Fireside with Voxgig

It’s possible we generated more questions than we answered in this episode. This was straight from the practice of developer relations. Sid is the VP of Developer Relations at APIMatic which has ben around about eight years but has a start-up energy. Sid’s role is to improve their explanation and communication of their SDKs and APIs.

This includes a glorious description of a date format fix got softly rolled out to “hide” technical debt through a SDK. And as for a steering committee on API governance? API versioning? You have come to the right place! We believe we are moving to a world where attitudes to APIs and SDKs have matured. These discussions on specifications and documentation is valuable. Meaningful, better feedback from customers through specification mocking. But at the heart of everything is the developer experience so your software will be adopted and loved.

Reach out to Sid here : https://www.linkedin.com/in/sidmaestre/

Find out more and listen to previous podcasts here: https://www.voxgig.com/podcast

Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly updates and information about upcoming meetups:

https://voxgig.substack.com/

Join the Dublin DevRel Meetup group here: www.devrelmeetup.com

Richard was delighted to talk to Chris O’Neill, the first Developer Advocate at Stytch for this week’s Fireside with Voxgig podcast. Why? Well, recently Richard and the team at Voxgig had the very great pleasure of using Stytch – and it worked a dream. So to be able to share a practical discussion about DevRel after experiencing the DevRel and the product first hand was rewarding. But apart from the product, this discussion gives a three step playbook on how to succeed as a developer advocate. … and the developers you’ll meet in Heaven!

Meanwhile back on earth, this is another open and honest conversation with an experienced DevRel professional giving both the technical details of a product and the strategic actions that contribute to successful DevRel and developer advocacy. Dive in and thrive!

Connect with Chris here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-o-neill-3a407048/

Find out more and listen to previous podcasts here: https://www.voxgig.com/podcast

Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly updates and information about upcoming meetups:

https://voxgig.substack.com/

Join the Dublin DevRel Meetup group here: www.devrelmeetup.com

This episode looks at how DevRel works at very large organisations. Jason St-Cyr, Developer Relations Leader at Sitecore, one of the largest digital experience providers in the world. With such a large ecosystem, it’s no wonder that DevRel looks different here than in a SaaS start-up! Jason tells us about ambassador programmes, the starting point for his career in DevRel. And he shares his metaphor of DevRel professionals with us – do you see yourself as a human router? Maybe you should! We also cover developer portals that work, and of course, the old chestnut: measurement.

Listen and learn and share - which is kinda Jason's approach to his work too.

Find out more and listen to previous podcasts here: https://www.voxgig.com/podcast

Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly updates and information about upcoming meetups:

https://voxgig.substack.com/

Join the Dublin DevRel Meetup group here: www.devrelmeetup.com

Brian Douglas wants to understand where contributions to Open Source projects are coming from.

Brian was the first official Developer Advocate in GitHub! Brian is also another example of a degree in something not computer science. With a finance degree, he taught himself to code and is now running his own startup via DevRel role with GitHub, He’s learned the importance of scaling through developer advocates. Brian has built a myriad of devrel tools and his opensauced.pizza.

Brian shares some great advice for both developers and their organisations especially now in the light of industry layoffs: you need to advocate for your company’s product internally too. Is there a feature no one is using? Cut it!

If you maintain an open source project, you need this podcast and OpenSauced.pizza.

In this podcast we talk to people from across the spectrum of developer relations, from vice presidents, to experienced developer relations professionals, public speakers, event organisers and community builders – and to those just starting out on their developer relations career. This week, Richard talks to Lewis Meyers in an open, honest and fascinating conversation about breaking in to the tech industry from a military and martial arts background. Lewis did a bootcamp, and they discuss the attitude towards bootcamps and his experience as a bootcamp student.

They also discuss in depth the wide divergence of approaches companies take when hiring developer relations. As Lewis puts it, they tend to lean more heavily on one or two of the 3 Cs (code, content and community), and some will be explicit, others won’t really know until they are part way through the hiring process! So you need to be clear on what you are and what drives you in developer relations.

Lewis thinks so deeply about his craft and his career choices, that he and Richard have a discussion on how the tech industry could be improved with perhaps a bit more professionalism - and intentional humility and willingness to serve.

Reach out to Lewis through LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/devrellewis/ or Twitter @DevRelLewis

This episode starts out with a reassuring tale about a rock gig…with more people in the band than in the audience…. So as a conference speaker or community builder, remember that everyone has started out somewhere and not every moment on every stage has been perfect. It all takes practice. Jono takes us through his approach to conference speaking. This is gold. This podcast is dedicated to helping DevRel professionals to be the best they can be in this complex and diverse role. This episode is a repeat from our archive of public speaking podcasts from 2020 and is being re-released as it is timely and relevant as the in-person events are ramping up well and truly this year. This podcast will help you bring your presentation skills to the next level.

Reach out to Jono here : https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonobacon

Readme Ops. I love it! And wanted to find out more. So Adam Christian, CEO of Stateful kindly joined me to explain the phrase they have coined.

Ah, documentation! Imagine a Readme where the samples you run actually work?

Runable commands should become runabale – out of the box with Runme. It’s not magic, it’s the passion of Adam Christian and his team at Stateful to address the epidemic of non-maintained documentations. Richard and Adam discuss the ideal customer and target market for this Readme Ops product. Open Source projects and larger enterprises are ideal, but really there is a need for this in many, many scenarios. So what’s their DevRel strategy?

This is another career guidance episode! Julia has a background in law, marketing and now is a successful developer relations guru. Julia generously shares her journey to DevRel in an accessible chat and with an achievable pathway. But be prepared to commit time and effort to community building.

Courtney Stanley, a keynote speaker, MC and meeting planner, talks about why it’s important for virtual event organisers to offer people an authentic live experience online.

As virtual experience improves year by year, we reflect on the Fireside Chat with Courtney we had two years ago where she talks about her transition from live events to virtual events and how to make this happen.

She has plenty of experience in the technology and marketing behind successful events.

She encourages event organisers to leave the comfort zone of Zoom, and explore platforms that allow them to offer people an authentic live and interactive experience online.

Courtney Stanley is all over social media. You'll find her on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, on her website, and on the #OUTSPOKEN Facebook group.

Learn more about Colm here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/courtneystanley

To get a weekly dose of the experiences of DevRel professionals or news on DevRel meetups sign up to the Voxgig newsletter.

View all show notes, links, and more brilliant public speaking resources at voxgig.com.

If you like what you hear on Fireside with Voxgig, don’t be shy―tell everyone!

Use #firesidewithvoxgig on your social media.

Fun Fact: Our guest this week is a once-developer who, believe it or not, registered Microsoft’s first Github account!

Martin Woodward has been helping first Microsoft and then Github build, sustain and support their respective open-source communities.

There are a lot of highlights in his long distinguished career as he is now the Vice President of Developer Relations, #DevRel has influenced him throughout his career.

With Martin as our guest and Richard Rodger as our host, the topics discussed are practical things such as what recording we use for preparing a content, and similar. We talk about the impact of AI, coding and how it can improve tooling.

Tooling plays a very significant role as the help of a #DevRel to be more effective and - more importantly – productive. This is when the quality of product comes into play. The product, as we know it, is used by the developers and, then, there are the people who make the product.

#DevRel is about creating a bridge between the two parties so as to make the product better.

If you ever wondered what would be one of the most considerable impacts you can have in #DevRel, it is helping others to purse or further their careers. In this podcast, listen to what Martin has to say that can help you take on this assignment accordingly.

Learn more about Martin here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martinwoodward

To get a weekly dose of the experiences of DevRel professionals or news on DevRel meetups sign up to the Voxgig newsletter.

View all show notes, links, and more brilliant public speaking resources at voxgig.com.

If you like what you hear on Fireside with Voxgig, don’t be shy―tell everyone!

Use #firesidewithvoxgig on your social media.