so you want to run a developer event, are you crazy?

So you want to run a developer event, are you crazy ?by John Stevenson@jr0cket

My Experiencesthe last 5 years in the community

Open source workshops- Using Ubuntu Linux- Poster design- Video Editing- Desktop Publishing

University outreach

Organised my first coding

dojoOrganiser for the

ClojureX conference, ClojureBridge London,

London Clojurians,& logo designer

Atlassian

Salesforce / Heroku

Inspiring others

Diversity in Tech

Why do you want to run an event ?

What are the motivations ?

Motivations

● For a company● For the community● Your own interest

What does success look like

Think about why you want to run an event.

- what will be considered successful?

- what do you want to avoid?- who are the stakeholders?

Company success

- awareness, api / product use, hiring new staff, engaging existing staff

Community success

- growing the community in numbers & capability

Individual interest

- you want to learn, meet people

What is the Event about

If you build it, they will come...

If you don’t build it, they won't come

Things to do...to help the event be successful

Describe why people should attend

● say who its for or who will be attending● say what people will gain from it● include feedback from past events

Promote the event effectively

1. use social media networks & contacts2. create a meaningful hashtag & put it

everywhere3. go to other events and talk about your

event4. look for media partners who can spread

the word in their networks

Provide detailed location information

Visualise the schedule

Make all the things visually appealing

beware of your own bias though...

beware of expensive print costs too…

not everyone loves purple...

Code of Conduct

&

Under 18’s Policy

Work out your budget early

What are your costs for

- venue, food, advertising, swag, extra wifi, video screens / tv, etc.- speaker hotels / travel, speakers dinner- diversity fund for those otherwise unable to attend

Plan for contingency

- last minute sponsor drop-out- unknown expense- event more popular than you planned

Give your sponsors clarity & options

What are you willing to allow sponsors to do ?

What are you definately not going to allow them to do - ie. product pitches

Provide several tiers of sponsorship packages in a very clear document / pdf

- include reasons why sponsors should sponsor you!

Include a menu of options and encourage sponsors to get in touch and share what they would like to do

- Atlassian sponsored one event and paid for all the event staff to wear an Atlassian t-shirt. This helped the organisers & attendees as well as the sponsor

Healthy food

options, please

I love RaspberriesHave more Raspberries at your event and I will come :)

Finding something simple that your audience will love will improve attendance and return visits.

Things to avoidunless you like stress

Personal Life upheavals

● don't change jobs● don't move house● don't take a holiday whilst organising

Organisational challenges

1. don't try and do this alone2. don't leave everything until the last

minute3. don't do it alone, seriously!!!

Even if this is your job, find someone else to help you and delegate like crazy

Doing the event again? Have a Retrospective

What worked

What didnt work so well

What should you do more of

What should you do less of

Document as much as you can, so it's easier next time!

Thank you

@jr0cketjr0cket.co.uk