Episode 029: Organizing Conferences

00:57 Balancing Conferencing with Parenting

• Andy has organized RedDotRubyConf, still organizes Brighton Ruby, and has spoken the past few years at RubyConf.
• Andy also puts out an email newsletter, with one Ruby/Rails technique delivered with a ‘why?’ and a ‘how?’ every two weeks. It’s deliberately brief, focussed & opinionated, and called One Ruby Thing.
• Chris helps to co-organize Ruby For Good.
  • Systems, systems, systems.
  • Staying in the speaker hotel during crunch time.
  • Getting paid helps.
  • Having no co-organizers = no extra communication challenges.
  • Relying on your partner.
  • Staying local helps.
  • Having a venue.

06:52 Conference Sizes: How Big is Big?

• Andy runs Brighton Ruby as a single track, one-day conference of 300-400.
• Ruby Central conferences by comparison are up to about 1,000 attendees and multi-track over 3-4 days.
• Ruby For Good is about 80 people, but has less of a conference feel because it's groups of people hacking on different projects over a few days.

09:46 Classifying These Gatherings as "Work-Adjacent Hobbies"

• Benefits the career.
• Meeting, networking, and making friends.
• Feel-good factor.
• Prioritization.
• Time frees up as kids have gotten older.

19:30 Family Involvement

• Kids on stage are cute.
• Teenagers can help volunteer!
• Osmosis of exposure. This is what mom/dad does!
• Showing that work does not necessarily equal drudgery.

22:30 Behind-The-Scenes Tradeoffs

• The best track at any conference is the speaker track.
  • Coaching, mentoring, and cheering on first-time speakers.
• Repetition of putting on conferences over the years = it gets easier, more fun, and less stressful.
  • Atomic Habits

28:21 Meal Kits and Meal Planning Conversation

• We all have tried them. We all have opinions. We are definitely open for sponsorship. Email us! 👇🏻

32:36 Getting Involved in Conferences (for those who are brave enough)

• Speak.
• Volunteer.
• Conference Scholar/Guide Programs. i.e. Ruby Central's
• Community Meetups

37:46 Genius / Fail Moments

• Andy's kids learning empathy from movies. (#Genius)
• Chris forgot to pack his son's main lunch entreé and left it in the microwave! (#Fail)
• Josh's daughter revealing she has a video clip of the two of them from when she was very little and being fond of watching it often. (Genius)
• KWu's son fell and hit his head 🤕. (#Fail)

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Panel

Chris Sexton
KWu
Josh Puetz
Andy Croll