The first-ever Umbraco MVP Summit kicked off just before Codegarden 2025. It was the first event of it's kind, exclusive to the Umbraco MVPs. The purpose was to bring together MVPs to share ideas, knowledge, plans and feedback - while also connecting with friendly faces from the Product, Engineering, and DevRel-teams at Umbraco HQ. If you couldn’t join us in person - don’t worry! In this blog post you get to follow along on the first-ever Umbraco MVP Summit.
Setting the stage
The venue of the Umbraco MVP Summit was located just a short walk from Odense city centre. The entrance was easy to find: a big unicorn-balloon was greeting the MVPs when they arrived, making it impossible to miss 🦄
Upon stepping through the doors, everyone was greeted by the obligatory high-fives from the friendly HQ-attendees. This year, everyone's name tags were printed on actual floppy discs - a fun twist that added a hint of mystery - what was on these floppy discs? Sebastiaan had big plans, but it would not be revealed until Codegarden started a few days later... 🕵️
Back to the MVP Summit - the day started off with lots of coffee and lots of catching up with new and old friends. This year, a whopping 25 new MVPs has been announced, and 86 MVPs have been renewed, making the total number of Umbraco MVPs 111! Sadly but understandable, not everyone was able to make it to the MVP Summit - but 62 MVPs came and gave their valuable insigts and feedback in the casual open circle chats!
Lanyards and floppy discs for the name tags
Matt Brailsford giving a talk about how to create a neurodivergent-friendly workplace in front of MVPs
On Linkedin, Matt elaborates on the experience of sharing his story
"Honestly, this was a big deal for me as it was the first time I’ve ever publicly shared my own ND story after getting diagnosed last year. I won’t lie, it was pretty nerve-wracking putting myself out there like that, but you all made it so much easier with how welcoming and engaged you were.
What really blew me away was how many of you reached out afterwards. So many of you are navigating similar journeys yourselves or supporting ND family members, friends and colleagues. Hearing your stories and knowing I’m not alone in this has been incredibly meaningful. Whether you’re figuring things out after your own late diagnosis, advocating for others, or just trying to understand better – every conversation has reminded me why sharing these experiences matters."
- Matt Brailsford
How to create a neurodivergent-friendly workplace by Matt Brailsford
Before the open circle chats started, Matt Brailsford gave us all an amazing and inspiring talk about how to create a neurodivergent-friendly workplace. Luckily for everyone, Matt was also able to give his talk a second time for non-MVPs because of a last-minute cancellations in the Codegarden lineup! For people who weren't present for Matt's talk, it is recorded and can be watched online here on SpotMe. It is well worth a watch for everyone!
To give a quick summary of the talk, Matt was diagnosed last year (2024) at the age of 44 with autism, ADHD and dyslexia. In his talk, he explains how he in retrospect can see all the signs of being neurodivergent, and how he struggled to fit in, especially in a workplace environment. He advocates for better work environments for neurodivergent people, and shows how even small changes can make a big impact. Matt has illustrated his talk with wonderfully funny and relatable illustrations, and does a great job at being both serious, inspiring and hilarious at the same time. We send a big #H5YR to Matt!
Matt standing next to the unicorn balloons on stage
MVPs sitting and listening to Matt Brailsfords talk on neurodiversity
Time for some hacking!
Connecting, sharing, and shaping the future
The main part of the MVP Summit revolved around several open circle chats, created to give room to everyone present to speak and collaborate with each other. The open circle chats revolved around the following topics:
- Bellissima Backoffice Development & Extensions
- Headless use cases and best practices
- Backoffice Editor Experience
- Community Growth & Engagement
- Version Migration & Adoption Barriers
- Training & Educational Resources
- AI Integration & Innovation
- Meetups & Events
- Package Development & Community Contributions
- Content Modeling
- What features are missing in Umbraco
Now, let's explore what results came from some of the open circle chats!
Open circle chats
We also had time to have some fun in the sun at the MVP Summit!
A quick recap of Community Growth & Engagement
We realized that while many people use our platform, they aren't actively engaging with the community. So, how do we reach out and attract those who haven’t joined the conversation (yet)?
One of the key ideas we discussed was leveraging the dashboard as a way to connect with users by showing relevant information for newcomers about upcoming meetups or other community events to attend - and maybe even consider a dashboard design overhaul.
Our conversation delved into the challenges faced by junior developers - the big ones right now being layoffs and AI disruptions. We see a real chance here to support new talent, whether they’re boot camp graduates or even secondary school students.
Ultimately, many of us join the community for the educational value and end up staying for the people. To keep that momentum, we need a clear funnel from events like conferences to meetups and ongoing community participation.
A quick recap of Training & Educational Resources
We’re aiming to make learning at Umbraco more fun and useful. First up, we’ve discussed creating Umbraco v17 Learning Days, which would be global hybrid events across multiple locations in the world. These events would focus on new features added between v13 and v17, such as the hybrid cache.
We talked about improving the Umbraco Docs to make them more functional and neutral, focusing on what something does, not how or why.
We discussed the making of a platform where users can submit questions and requests for information on how to approach something. The requests would then go into a queue, where other community members could upvote requests relevant for them. The top items would then become the basis for workshops or blog posts.
A round circle chat
Lotte taking a picture of post-it notes with ideas for the new community website
Post it notes with ideas for the new Umbraco Community Website
Hopes & Dreams for the new community website
A big task for the DevRel-team after Codegarden week is to revamp the Umbraco Community Website, so we made sure to create a post-it wall where all the MVPs could contribute with their ideas, hopes and dreams for the new community website.
Among the many ideas were:
- Promoting localized meetups and events better to increase visibility of the meetups and hopefully attendance as well.
- Make sure the new website is accessible and inclusive - also for non-developers.
- Make a MVP directory with bios/info/links for MVPs, coupled with opinionated blog posts/a blog post feed by MVPs.
- Package author/contributor profile pages.
- Searchable and filterable community blog posts and feature community videos.
- More training materials - problem-focused instead of function-focused. A list of common problems that can be solved with Umbraco including examples of how to solve them. Case studies and lots of examples.
- Dedicated section for the community teams to post updates.
- Meaningful integrations of services such as the forum and GitHub to put them front and centre and highlight their importance for the community.
- Speaker stuff - how to, where to, and generally helping speakers speak for/promote Umbraco. Speaker profiles from people who want to speak at events, including videos.
Let's not forget to follow up!
As we wrap up the first-ever Umbraco MVP Summit, let's not forget that the things we discussed will need to get carried forward from the summit into the work we all do year-round. Over the next few weeks, the DevRel team will set aside dedicated time to revisit the action points identified in the summit and find out what, when, and and how to follow up - together with any MVPs who'd like to join us. Whether it's verifying what's already underway or pinpointing where we need fresh momentum, this follow-up will ensure our conversations turn into lasting impact.
Finally, we would like to say a big thank you to the MVPs who came and participated in this event! Your dedication to Umbraco is extremely valuable and so very appreciated. #H5YR!
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Written by: Mathilde Høst from the DevRel-team Published: June 25, 2025 |