GitLab Notable Contributor Selection Process

Process for Contributor Success to select GitLab Notable Contributors

GitLab Notable Contributor

Each month GitLab recognizes one or more community contributors as the GitLab Notable Contributor to be featured in the GitLab release post. This was formerly known as GitLab MVP (“Most Valuable Person”). Nominations are a rolling process so that contributors can be nominated and supported at anytime. The GitLab Notable Contributors are recognized within the GitLab release post and across Slack and Discord. Notable Contributors also receive an achievement badge for their profile and GitLab swag credits in celebration of their contribution.

Hall of fame list of GitLab Notable Contributors
Release posts on GitLab blog

Workflow for selecting GitLab Notable Contributor

A rolling GitLab Notable Contributor nominations issue is used for the entire major release cycle (for example 18.0 through 18.11). Community contributors can be added to this issue at anytime.
Use the notable_contributor_workflow_tracker.md issue template to create an issue with a checklist of steps to follow during the selection process.
Select one or more eligible Notable Contributors from the nomination issue.
- Selections should be chosen based on contribution and community impact, nomination comments and emoji votes.
- Selections should be completed at least 10 calendar days before the release date.
If this is is a minor release version, use the existing thread in the nominations issue announcing the Notable Contributor winner.
- Be sure to ping and thank the nominators and anyone who added supportive comments for the nominees.
- Add the Notable Contributor to the table in the top level description of the issue.
```
:tada: Congratulations to our X.Y Notable Contributor award winner X https://gitlab.com/x
Note about X's contributions.

A huge thank you to A B and C for nominating Notable Contributors and X Y and Z for adding support.
```
From the current release branch, draft a merge request for adding the new Notable Contributor
- The first step is switching to the current release branch release-x-y in the www-gitlab-org project. Using the 15.8 release as an example, navigate to the current release branch directly on GitLab by selecting the release-15-8 branch from the dropdown menu. If working locally, checkout the release-15-8 branch.
- Navigate to the mvp.yml file inside the current release folder under data/release_posts/x_y. In this example it would be the 15_8 folder which has a placeholder mvp.yml file inside.
  - NOTE: When there are multiple Notable Contributors, please use array syntax in the yaml files, when singular please avoid array syntax. Examples:
```
  fullname: Single Recipient
  gitlab: single_username
```
```
  fullname: ['First Recipient', 'Second Recipient']
  gitlab: ['first_username', 'second_username']
```
- Begin drafting the merge request by updating the new Notable Contributor name and user handle. Remove the placeholder text for the write-up blurb. Commit the changes on a new branch. When creating the merge request on GitLab make sure your branch is targeting the current release branch release-x-y and not targeting master.
- Follow the steps to collaborate the Notable Contributor write-up blurb.
- Add release version, Notable Contributor name, user handle, release post date and release post URL.
- Assign another Contributor Success team member to review/merge and double check the merge request is targeting the correct release branch.
- Ping the release post manager into the MR for awareness.
- Merge by the Tuesday of release week.
Add the Notable Contributor to the Recipients section of the Notable Contributors platform page
- Update notable-contributors.md in the contributors-gitlab-com project
- Follow the existing version and date format to link to the #notable-contributor header of the upcoming release post page
- Follow the existing format to link to the winner’s GitLab profile
- If more than one winner, use an inline line break <br> to separate contributor names
- Use the feature changelog trailer in the commit message to generate release notes
- Merge and deploy prior to the live release post date
Award the Notable Contributor winner with the Notable Contributor achievement by running the following query in GraphiQL. (You will need to be a Maintainer of the Achievements Group. By default Contributor Success team members should have rights.) If there are no errors, you have succeeded! You can also verify the achievement by visiting the MVP’s GitLab profile.
```
mutation {
  achievementsAward(
    input: {achievementId: "gid://gitlab/Achievements::Achievement/53", userId: "gid://gitlab/User/<user id>"}
  ) {
    userAchievement {
      id
      achievement {
        id
        name
      }
      user {
        id
        username
      }
    }
    errors
  }
}
```
NOTE: To find a userId from a username, visit the GitLab profile page for the user and click the dropdown ellipsis (kebab menu) in the upper right corner.
Follow the steps for Sending Notable Contributor Rewards.

After release post goes live, link the Notable Contributor section of the release post in Slack #whats-happening-at-gitlab channel along with a reminder to add new nominations.

:mega: Check out our latest GitLab Notable Contributors X & Y in the X.Y release post!
You can nominate community contributors in the rolling nominations issue here: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/developer-relations/contributor-success/team-task/-/issues/?label_name%5B%5D=Notable%20contributor%20nominations
Please add any community contributors throughout the year whenever you see a helpful contribution. Your support now will help them when they make future contributions to GitLab too!

Forward the message to #developer-relations, #mr-coaching, and #core
Share the message in the Discord #announcements channel and thank any wider community members who added nominations or support.
Update the nomination issue and the nominated thread to document the winner.

Notable Contributor Eligibility

The Contributor Success team will make the final choice on the GitLab Notable Contributor award selection.
The Contributor Success team will consider one or more Notable Contributors as appropriate.
A contributor is eligible to be Notable Contributor once per major release cycle. For example, if they are Notable Contributor during any 17.* milestone, they cannot be a Notable Contributor again until the 18.0 milestone.
View past Notable Contributors on the contributor platform.
Contributors may be nominated whether they have contributed to the current release cycle or not. Contributors are recognized for previous and ongoing contributions to GitLab.
- E.g. See the 15.8 Notable Contributor selected for prior release work and the 15.7 Notable Contributor selected for steady contributions.

Notable Contributor Write-Up Blurb

Use the data/release_posts/x_y/mvp.yml merge request to collaborate on the Notable Contributor write-up with the Notable Contributor winner, nominator and other team members.

The Notable Contributor write-up section should:

Contain a brief description of the Notable Contributor’s contributions to GitLab.
Links to relevant issues, MRs, issue boards or epics the Notable Contributor contributed to.
Links for the nominator and/or supporters with quotes about the Notable Contributor.
A quote or any details from the Notable Contributor if provided.
The role or organization of the Notable Contributor if provided.
Contributor Success is responsible for reviewing the entry for:
- Consistency and accuracy
- Correct and working links for user information, issues, MRs, etc.
- Correct spelling of names, organizations, product features, etc.
- Correct prounoun usage
The write-up should be merged by the Tuesday of release week to the data/release_posts/x_y/mvp.yml file targeting the specific release branch

You can use the sample message below when pinging the Notable Contributor winner and team members into the merge request:

Hi **{WINNER}** :wave:

Congrats on being selected as GitLab's **{X.Y}** Notable Contributor!

We are working on a write-up for you that will be included in the **{X.Y}** release post. For reference you can check out our past [Notable Contributor list](https://about.gitlab.com/community/mvp/) and here are a few notable examples:
- https://about.gitlab.com/releases/2025/04/17/gitlab-17-11-released/#notable-contributor
- https://about.gitlab.com/releases/2024/04/18/gitlab-16-11-released/#notable-contributor
- https://about.gitlab.com/releases/2024/03/21/gitlab-16-10-released/#notable-contributor
- https://about.gitlab.com/releases/2024/02/15/gitlab-16-9-released/#notable-contributor
- https://about.gitlab.com/releases/2023/07/22/gitlab-16-2-released/#notable-contributor
- https://about.gitlab.com/releases/2023/02/22/gitlab-15-9-released/#notable-contributor

Please let us know if there are any details you would like us to highlight about yourself, your work or your contributions to the GitLab community.

I'm also pinging **{NOMINATOR}** **{COMMENTER}** who either nominated or commented on your contributions in the **{NOMINATION_ISSUE}**. They can also chime in with anything worth noting for the release post write-up or a quote about your contributions.

We only have a few days to put this together. If we don't hear back or you don't have the time we will do our best to put something together! The **{X.Y}** release post will go live on the [release date](/handbook/engineering/releases/).

Finally we will work to get your GitLab swag sent over soon!

Sending Notable Contributor Rewards

After selecting the Notable Contributor and working through the the workflow for selecting Notable Contributors:

Visit contributors.gitlab.com/rewards
Issue 150 contributor store credits to their username (if multiple winners, each winner gets 150 credits)
Select the “Notable contributor (MVP)” option from the Reason dropdown
Include an optional thank you note or link to the release post

Last modified April 28, 2025: Update handbook pages for MVP to Notable Contributor rebrand (7c503fe4)

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