Headed to DjangoCon this year? Do I have a terrific opportunity for you!

The organizing committee is looking for folks to serve as session chairs and session runners.

I love these volunteer opportunities because they allow you to make a huge difference for the conference, speakers, and attendees, while doing relatively little work. After all, you were probably going to attend a few talks anyway, right? 

Read on…

Session runners and session chairs work together as gatekeepers of a terrific DjangoCon experience. You’ll help foster a supportive environment by welcoming guests, introducing speakers, and making sure folks get to where they need to be.

Session runners are the shepherds of the speaker room. Your job starts in the Green Room fifteen minutes before each talk, where you’ll meet your speaker and help them get ready by testing their laptop and briefing them on what to expect. Five minutes before their talk, you’ll walk with them to their session room and help them get their laptop set up. You’ll hand the speaker off to the session chair, and then relax and enjoy the talk. Your job is done until 15 minutes before the next talk!

Session chairs are the moderators of the session. You’ll arrive in the speaker room 10 minutes before the talk starts. Meet your speaker and find out a few things: how do you pronounce your name? Do you want to take questions? How do you want us to count down time? At showtime, you’ll introduce the speaker to the audience, keeping it simple — their name, where they’re from, and talk title. During the talk, watch the clock and let the speaker know when it’s time to stop for questions. Mediate questions (if any), and let speaker and attendees know when it’s time to wrap it all up. After that, help the speaker disconnect the microphone and make any announcements.

Pretty cool, huh?

Sign up here!

If you’re on the fence, consider what I said earlier. You were probably going to attend a few talks anyway, right? Why not make a huge difference while you’re there? Thanks 🎉

I’ll be available on Twitter this week to answer any questions about session chairing and running this week, and am happy to help at the conference. (Yep, I love it so much I help run sessions, too!) Looking forward to seeing you there.

Yesterday was a great day. It was my first day at Juice Analytics, where I joined the team as Director of Engineering.

That’s right — I got a new job!

In my last post about leaving Emma, I talked about my journey from passionate customer advocate to empathetic software engineer.

At Juice, I’ll manage a dynamic engineering team solving interesting problems, and help others in the organization feel connected to the work they do. If you’re curious, you can check out the full position description here. I am thrilled and thankful for this remarkable opportunity!

In the last week, I’ve felt warmly welcomed and embraced by an engineering leadership community that I didn’t even know existed! Folks at all levels have been offering kind, real, and honest words of advice and support.

So, please consider this my invitation to you to drop book recommendations, personal experiences, front line stories, and more about this journey we’re on. Because like the poster next to my old VP’s desk said:

Tie your shoes, pack a good lunch, and remember that we’re all in this together.

PS: Juice has a great blog. Check out my favorite post here (especially if you like role-playing games). 🐉