How could Five for the Future connect company time with the teams that need it? David Bissetcolleague brought me up as a speaker during Post Status Comments No. 4, a live audio discussion after State of the Word 2021. I talked about contributor days and the ideas Andrea Middletoncolleague had left for the program.
🎙️ Episode details
- Show: Post Status Comments, No. 4, “State of the Word 2021 Analysis”
- Host: David Bisset
- Topics: Five for the Future, Andrea Middleton’s proposals, and contributor days that match skills to needs
- My role: invited speaker during the live discussion, about 44 minutes in
- Published: December 16, 2021
- Episode page: Post Status Comments No. 4, with a transcript
🧩 Andrea’s last post on Five for the Future
Andrea Middleton was in the audience. I pointed listeners to her post on the Make WordPress project blog with suggested iterations for Five for the Future, including ways to connect company pledges with the specific teams that need work done.
🧑💻 Contributor days that match skills to needs
I’d taken part in about five contributor days that year for the Training team, all virtual and tied to WordCamps or similar events. There, I praised Yoast’s model: reach out to each Make team before the day, collect tasks, then split contributors into groups, partly online and partly in person.
Also, I said GoDaddy, my employer, had helped through its Five for the Future funding and sponsorships, including Post Status. So I wanted to run contributor days through Post Status the same way, open to the wider community, because teams were struggling. COVID had set back event attendance, and fewer contributors were showing up to do the work.
🧪 What can you take for Five for the Future?
- Companies: before a contributor day, ask team reps for a task list and match it to your staff’s skills.
- Contributors: read the Five for the Future proposals on Make WordPress before pledging your time.
Also, more conversations like this one live in my podcast and speaking archive.
🗓️ Archival note
Post Status published this discussion on December 16, 2021. Then I added this post on November 9, 2026, from the publisher’s transcript, which shows my segment beginning about 44 minutes in. However, I reviewed the transcript, not the audio.