordPress community be the best they can be. As a diverse community, we share a range of interests, skills, knowledge and experiences, so not every talk will have WordPress at the core.<\/p>\n Similarly, if your talk has some connection to WordPress, or is directly about WordPress itself, we would love to hear from you!<\/p>\n As much or as little as you want. As a loose recommendation, we’d suggest you submit an abstract of a maximum of three paragraphs.<\/p>\n To get a better idea of what makes a submission successful, take a look at these abstracts from past editions. You should give us a taster of what your talk is about, but you don’t need to give everything away.<\/p>\n Example 1:\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n WordPress Coding Standards have been around for a while, yet many developers don\u2019t write code with them, let alone know they exist. This was the case with me until September 2015 when I made the switch, and now I wish I\u2019d dived in earlier! In this talk I\u2019ll explain what they are, how they will help you write better, cleaner and more secure PHP code and why you should be using them for all WordPress projects. Then I\u2019ll show you how to introduce these into your development workflow using two of the most popular IDEs around \u2014 Sublime Text 3 and Atom Editor on OSX\u2014 along with the necessary tools required to get up and running with the minimum of fuss.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Example 2:\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n Not sure what user experience (UX) is? (Neither am I). Or whether it matters to you? (It TOTALLY does!) Or why it’s important? (Let’s find out!). I’m not a UX expert, but I don’t think you have to be: we should all be thinking about how people interact with the things that we make. Let’s take a really (really!) simple web app, tear it apart, and realise that UX is hard, very important, and definitely worth thinking about. Expect tips, links, resources, door handles, cars, small children, and possibly a little WordPress.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n <\/p>\n Yes! This will significantly increase your chances of being accepted and give us a wider variety of talks to select from.<\/p>\n But don’t worry\u2014we will never ask you to do more than one talk.<\/p>\nQ: Who will be in charge of wrangling speakers?<\/h2>\n
Q: Does it matter if you haven\u2019t spoken at a conference before?<\/h2>\n
Q: What\u00a0should people\u00a0talk about?<\/h2>\n
Q: Do talks have to be WordPress related?<\/h2>\n
Q: How much detail should be included in speaker\u00a0applications?<\/h2>\n
Q: Can\u00a0you submit more than one talk?<\/h2>\n
Q: How do I submit my application?<\/h2>\n