General

Submitting a Conference Talk Proposal

This is an inwards-facing post, which you may or may not find valuable. The short version is: TL;DR: Do something that scares you. Perhaps submit a proposal for a conferences Call-For-Papers?

Some time ago, I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to speak at NDC Oslo, with a dear friend and colleague of mine. An experience I will cherish with personal growth and many connections made.

I feel, though, I had the home-side advantage. Presenting in my country of residence. On stage with a colleague that had my back. The topic was in context of my employer, who was well-known for the home audience.

I’m not trying to de-evaluate the accomplishment, but rather the potential and hunger to take the next step. But is it worth it?

https://twitter.com/tomasekeli/status/774668537453481984

The next step, maybe

Fast forward a summer vacation / paternity leave and the speakers-high has started to wear off. I’m curious if I can make the step to an international arena, alone. Searching around I stumble over The Lead Developer New York, and decide I want to try for that.

I take a first step, and ask for feedback on the talk from NDC Oslo. Feedback is decent, but there’s a lot of work involved to re-angle it for it to work in that setting. Challenge accepted…but not today.

A few weeks more go by, and I’ve procrastinated away my first opportunity as a CFP (Call For Papers) goes by. Too much going on, or so I say to myself.

Reality check. I can actually do this if I want to. Then Imposter Syndrome strikes. Hard. More procrastinating. Some interactions, and writing the blog post on Imposter Syndrome remind me of what I need to do.

Action!

Last week I submitted a proposal for a talk that’s been swirling in my head for some time for The Lead Developer London 2017. I have no idea if it will get accepted, but I’ve taken the first step.

The journey from idea to submitting a proposal is a tale of missed opportunities, failure to take action, internal struggles with my self-worth, but most importantly growth.

For the record, the title of the talk is “You are more than just your code“.

What’s holding you back from taking the first step towards something that scares you?

Reach out to me directly if you have any thoughts, questions or criticisms. Or leave a comment below.

Cover Image:  WilliamMarlow via Visual Hunt / CC BY-NC-SA

Community

The road to NDC Oslo 2016

Inspired by Torbjørn Marø’s writeup on his planned agenda for NDC 2016, I’ve written my own initial plans.

Topics

In my role as a team lead at KomplettDev I’ve started leaning naturally to topics on people / softskill / agile.

I’m not leaving technology behind , though. There are exciting things happening in the .NET cross-platform space, and it’s good to get up to speed with ASP.NET Core. We’ve just started with ReactJS, and it’ll be good to get some feedback from others’ experience using the technology in the wild.

There’s also the possibility that I’ll jump on a few architectural and deployment sessions.

The twist – I’ll be a speaker!

This year there’s a twist though. I’ll be attending a conference as a speaker for the first time! My colleague, Tomas Ekeli, and I will be speaking about how we’re scaling our team and architecture at Komplett in the session “Making Komplett big by going small“. We were a late entry to the conference and have naturally been placed in the last available slot.

I expect Friday to be filled with last-minute preparation, thoughts, nerves and whatever else is natural when speaking at a conference for the first time.

Connections

Probably the most important long-term effect of attending a conference like NDC Oslo is the social aspect. Because of the way the event is organized there’s a natural focus on being social in the breaks. I’m looking forward to meeting old friends, and making new ones.

Among the people attending the conference there’s one I’ll bring up: Dave Rael, the Developer on Fire. It’ll be great to finally meet Dave in person after being a guest on his podcast, and getting to know him through twitter / facebook-group.

Those plans…

As you’ll see there are just so many awesome sessions going on in parallel, so many last-minute decisions will be made on the floor!

As with any plans, they can be changed, and most probably will. I may sit out a session or two. Or maybe just socialize near the community area, representing NNUG (Norwegian .NET User Group).

So here’s my tentative agenda for the 3 days at NDC Oslo. Please reach out and say hi if you’re there. 

Wednesday

09:00

10:20

11:40

13:40

15:00

16:20

17:40

Thursday

09:00

10:20

11:40

13:40

15:00

16:20

17:40

Friday

09:00

10:20

11:40

13:40

15:00

16:20