What Wikimedia UK’s Trainers Skills Lab taught me about building resilient communities

This month, Wikimedia UK (WMUK) hosted a skills lab for volunteer trainers who had previously participated in the chapter’s Train the Trainer course. Train the Trainer is run annually by WMUK, equipping wikimedians with the skills to deliver workshops and training events to attract new editors through an online course and in-person component. After volunteers complete this program, WMUK provides ongoing support like mentorship and further training like this month’s skills lab hosted in Birmingham and online.

Understanding how to build resilient communities of wikimedians capable of thriving over the next 25 years has been woven into the fabric of discussions throughout this momentous anniversary year. WMUK’s Trainers’ Skills Lab was no exception and opened with a session from Sara Thomas and Rupal Karia that discussed spotting and preventing burnout, digital hygiene, navigating challenging spaces, and how understanding the motivations that drive editors’ contributions can help turn casual editors into committed ones. 

I found the discussions on tools to spot and prevent burnout particularly powerful because not only are they highly relevant to the wikimedia movement but provide lessons applicable across many spaces that the movement overlaps with, such as climate action and sustainability. You can find the resources from the Volunteer Support Network that Sara and Rupal shared on Meta-wiki. 

Burnout can manifest in many ways. In its most obvious form, it might look like reduced engagement and longer response times than usual, withdrawal, or becoming easily overwhelmed and snappy with others. It can also look like over-commitment, where a volunteer agrees to do more than is feasible – a workload they cannot ultimately sustain. Similarly, it can have many causes: negative on-wiki experiences, feeling your work is not valued, or feeling that you have to do something as it will not get done if you do not do it, rather than truly wanting to. 

During discussions, someone said something that struck me as highly relatable: many of us have internal managers who would be hauled into Human Resources if they were in a workplace, rather than our brain. As we all try to juggle our contributions and ambitions as volunteers alongside work, studies, and day-to-day life, it can be challenging not to listen to this voice, yet it is essential to strike a balance and find a sustainable pace. 

The session offered helpful solutions. First, building a community where volunteers know that it is ok to stop, take a break, and that they can say no. Secondly, developing a nourishing, mutual relationship among volunteers by celebrating contributions (pressing the ‘thank’ button can have a great effect here!), and taking time to meet just for fun rather than for a task. 

In the afternoon, the focus shifted from developing as communities to developing as individuals by providing space for trainers to share expertise from across projects: Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons, Wikidata, and Diff.  

Over a year after I finished WMUK’s Train the Trainer program, it was a pleasure to return to Birmingham and, this time, to have the opportunity to share my skills by delivering a session on writing Diff posts. Above all, I wanted my fellow trainers to take this away: don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good. A Diff post doesn’t need to be endlessly polished to be worthwhile, be it through painstaking revisions or through editing with generative AI; what is most valuable is sharing your unique experience in your own, authentic voice. In doing so, you can grow as a wikimedian through reflection, help others in the movement learn, and represent your community’s contributions, joys, and challenges.

Covering a wide range of skills over the afternoon, I particularly enjoyed learning about the many ways to contribute to Wikimedia Commons, beyond what the project is best known for – uploading images. After uploading my first image to Commons earlier that day, I was excited to understand more about the less obvious ways to contribute and I hope that the ideas Sumit Surai shared in his session ‘Wikimedia Commons beyond Photography’ will inspire you too. 

Sumit covered a range of tasks for volunteers: organising campaigns (one I was already familiar with thanks to Wiki Science), scanning public domain books to create an accessible digital library, writing descriptions for uploaded images (including translating descriptions into other languages), categorising images, recording audio books, and even documenting cultural heritage. Sumit emphasised the need for volunteers willing to do these tasks, as photographers aren’t always so keen on them. 

As Wikipedia’s 25th anniversary year enters its final quarter, the inspiration from lessons taught by WMUK’s Trainers’ Skills Lab can help the chapter’s volunteer trainers like me and, by extension, other organisers in the wikimedia community remain resilient as we embark on the next 25 years of open knowledge. Over a year on from my completion of the program, I highly encourage any wikimedian who is looking to bring others into the movement but doesn’t know where to start to participate in Wikimedia UK’s Train the Trainer program.