Perhaps it's the fear of speaking in front of a large audience, the worry of forgetting your words, or the challenge of finding the perfect topic to discuss. You're not alone – many aspiring speakers face these same fears.

But creating an engaging conference talk is a skill that you can perfect with practice. In this tutorial, I will share effective tips for crafting compelling conference talks that captivate your audience and leave a lasting impact. I'll also provide examples of inspiring presentations that have influenced me.

If you're looking for a comprehensive guide on speaking at conferences, check out my video where I discuss topics such as finding a conference, preparing slides, delivering engaging talks, and networking.

Embedded content

Know Your Audience

It's important to understand your audience's interests and needs to tailor your content effectively.

Audience Expertise and Interests

Before preparing your talk, consider the level of expertise your audience possesses. Are you addressing beginners who are eager to learn the basics, or are you speaking to seasoned professionals seeking advanced insights? Understanding this will help you customize your content accordingly.

Gather Insights

To gain valuable insights into your audience's preferences, talk to event organizers or conduct surveys. This will give you a better understanding of their expectations and what they hope to take away from your presentation.

Balance Fundamentals and Advanced Insights

If your audience consists of newcomers to the topic, focus on providing clear explanations of fundamentals, terminologies, and motivations.

On the other hand, if you have an audience with intermediate to advanced knowledge, dive into the nitty-gritty, discuss pros and cons, share opinions, and share real-life experiences.

Avoid Jargon Overload

Ensure that your content is accessible to everyone by avoiding excessive use of jargon. Make complex concepts understandable by using clear language and providing relevant context.

Gauge with Show of Hands

During your talk, you can engage the audience by doing a show of hands to gauge their familiarity with the topic. Based on their response, you can offer a brief 101-style introduction for those who are new to the subject, or dive directly into the main content if most of the audience is already familiar.

People responding to a question by show of hands

Work on the Core Content of the Talk First

When preparing your conference talk, focus on developing the core content and the compelling story you want to share. Design and templates can be addressed later – prioritizing your message is key.

Identify the Key Objective

Start by answering this question: What is the one thing you want your audience to take away from your talk? This objective will be the central theme around which you build your narrative.

For example, if the talk is on "Angular to React migration", your key objective could be - what are the steps developers need to take to migrate their Angular app to React app. From there, your entire talk outline could frame around providing developers the background and context for providing information on migrating from Angular to React such as introduction to angular and react, need for migration, challenges and considerations, migration strategies and codebase analysis.

Create a Mind-Map

I find it helpful to create a mind-map of the topics I'll cover, centered around the main point I want my audience to remember. This approach ensures that your talk flows logically and maintains a clear focus throughout.

Check out this example of mind map I saw on LinkedIn for a conference talk on "32 things to help English Learners become successful readers". Mind map is a great way to ensure the talk is aligned on the key concept.

Example of a mind map

Tell a Story

As humans, we like storytelling. Instead of just talking through your content, frame the story around why you are sharing this.

By telling a story that follows this format, you engage your audience on an emotional level, make your content more relatable, and leave a lasting impact.

Here’s a template I like for storytelling:

Introduce the Problem

Begin by describing a relatable problem or challenge you encountered. Paint a vivid picture to evoke empathy and interest from your audience.

Highlight the Impact

Illustrate the consequences and impact of the problem. Share the challenges and struggles you faced, allowing your audience to connect with your journey.

Present the Solution

Transition into the solution you discovered or devised. Explain how you tackled the problem and the thought process behind it. Make it clear why this solution was unique and effective.

Celebrate the Improvement

Describe how the solution improved your life or the lives of others involved. Share specific outcomes and successes resulting from your approach.

Embrace the Journey

Be honest about the ongoing nature of progress. Acknowledge that the journey may not be perfect, and there might be continuous efforts to maintain the positive changes.

Empower Your Audience

Provide actionable insights or advice for your audience to avoid or overcome similar challenges. Encourage them to apply your learnings to their own situations.

Structure Your Talk Thoughtfully

Start with a Captivating Hook

Begin your talk with an attention-grabbing introduction. This could be an intriguing problem you encountered, a humorous joke, a compelling personal story, or a thought-provoking question. The hook sets the tone for your talk and piques the audience's curiosity.

Keep Your Audience Anchored

Recognize that maintaining audience attention is crucial. To keep them engaged throughout, provide a clear roadmap at the beginning of your talk. Briefly outline what you'll be discussing, so the audience knows what to expect.

An example of outline that highlights which section is being talked about

Throughout your presentation, periodically remind them of the main points you're covering and where you are in the narrative.

Deliver Smooth Transitions

Practice delivering seamless transitions between slides and sections. This ensures that your presentation flows like a cohesive narrative.

Familiarize yourself with your content to the extent that you know what slide comes next. Using presenter's view can be beneficial to preview the upcoming slide discreetly.

Strategically Reiterate Main Points

Identify the core messages or key takeaways you want your audience to remember. Make a conscious effort to repeat these points at various stages of your talk, reinforcing their significance.

Use Visuals in Your Talk

A picture is a thousand words. We're naturally drawn to visuals rather than lengthy text.

Utilize a Variety of Visuals

Incorporate images, graphics, GIFs, diagrams, illustrations, and charts to visually convey your ideas and captivate your audience.

Visual elements help break the monotony of text-heavy slides and enhance the overall appeal of your presentation. Explore free platforms like Unsplash and Imgur to find high-quality visuals that align with the content of your presentation. High-resolution images and graphics add a professional touch to your slides.

Animate to Explain Concepts

Animations can be a great way to explain complex concepts dynamically. Consider using subtle animations to illustrate processes or step-by-step explanations.

As a reference, check out this talk with impressive animations explaining the JavaScript event loop.

Demonstrate with Demos

If your presentation includes a demo, start by showcasing the end product first. Then, take your audience through the process of building it step by step. This approach creates anticipation and helps the audience understand the context and value of your demo

AI-Generated Images

For a creative touch, consider using AI-generated images created with tools like DALL-E or Midjourney. These unique visuals can add a distinctive element to your presentation. Just make sure they don't contain too many odd/unexpected features. Check out this AI generated image I created of an avocado swimming in the ocean.

An example of an AI generated image of a halved avocado floating in water

Optimize Slide Design for Clarity

Creating visually clear and appealing slides is crucial to ensure that your conference talk is effectively delivered to all members of the audience, including those seated at the back of the room.

Here are essential tips to optimize your slide design:

Use Large Fonts

Opt for large, easy-to-read fonts that are visible from a distance. This ensures that even audience members at the back can comfortably follow your content without straining their eyes.

Large fonts from Zach Holman's talk on "How Github uses Github"

Use Concise Text

Avoid lengthy sentences on your slides. Keep the text concise and to the point. Too much text can distract the audience from your spoken words and diminish their focus on your message.

Avoid Information Overload

Refrain from cluttering your slides with excessive information. Stick to key points and use bullet points to convey your ideas succinctly. This allows the audience to grasp the main concepts without feeling overwhelmed.

Format Code Clearly

When presenting code, use tools like carbon.sh to format it in a clean and readable manner. This ensures that even complex code is understandable to your audience.

Code formatted with carbon.sh

Ensure Visible Contrast

Check the visibility and color contrast of your content against the background. Do a dry-run on the day of your talk to confirm that the slides are clearly visible on the projector or screen. Monitors can have varying color resolutions, so it's essential to be prepared.

An example of a slide with sufficient color contrast

Avoid Distracting Design

While visual elements can enhance your presentation, ensure that your design template doesn't distract from the main content. Keep it clean and professional to maintain focus on your message.

Avoid Over-Reliance on Presenter Notes

Presenter notes can be valuable tools for staying on track during your conference talk, but it's crucial to avoid relying on them too heavily.

Here are key points to consider when using presenter notes effectively:

Stay Natural and Engaging

Reading directly from presenter notes can make your presentation sound robotic and disengaging. Instead, aim to speak naturally and connect with your audience.

Familiarize yourself with the content to the point where you can convey it in a conversational manner. Treat presenter notes as aids rather than a script. They should serve as a helpful guide to remind you of key points, transitions, or specific details, but not dictate your entire presentation.

Practice Makes Perfect

Rehearse your talk multiple times until the content becomes ingrained in your memory. By knowing your material inside out, you'll be able to deliver it smoothly without relying solely on presenter notes.

Keep Your Audience Engaged

Keeping your audience engaged is essential to ensuring the success of your conference talk. By incorporating various interactive elements, you can captivate your listeners and maintain their interest.

Here are effective strategies to achieve this:

Inject Humor and Memes

Light-hearted humor and relevant memes can add a touch of fun to your presentation. Well-timed jokes and amusing visuals help create a relaxed atmosphere and make your talk more enjoyable.

Note on Jokes: If a joke doesn't land as expected, simply move on without dwelling on it. Avoid explaining the joke or making the audience feel uncomfortable for not getting it.

Interact with Your Audience

Engage your audience by asking them questions or encouraging them to participate in brief activities. Interactive elements make your talk more dynamic and involve the audience in the discussion.

Offer Quick Breaks

If your talk contains substantial content, consider giving the audience a quick break to recharge. This break can be as simple as taking a sip of water or pausing briefly to allow the audience to take screenshots of important slides.

Leverage Live Demonstrations

Live demos are excellent ways to immerse your audience in your topic. Letting the audience interact with your demos, ask questions, and explore the process hands-on keeps them engaged and interested.

Share Swag or Resources

If appropriate, consider offering swag such as stickers, or t-shirts. This can serve as an incentive for active participation and create a positive association with your talk.

Share Resources for Ongoing Engagement

Empowering your audience with valuable resources ensures that the impact of your conference talk extends beyond the event itself. Here are effective ways to share resources and foster continued engagement:

QR Codes for Accessibility

Make it easy for your audience to access your slides and additional resources by displaying QR codes at the beginning of your talk. By scanning the code, attendees can quickly access relevant materials on their devices. Check out this slide where I shared a QR code of a code demo.

An example of how to share QR code in your talk for code examples.

Tweet Links to Slide Deck

Increase accessibility by tweeting links to your slide deck a few minutes before your talk. This allows people to access the content during your presentation and refer back to it afterward.

Provide GitHub or CodeSandbox URLs

If you demonstrate a technical project, share the URL to the corresponding GitHub repository or CodeSandbox. This enables your audience to explore the project further and gain hands-on experience with the code.

Include Your Contact Information

Display your name and contact information on every slide, ensuring that attendees can easily reach out to you after the talk. This is particularly helpful if they want to share the slides or contact you for further discussions or inquiries.

An example of including your social handle at the bottom of every slide

Give Action Steps

Leave your audience with a call-to-action or "from here, do this" tasks related to the topic. This encourages individuals interested in learning more to take action and engage further with the subject matter.

Make it Relevant for Your Audience, Not Just You

Ensuring that your conference talk resonates with your audience is essential for creating a meaningful and impactful presentation. Consider the following points to make your talk relevant and valuable for your listeners:

Abstract the Problem and Solution

If you're sharing a talk about a problem you encountered and the solution you formed, abstract the problem to make it relatable for the audience.

Avoid overwhelming them with excessive technical details or specific scenarios that may not directly apply to their situations. Instead, focus on the core principles and broader implications that your audience can relate to and learn from.

Avoid Over-Marketing or Over-Selling

While it's natural to be passionate about your work or product, avoid turning your talk into a promotional pitch.

People attend conferences to gain knowledge and insights, not to be sold to. Provide valuable content that genuinely benefits your audience, and let the quality of your work speak for itself. Authenticity and value will naturally attract interest and followers.

Note on Self-Promotion: Subtly promote your social media presence at the beginning and end of your talk, but do so in a non-intrusive manner. Mentioning your Twitter handle or other social links during the introduction and conclusion allows interested listeners to follow you for more content without feeling overwhelmed by constant promotion.

Where to Find Templates

I'm a fan of simplicity when it comes to design templates. There are various sources to find templates, such as Envato or Canva. You can also hire a designer from platforms like Fiverr or Upwork to create a custom template for you.

Personally, I've refined my design template in Keynote over the years, and it's the one I use most frequently. This is the template I started off with.

Examples of Great Talks

• Zach Holman's Talk with Huge Fonts
• Jason's Talk with Great Fonts
• Andre's Funny Talk with Cool Animations
• Shaundai's Talk with Great Use of Visuals

Speaking at conferences is an enriching experience that allows you to share your passion and expertise with others. Following these tips will help you create powerful conference talks that leave a lasting impact on your audience. Embrace visuals, engage your listeners, and deliver valuable content that inspires and empowers others.

Remember, every great conference talk starts with a few seconds of courage. Take that step and share your knowledge with the world!

If you enjoyed this article, share it with someone who will benefit from it.

If you are interested in articles like this and front-end articles on JavaScript, React, GraphQL or Accessibility, sign up for my newsletter and get these directly in your inbox.

Follow on YouTube for tutorials

Check out my other articles

Join on Discord

#####

Often in technology, we assume that everyone else is as excited about our product as we are. This tends to be a problem across the board in the tech sector (and even amongst teams, like security and developers, or operations and developers).

There's a reason that DevOps and DevSecOps were created: operations teams, developers, QA testers, and security often don't work together. And if we can't even get all of the tech people on the same team, think how hard it'll be to get everyone else (think marketing, communications, and the business functions) on board.

Because of that, technical skills alone aren’t enough to be effective. You need to be able to communicate what the problem is, what the solution you’re recommending is, and why it’s necessary — in terms your audience can understand.

And the more you advance, the more important those skills become.

I’ve definitely struggled with this. It’s easy to get caught up in what you’re working on, and forget that not everyone is immersed in the same jargon you are.

I work in security, so for me, this tends to follow the same script every time. Your average user generally isn’t used to thinking about security and doesn’t understand how often companies see attacks.

Often, there’s a tendency for them to think, ‘Well if I’ve always done it this way, and I haven’t seen any problems, why do I need to implement your more complicated system?’

Thus, it’s up to the security team (in this example, me) to explain to them why — how often real attacks occur, why the more complicated way will make their life easier in the long run, and why security is everyone’s responsibility (spoiler alert: anti-virus doesn’t protect against everything).

The same policies apply across technology functions. Good technology requires empathy. You can have the best tools in the world, but if no one uses them, it doesn’t matter. If people see you as a roadblock to their productivity, you won’t be able to effect change.

That’s why soft skills, like effective communication, are key to success in tech. If you can communicate to a variety of audiences in a way they’ll understand, you’ll be much better at your job (whatever that job is).

How can you develop soft skills?

Treat soft skills the same way you would any technical skills. Communication skills might be listed as 'soft' but that doesn't mean they're easy to acquire or that you can't improve them.

First, spend time actively thinking about and working on your skills.

Step 1: Figure out what skills you already have

What skills do you have? What are your strengths? Are you great at communicating with your boss, but struggle to communicate to leadership? Are you an excellent public speaker, but struggle with written communication?

Get very specific with yourself. If you're not sure, try asking trusted friends, colleagues, and bosses to describe what they think your strengths are.

If possible, ask folks who have worked with you closely in the past.

Step 2: Figure out what skills you want to develop

Ok, where do you want to go from here? Think about the job you have, and the job you want next.

What skills do successful people in those roles have? Does the role require a lot of communication with non-technical executives or users? Does the role mostly involve speaking to other technical folks? Do you need to work as part of a larger team, or are you mainly an individual contributor?

Consider your audience. Who are they (the users you want to use your product, your teammates, executives, and so on)? What matters to them ? Think about their needs and the medium you use to communicate with them (written, spoken, small audience presentation, and so on).

Step 3: Reflect on your past experiences

Now think about the last time you exercised this skill.  What happened? Did you use jargon they didn't understand? Did you appeal to their needs? Were you successful in convincing them that your idea was worth pursuing?

Think about where you fell short and what you can do better next time. If you're able to, ask others for feedback (ideally a trusted co-worker or mentor).

Step 4: Study, learn, and improve your skills

Time to start studying. What (and how) you should study depends on what you want to learn and how you learn best.

You can try researching the idea by reading a book. Stephen King's On Writing is excellent, as is the Elements of Style, for learning how to write better and craft a story which people will be drawn to (and effective communication nearly always revolves around a story, even if you don't initially think of it that way).

The Cuckoo's Egg and Countdown to Zero Day are great examples of books about very technical topics told in a narrative format for a non-technical audience.

Blogs like Ask a Manager or the Harvard Business Review can help with improving internal communication (writing emails, talking to your boss, and so on).

Don't feel like reading? Try a TED talk such as Julian Treasure's 5 Ways to Listen Better, the Secret Structure of Great Talks (Nancy Duarte), or How to Speak So People Want to Listen.

Step 5: Practice your new skills

Then, practice — research something, and write or speak about it. Medium lets you set up a free personal blog, as does GitHub, both of which give you a platform to try out writing.

Local meetup groups, like BSides, WiCyS, or Women Who Code, may provide a supportive environment for you to give a talk for the first time (or even a lightning talk, which is typically a short talk between 5-15 minutes).

International organizations like Toastmasters are another great way to get practice presenting publicly. You can even practice with  your coworkers, your mom, or strangers on the street. Get comfortable explaining your ideas.

Step 6: Improve your process and push yourself

Work on improving. Think about style and presentation. Tools like Hemingway and Grammarly can help you check your grammar and even give style pointers.

LaTeX is a tool which helps to display code fragments in a professional way and embed code into reports.

And try to push yourself outside of your comfort zone. Apply to speak at conferences, give lightning talks, write a blog (or apply to write for freeCodeCamp!). It’s hard at first. Keep trying, and don’t let yourself give up.

Step 7: Get people's feedback

Seek (more) feedback — if someone doesn’t like your idea, ask why (and make an effort to understand where they’re coming from and what they need). Then, use that information to craft appeals directly to them.

Try to find a mentor, and if you're struggling to find one, consider a peer. Sometimes a peer mentor can be just as helpful and you can provide similar feedback to them.

Sometimes all you need is an outside perspective. Often, they can help you identify your strengths and weaknesses better than you can yourself. Ask them for specific positive and negative feedback. It might be painful, but you'll learn faster than you would alone.

Whatever you do, make it a habit. Work on it every day, week, or month. Continue to practice, to seek feedback, and to improve.

via GIPHY

Still looking for guidance? Check out these resources:

• Soft Skills for an Engineering Manager
• Sharpen Your Communication Skills
• Negotiation Genius
• Never Split the Difference

If you’re like most people, the idea of public speaking terrifies you (it terrifies me too). So how do you get over those jitters, get up on stage, and give an amazing talk? First, a disclaimer: this article is purely about your stage presence, not about crafting the content of your talk.

Tip #1: Practice, practice, practice.

Don’t just read through your notes, talk out loud. Talk to yourself, talk to your friends, talk to the mirror. It doesn’t matter where you practice as long as you do it out loud.

Get used to the sound of your own voice. It might sound strange at first, particularly if you haven’t done it before. But it will help you identify phrasing that sounds strange or points that don’t connect much more quickly than reading your notes in your head.

Often, when someone tells you that you sound ‘rehearsed,’ it actually means you haven’t practiced enough to make the speech sound conversational. If you’re feeling very brave, record yourself and watch your performance. Notice your movements. Do your hands distract from the points you’re trying to make? Do you sway back and forth nervously? Are you making eye contact?

Tip #2: Listen to others.

Watch others give talks. How do they speak, gesture, relate to the audience? Go to talks similar to the ones you want to give and pay attention - not just to the speaker’s content, but to their delivery. Do they seem excited about their talk? Are they making eye contact with the audience? What do they do with their hands? How quickly are the speaking? Now, pay attention to the audience. Are they engaged, or are they on their phones? Are you interested? Now think about why.

If you need inspiration, check out these TED talks. All three speakers have very different talks and very different styles, but they have several things in common. They talk relatively slowly, pause often, and make deliberate hand gestures.

The best advice I ever got before giving a speech (as I tend to talk very quickly) was to speak so slowly it felt painful. Particularly as most people tend to talk faster when nervous, it’s pretty great advice.

Figure out where there is a natural break in your speech, and pause there. Take a deep breath. Hold it. Does it feel uncomfortable yet? You’re doing it right. Okay, keep going. At first, your speech cadence and pauses will feel far too slow. That’s okay. Keep doing it. On stage, when you’re nervous, you’ll naturally speed up, and your speech will feel normal.

Tip #3: Avoid Reading.

Notes, or a script, are definitely easier, but they put up a barrier between you and your audience. Try your best to avoid staring down at a screen so that you’re not distracted by looking down. Spend your time focusing on the audience instead, in order to connect with them.

Tip #4: Beginnings and Endings.

People tend to remember the beginnings and endings of things, while the middle tends to fall away. Open with something which gets your audience engaged (try asking a question, playing a game, or telling a fun anecdote). When you end, summarize your talk, and give one (or a short list) of key takeaways.

In order to develop this, think about your audience leaving your talk. When someone asks them ‘What was that talk about?’, what do you want them to say? That’s your takeaway.

Tip #5: Keep it Relevant.

Try your best to keep the talk specific to this audience (even if you’ve given the same talk 100s of times). Can you incorporate a reference to a previous speaker? What about the place where you are, or the type of event? People will pay more attention, and appreciate the talk more, when they think it is directed at them.

Think about your audience and put yourself in their shoes. If you can, talk to the speakers before and after you. Can you connect your presentation to theirs?

Tip #5: Slides.

Ensure that any slides you use are necessary and avoid words as much as possible. Any time you have words on your slides, you audience will stop to read them, and you’ll lose their attention. Keep words to a minimum, and keep the slides simple and relevant.

If you're showing code snippets, make sure they're big enough that people in the back can read (my favorite suggestion I've received for how large a font you should use is to take the age of the oldest person in the room and halve it. Someone's 40? Great, make your text size 20. It's lighthearted, but it helps ensure your audience isn't squinting at the screen to read).

Tip #6: One Day Before.

Great, you’ve practiced, you’re ready, and you’re at the conference. Figure out where and when you’ll be speaking. Think about your audience at that time. Are they sleepy after lunch (how can you get them moving and engaged)? Is it first thing in the morning (great, they’re probably still really focused!)? Is it right before lunch (definitely end on time!)? If you can, check out the room ahead of time.

• How big is the area where you’ll have to stand?
• Where will your slides be broadcast?
• How big is the room?
• Is there a timer available?
• Can you test your presentation?
• Where should you stand before your presentation?
• Is someone announcing you?
• What should you do if there’s a tech issue?
• Do you have a microphone? What kind (does it clip onto you, or is it on a podium)?
• Does the audience have a mic for questions?

Tip #7: Prepare for EVERYTHING.

Assume that anything which can go wrong, will, and pack accordingly. With that in mind, what should you bring to your talk?

• Your (fully charged) laptop
• An adapter to connect your laptop to ANYTHING
• Charging Cable, adapter (if necessary)
• Water
• Slides clicker (if you have slides)
• Your slides on your laptop
• Your slides on a USB
• Your slides printed and ready to go
• If you have a live demo, make sure you also have a video pre-recorded in case something goes wrong

Tip #8: Take Care of Yourself.

Get a good night’s sleep the night before. Don’t be afraid to call it an early night to review your presentation one more time. You don’t want to be hungover, tired, or sick tomorrow. If you’re jet-lagged, keep that in mind and make sure you’re well rested.

Tip #9: Relax

Take a deep breath and give your speech. You’re going to be great! Personally, right before I get up on stage, I like to imagine the audience applauding at the end of a great talk. At that point, there’s no preparation left to do, and it helps calm my nerves to imagine the most positive outcome. Remember, everyone gets nervous. Public speaking is all about dealing with the nerves, and pushing through it.

Tip #10: Celebrate!

Don’t forget to relax and celebrate your accomplishment afterward. Giving a talk can be really, really hard and just finishing it is an accomplishment.

You’ve attended a few conferences, watched a lot of presentations, and decided it’s time to give a talk of your own! As someone who has both given talks at conferences, and sat on the proposal review board for others, I’m here to tell you what I’ve learned and to encourage you to submit your own talk proposals.

How do you go about doing that?

First, find your niche.

Figure out what you want to talk about. What are you passionate about? What kind of unique perspective do you bring to this topic? That doesn’t mean that if someone has written about it, or presented about it before, that you should completely avoid the topic.

However, you should think about how your presentation is different than the content which already exists, and what new example, viewpoint, or data you’re bringing to the topic (your view on a particular thing counts as a unique viewpoint!). Also, you don’t have to start out by presenting for an hour. Conference talks range from 5 minute lightning talks (a great way to get an introduction to conference speaking!) to 15–30 minute presentations, to 2+ hour workshops or panels. Figure out what you’re comfortable doing.

Then, based on your idea, figure out where to give your talk. You can look at online lists such as CallbackWomen or Paper Call for CFPs (or Call for Presentations/Papers) or try looking at some of the following:

• Internal company presentations (Can you host a lunch & learn event? What about an annual conference your company might host?)
• Look at past conferences you’ve attended (or search for conferences based on the topics you’re interested in).
• Get involved in local organizations, meet the organizers, and ask to present (Meetup is great for this).

Then, write your proposal.

Follow the rules outlined in the call for speakers. Seriously. You’d be surprised how many people don’t do that, and while some reviewers or conferences are willing to overlook that, don’t take the chance. Just follow the requirements.

1. Avoid the sales pitch (if you work for a sales-driven organization). It’s fine to use your organization to illustrate a case study, but avoid making your proposal a giant advertisement.
2. Write a great title. Pick something catchy, but that clearly explains what your talk will be about. Think about your title as if you were an attendee. Would the title draw you in? Does it tell you enough about the proposal to pique your interest? I like puns, but that’s a personal (and surprisingly polarizing) choice. The title for the last talk I gave was 'Shooting Phish in a Barrel: Practical Proposals for Reducing Phish Click Rates'
3. Write the abstract. If a proposal is accepted, the abstract is often used (unedited) as the description of your talk the audience will see, so make sure it caters to the audience (not to the conference reviewers). Think about what matters to them. Tell a story, but keep it brief. Clearly explain what your talk is about (why do I want to go?), who the talk is aimed at (is this talk a good fit for me?), and what your audience will gain from attending (what did I learn from this talk? What can I do now, that I couldn’t before?).

Personally, I recommend the following structure:

State the problem [Sentence one]. What did you do to approach the problem? [Sentences 2 and 3]. Actionable takeaway for the audience [Sentences 4 and 5]. That's it! Don't use more than 5 sentences, and you can usually do it in less. If it takes you more than that to explain your proposal, it probably isn’t well thought through.

5. Most proposals consist of an abstract and a bio, but some will have additional sections (justification, outline, etc.). For these additional sections, keep in mind the same key principles as above.

6 . Create a bio. This is an opportunity for you to highlight your relevant experience and explain to the organizers (and later attendees) why YOU are the best person to give this talk. What experience do you have that directly relates to this talk? Here’s a helpful place to start (it's my favorite template for writing a conference bio).

Here's mine from a recent conference: Megan Kaczanowski is a Threat Intelligence Analyst at S&P Global who works closely with the threat hunting and incident response teams to protect organizations from emerging cyber threats. Megan understands that delivering effective threat intelligence isn’t about utilizing the latest industry buzzwords – it’s about delivering curated, actionable intelligence to the relevant stakeholders.

In addition to her experience in threat intelligence, Megan runs the simulated phishing training program at her organization and co-leads a Security Champions user awareness initiative. Megan holds a BA in Economics and Political Science from the University of Michigan. In her free time, she enjoys rock climbing and is a PADI certified scuba diver.

7. When you’re finished, check your spelling, grammar, and formatting. Use an app like Hemingway or Grammarly or ask a friend to review it! Little mistakes can impair a reviewer’s ability to read and understand your proposal and you want to make it as easy to read and understand as possible. This is particularly important if you're writing a proposal in a language which isn't your native language. Often reviewers have very little time to look at each proposal simply because there are so many proposals. Make their job easy.

8. Feel free to submit more than one proposal, if the conference is something you’re very interested in (but make sure that all of the topics are something you’re excited about, and feel comfortable speaking on).

Still looking for help? Check out these resources:

• How to Write a Successful Conference Proposal
• Writing a Conference Proposal
• What Your Conference Proposal is Missing
• Conference Prompts: Or How to Submit Proposals and Influence People
• What I learned from reading 429 conference proposals
• Is Your Proposal Good Enough?
• How to Write a Compelling Proposal

If your talk is rejected, don’t worry! This can happen for many reasons, and doesn’t mean that your proposal was necessarily bad. Perhaps there were 4 other proposals on the same topic. Perhaps the conference organizers are looking for a range of different tracks/experience levels/topics and yours wasn’t a good fit this time.

Whatever the reason, if the conference provided feedback, read it and use it to improve your next proposal. If not, ask for it. They might not have time to provide feedback for every single proposal, but there’s no harm in asking, and feedback will help you improve faster. Don’t let one rejection discourage you. Everyone gets proposals rejected. Improve your proposal, or write a new one, and try again!

If your talk is accepted, congratulations!

Time to write your talk. Here’s some resources to help:

• Practical Tips for Creating Great Slides
• Practical Tips for Being a Great Speaker
• Toastmasters (an organization which can help you improve your public speaking skills)
• How to Improve Your Communication Skills

Conferences can be stressful even if you are not giving a talk. On the other hand, speaking can really boost your career, help you network, allow you to travel for (almost) free, and give back to others at the same time.

I’ve given over a dozen conference talks in the last few years and I want to share some of the things I’ve learned from my experience here.

Applying to Conferences

It can be tricky to get accepted at your first conference. Your best bet is to speak at local meetups, user group meetings, or nearby events first. The people who run those groups are always happy to have volunteer speakers and the audience is much more forgiving when you are starting out.

Before speaking at my first conference, I met lots of people by speaking at local events. This really helped to boost my confidence enough to start projecting my voice better and make eye contact. After a few local talks, someone recommended that I apply for a new, local conference. I got in! Then one talk led to another and here I am today.

Here are some conferences I recommend applying to:

1. Any local conference — They love to attract local speakers because it’s, A: cheaper, and B: better for local advertising and promotion. You can also usually connect with the people who run it beforehand and ask them to give you a chance as a first-time speaker.
2. NDC conferences — These are very well run conferences that are hosted all over the world. They pay for your airfare, hotel, and some events, meals, and, of course, give you a free ticket to the conference. It’s not just about the free stuff though; they attract top notch speakers and a wonderful community of people. I’ve personally been to NDC conferences in London, Sydney, and Minnesota. I plan on applying for many more in the future, so maybe I will see you at one soon :)
3. Python conferences — The Python community is known for being very open and welcoming to newcomers. Many of the conferences are low cost or free and you can sign up to give a five minute lightning talk if you just want to get your feet wet. The people at all of the Python conferences I’ve been to are so nice and will try to help you and give you feedback on what you can do better.

Making a Proposal

Once you have found a conference you want to apply at, you have to write a proposal for the talk and come up with a title. Most of the time, the requirements will be similar or the same so you can pretty much copy/paste to reuse talk proposals. Here are some general steps to making good proposals:

1. Research the topic: Usually, you can see a list of the speakers and talks from previous years on the conference website (unless it’s the first year, of course). Take note of about what people spoke about and which topics were underrepresented. Most of the speaker profiles will also link to contact information, so you can reach out to individual speakers and ask them their opinion on the conference and for advice on applying and getting accepted.
2. Make a catchy title: The title is the first — and sometimes only — thing attendees see when they are scrolling through a list of talks online or in the brochure at the event. It has to grab their attention, so conference organizers look for great titles when they are reviewing talks. Pick out some of the titles that pop out at you when you scroll through talks from previous years and keep a list of them for inspiration as you are making your proposals.
3. Create a proposal: Make a quick list of things you will cover and in what order. It’s good to write down an overview of what the talk will be about and then make notes about what you want the audience to get out of the talk. Experienced speakers have always told me to talk to the audience in the proposal and tell them how they will directly benefit from attending. From reviewing lots of talk descriptions in the past, I have found that it can also be good to start the description with a question to pique interest. Here is an example: “What if we could build apps that aren’t just functional, but also fun to use? Done right, gamification can vastly improve user experience as well as boost…” Some conferences will ask you to do an abstract as well as a description and some will ask only for a description and then truncate it if they need a shorter version. Either way, the method of writing the proposal is about the same.
4. Ask someone to review it: Several experienced speakers have helped me a lot over the years; from reviewing my talk proposals to giving me advice to helping me practice. It can never hurt to ask someone for help. The title of my last conference talk, “Game on! Gamifying your apps for fun and profit.” — and the idea for making it — came from another speaker I met years ago who has helped me with encouragement and advice for almost every talk I have given. People can seem scary, but they are usually nicer than you think.
5. Save your proposal: Many conferences manage their proposals with something like Sessionize.com or PaperCall.io so you can log back in and look at them in the future. Some conferences, however, have their own forms that you won’t have access to, so it’s best to save the title, abstract, description, tags, and any other information you enter in a separate location just in case.

Rejection

Everyone gets rejected. It happens all the time, even to experienced speakers. You never know if it was because you are a new speaker, or maybe the topic didn’t fit in with one of the tracks, or they might have had too many people applying to give similar talks. It’s not personal, you just have to keep applying and you will get in somewhere.

Planning & Preparation

Like I said before, practice the talk at local meetups first. If you have already been accepted, then you have to prepare the talk anyways — you might as well use it more than once. Meetup.com, Facebook groups, and local coding bootcamps are great places to ask if they will listen to you give your talk.

When I get accepted for a conference, I like to make a map of what I have to get done and by when I need to do it. Preparing for a talk is not easy. There is research to do, code to write, and slides to make. If you don’t plan and start working in advance, the time for the conference will arrive with you scrambling to get everything done. This makes an already stressful situation even more stressful.

Every talk will be different, but I generally find myself following similar steps to prepare. For example, I usually make a list of relevant articles and books to read right away because that takes the longest. Once I have done some research and have lots of notes, I go through them and write out a detailed outline of what I will cover in the talk. Then I decide what framework I want to use for my slides; if I can reuse styles from someone else’s template, all the better. After that, I make some placeholder slides for each section of my talk and then work to fill in the details. Note: it’s a good idea to keep the description of your talk nearby where you can see it while preparing for your talk. This will help to make sure your content doesn’t diverge from what you promised the conference and your audience.

Once I have the talk and slides almost ready, I will start practicing it. This helps me find holes and inconsistencies that I might not notice while creating individual slides and sections one at a time. If the talk is longer than 30 minutes, it can be hard to practice the whole thing many times over. In that case, I shoot for at least 3–6 complete run-throughs, depending on how well I know the topic. For long talks, it’s easy to start practicing and then have to stop and go do something else: Thus, it’s important to make sure you aren’t only practicing the beginning, but the middle and ending as well.

In addition to preparing your talk, here are a few items to remember to bring with you to the conference:

1. I like to prepare cables for my laptop and any dongles just incase the conference doesn’t have the right ones for my setup (most will, but you never know).
2. I also store a copy of my talk in the cloud or on a thumb drive just in case something happens to my computer. If you are using slides.com, google slides, or something similar, they have the ability to export as html or pdf files.
3. If you are doing any sort of live coding, you should probably have a video or slideshow backup. All sorts of things seem to happen when you are on stage and it never hurts to be extra prepared. Video backups have saved me a few times.
4. I always make sure I have business cards to give out after my talk in case there is someone I want to connect with.

Arriving at the Conference

You arrive in a new place with lots of strange people around you. What do you do? Who do you talk to?

The best thing is to arrive at least a day early and get situated. This can really help to relax your nerves and feel more confident. I like to check out the conference venue in advance and make sure I know how to get there. I was late for one of my talks once because I got lost in a new city trying to get to the conference. I felt terrible about it for the rest of the trip.

When you arrive at the conference venue, the first thing you will see is an info desk where you can check in and receive a speaker name tag or badge and whatever official swag they are giving out. If the room you are speaking in isn’t marked on your name tag, make sure to ask them so you know where it is and aren’t scrambling at the last minute.

As a speaker, you will probably have access to a few rooms that other attendees do not. Most conferences have a tech check room where you can plug in your laptop ahead of time. Make sure you ask about this at the info desk if you can’t find where it is. There will also be a speaker room for you to work on your talk and relax or chat with other speakers. This is probably the best place to go to meet people when you initially get there. It’s a relaxed environment and it’s great to start networking with other people in the speaker circuit as soon as you can.

When I started going to conferences, I would hide in my hotel room during meals if I didn’t know anyone. I don’t do that anymore. Now I make myself sit at a table with other humans and start a conversation. The other people are usually just as awkward and nervous as myself and I’ve met lots of cool people like this.

On Stage

If you are more of an introvert, it can feel very overwhelming to know you are about to go on stage and start speaking. In the past, I have even had panic attacks before giving talks. It’s just something you have to push through if you want to become a good speaker. Remember, everyone wants you to succeed, especially your audience. I like to go into the bathroom beforehand and take a few deep breaths. Then I arrive at least 10–15 minutes early to get set up in the room where I will give my talk. This has really helped in calming my nerves.

I once listened to a talk by Robert C. Martin — author of “Clean Code” — and asked him for speaking advice afterwards. He told me that I have to believe that I am the expert in the room and the audience is stuck there listening to me no matter what, so I might as well have fun with it. It was a simple thing to say, but for some reason it stuck with me and my speaking improved after that.

Remember, it doesn’t have to be perfect. Everyone has good and bad speaking days. It can be a good idea to lead off the talk by saying that it’s your first conference and that you really appreciate XYZ conference for allowing you to come and speak. It’s always a good thing to start off by getting your audience to relate to you somehow, and that will probably make you feel more comfortable too.

If I have more than a few minutes left at the end of my talk, I will ask the room for questions and try to answer them in front of everyone. Otherwise, I will wrap up and tell attendees that I would love to answer their questions or talk to them afterwards.

Note: there may be times when you only have a few or even zero attendees. I’ve personally seen this happen to two very experienced speakers. Sometimes, it’s a topic that people aren’t interested in, or there is another famous speaker scheduled at the same time as you, or it was just a bad time of day (early in the morning after people went out the night before, or at the end of the day when people are worn out).

Afterwards

You’re done! Almost… Be sure to stay around for questions and discussion. If there is another talk after yours in the same room, just say you’ll be in the hallway after. It’s a great feeling to finish and then have people tell you thanks and give you compliments.

Don’t forget to thank the conference organizers for allowing you to attend and give a talk. If you don’t want to do it in person, a thank you email is great too. Tweet or write about your experience on a blog like freeCodeCamp’s.

Wrap Up

Don’t be afraid to speak at conferences. It’s a great way to improve your speaking skills, meet new people, and travel, among other benefits.

I hope to meet many of you at conferences in the future. Please let me know in the comments or on Twitter if there are good conferences that you have attended in the past. I’m always looking for new ones to attend :)

My Twitter: https://twitter.com/gwen_faraday

My YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxA99Yr6P_tZF9_BgtMGAWA

Great! You got a conference proposal accepted. Now you need to survive the talk. We’ll assume you’re already developed an idea, submitted a proposal, and written a description.

via GIPHY

The outline

First, draft an outline. Don’t skip this step. It’s really tempting, but it will help you organize your thoughts and ensure you have a clear beginning, middle, and end to your talk.

If you can, try telling a story. Personally, I like to use this outline, fill it with bullet points, and use it as the basis of my talk. I dislike using scripts because I find that no matter how well I’ve memorized them, once I get on stage (and stare out at the audience), I have a tendency to forget parts. If I have an overall outline, it makes it easier for me to remember the broad points I need to remember when giving a talk and I can present more freely.

For reference, here’s the basic talk outline I use (my examples are in italics below each section):

Start with a goal: What is the one (or short list) of takeaways that you want your audience to have after listening to your presentation? Reference this goal throughout your outline. Everything you talk about should tie back to this goal.

At the end of this blog post, I want you (the audience) to feel comfortable and prepared to give a conference talk.

Next, think about structuring your talk.

Grab Attention: How can you draw your audience in? Think about audience participation. How can you engage your audience in your talk?

I started one presentation with a round of Who Wants to be a Millionaire, complete with sound cues. Another presentation I opened with a corny dad joke to get the audience’s attention. (Do you want to hear a joke about UDP? You might not get it, but I don’t care.)

Think about Q&A. Do you mind interruptions or would you rather have the audience save questions for the end? Plan to let your audience know at the beginning. Ask your practice audience for questions, and think of questions you’re likely to get. Plan how to answer them.

via GIPHY

Introduction: Tell your audience what you’re going to talk about and why you’re a credible speaker on this topic.

I’m here to talk about surviving your first conference talk and share the lessons I’ve learned, having given talks to audiences of 1300+ people, reviewed conference proposals, and watched innumerable conference presentations, both good and bad.

First Key Point: Describe your first point, and any supporting facts or figures you want to remember.

In order to write your talk, you need to write an outline first, in order to organize your thoughts.

Second Key Point: Describe your second point, and any supporting facts or figures you want to remember.

Next, you need to create slides to enhance your presentation.

Third Key Point: Describe your third point, and any supporting facts or figures you want to remember.

Now, practice, practice, practice.

Conclusion: Review the key points you’ve pointed out, reinforce your takeaway (think of the goal you originally set), and include a ‘call to action’. Tell the audience what you want them to do after this talk (be specific).

Once you’ve written your outline, created your slides, and practiced, you should feel comfortable and prepared to give a conference talk. Run through a few tips for surviving and prepping the day of the talk and you’re ready to go! Go out and write your talk. You’re going to be great.

This outline doesn’t necessarily need to contain every single point you plan on making. It just needs to contain enough information to jog your memory when you’re reviewing it.

via GIPHY

Making slides

Next, create slides (if necessary). Here’s my quick rules for slides:

• Avoid too much text on your slides. Any time you have text on your slides, your audience will read it, and you’ll lose their attention. Recognize that and limit the texts to very important key points.
• Simple is better. Keep transitions, animations, fonts, and colors muted. Your audience should be thinking about your content, and not about the design of your slides. Make them professional, and standard, and then don’t worry about it.
• Finally, save them on a flashdrive, send them to yourself via email (in powerpoint and in pdf format), and to the conference organizers in the format they requested. Print a copy and bring them with you. You want as many back up copies as possible. Assume with presentation technology that anything which can go wrong, will go wrong.
• Personally, I prefer to avoid slides if at all possible (for example if I’m giving a talk on soft skills), or keep my slides only to a few images (if slides are necessary to show certain diagrams) and one final slide with the key takeaways listed. I find that this helps me focus on my material and to keep the audience focused on me, rather than on my slides.

via GIPHY

Practice makes perfect

Practice, practice, practice. No matter how much you’ve practiced, it’s not enough (I like to run through my talk at least once a day in the week or two leading up to the conference). Go through it again. Practice in front of the mirror, in front of a friend, or, if you’re really brave, record yourself. Listen to yourself speaking out loud, and get used to it. You’ll start to hear the flows in your talk, you’ll notice the key points, and and you’ll probably develop a better way to structure your talk. Let that happen. This is a good thing.

If someone tells you that you sound ‘rehearsed’, it’s generally because you sound scripted or stilted. That means you haven’t practiced enough. Go practice more. Do so enough that your presentation feels natural and that you can talk about your topic as though you’re having a conversation (with your 300+ closest friends). You’re done when you can close your eyes and feel comfortable talking through any of your slides (or your talk if you don’t have slides) individually without looking at them. If you have a live demo, TEST IT (repeatedly).

Work on your stage presence. Make eye contact with your audience (or different points in your practice room) and make sure to look around (try not to stare down any individuals). Stand up straight, avoid hunching or hiding behind a podium, and keep your gestures open (don’t cross your arms).

Practice hand gestures and movements which emphasize the points you’re making. Try to avoid wandering aimlessly or swaying back and forth. Make your movements deliberate so that the audience is focused on what you’re saying, not on your movement. I like to pick specific points where I’ll move across the stage to emphasize a point I’m making.

via GIPHY

Practice again. For the last talk I gave, I spent 3 hours the night before the talk, repeatedly giving my speech to the bathroom mirror until I felt completely comfortable and confident in what I was saying, even though I’d already been practicing daily. I know that public speaking makes me nervous and it always kicks in when I step up in front of a large audience. That means I need to know my speech so well that I can say it in my sleep (or when I’m really nervous).

You’re ready to go…now what?

On the day of the presentation:

1. Show up early. Check out the room set up, get comfortable, and if possible, test your AV setup. Bring your own adapters, power cables, and printed out slides/notes.
2. As you become more comfortable with speaking, begin to tailor your presentations to your audience. Talk to individuals in the audience (but don’t focus on any one individual for more than 5–10 seconds). Remember to pause, take a breath, and punctuate your talk with silence. It will help you and your audience recover and focus.
3. Remember that your audience wants you to succeed. No one wants to go to a bad presentation. They are rooting for you. Remember the old adage about picturing your audience in their underwear? I prefer to envision my audience applauding my talk. At this point, there’s little preparation which you can do, so relax, take a deep breath and picture your success. I know it sounds cheesy, but envisioning a successful talk helps me calm my nerves and focus.

_Photo by [Unsplash](https://unsplash.com/@nickxshotz?utm_source=medium&utm_medium=referral" rel="noopener" target="_blank" title="">Nicholas Green on <a href="https://unsplash.com?utm_source=medium&utm_medium=referral" rel="noopener" target="blank" title=")

After the presentation is over, think about whether or not you want to share your materials. If so, have a copy of your slides/materials you’re willing to share. Then, think about submitting your talk to other conferences!

Finally, ask for feedback (specific positive and negative feedback). The more feedback you get, the faster you will improve. I always find someone (usually another speaker or someone I know) for feedback after a presentation. I’ll specifically bug them for constructive feedback because I know it will improve my presentation skills.

Now give yourself a chance to relax! You did it!

Still looking for guidance? Check out these resources:

• Best Practices for Giving a Talk
• How to Prepare a Talk
• Giving a Talk
• A Multi-Part Guide to Giving Tech Talks
• Out Loud
• How to Not Throw Up

My mission in 2018 was to speak at every frontend-related meetup in Poland. In December I even made it to my first international conference. I learned a ton along the way. How can you benefit from my experience even if you don’t speak publicly yet? Well let’s find out.

You can speak

At the beginning of my journey, I believed I had to be somebody known to speak. Or that I had to persuade organizers with some magic words, otherwise I wouldn’t be invited.

Surprisingly, that wasn’t the case. Almost all meetup organizers told me afterward they are willing to invite first-time speakers (although some admitted they would only let them do a lightning talk). How cool is that?

This taught me something. Sometimes limitations only exist in our heads.

What limitations exist in your head right now, that you haven’t confronted with the reality?

_Me speaking at [Frontend Con 2018](https://frontend-con.io/" rel="noopener" target="blank" title=").

The topic doesn’t matter

In the beginning, I was sooooo freaked out about the topic. And my biggest excuse? I thought I had nothing to speak about. And when I finally had a list? I didn’t know which one should I choose.

You see, attending many different meetups gave me an opportunity to listen to a lot of talks. Some titles were promising but turned out to be boring in the end. Other topics didn’t sound exciting at all but the talk turned out to be super engaging. So, what’s the secret?

Delivery. You can talk about the newest, hottest, most exciting topic, but if your delivery sucks, the audience will experience the longest 30 minutes in their lives. Or you can have a relatively boring topic like borders in CSS. You can deliver it in an exciting way so that people won’t realize when those 30 minutes have passed.

Oh, wait. The topic does matter during the speaker selection process. A catchy presentation title helps a lot there. But once you are invited, the topic doesn’t matter. It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it.

_[Michał](undefined" rel="noopener" target="blank" title="), Joanna, and Marta talking to peeps at Frontend Con 2018.

Prepare in advance

By far preparation is my weakest point as a public speaker. That’s why my slides never get proof-read by a copywriter or fine-tuned by a designer (although Netguru provides these services for employees for free!). That’s a pity.

I regret it the most with regard to FrontendCon. I spent so much time researching the niche I was going to speak about that I literally had no slides the day before my talk (my most important talk this year! ?).

This not only caused me unnecessary stress and sleepless nights. Instead of talking to people, listening to awesome presentations, and making friends with community leaders, I was sitting in a speakers’ room with headphones on my head preparing my talk. What a loss!

_[Sara Vieira](undefined" rel="noopener" target="blank" title=")’s tweet.

Don’t be like that. Prepare your talk in advance. Let it be proofread and designed superbly. Invite people to listen to your rehearsals and ask them for honest, radically candid feedback. Make use of all the support you can possibly have. And during the event? Be there for people. Connect and make new friends.

Learn speakers’ names by heart

A person’s name is to that person, the sweetest and most important sound in any language
~ Dale Carnegie

It’s awkward enough when you go to the conference and most speakers know and hug each other but nobody knows you. Believe me, I’ve been there. In those moments, make sure that you at least know them.

Seriously. Take time and learn every speaker’s name by heart. This will pay off. You’ll show your respect to them, make yourself more likable, and build deeper connections during the event. And speaking about connections…

Connections matter

Wait, what? Just a couple paragraphs above you told me I could be invited to any meetup easily. That’s true. But that’s not the case with conferences.

You can submit to a call for papers and be invited, because some conferences welcome first-time speakers. But what if you want to speak at more recognized, prestigious events? You better have connections.

As long as you know the right people and they know, like, and recommend you, you can speak virtually everywhere. Whether you like it or not, whether it’s fair in your eyes or not, that’s what I see is happening.

Connections matter. Embrace the reality and make some friends.

_[Vitalii Bobrov](undefined" rel="noopener" target="blank" title=") and I discussing CSS tricks with folks.

Nobody knows everything

You know those people that are so widely recognized, have so many followers on twitter and whatnot? Leaders whom people respect, experts who speak at big events in our industry? When you think of them, you might feel so little and so tiny. Like an imposter, maybe? You know that feeling, don’t you?

Well, I had a chance to talk to some of those people. And you know what? The typical conversation sounded like this:

Me: so what do you speak about?
Super recognizable unicorn expert: about x. And you?
Me: about property-based testing.
Super recognizable unicorn expert: oh, I haven’t heard about it.

See? You’re an expert too. You researched your topic thoroughly. You have your own perspective and experience. Value yourself because the truth is everybody sucks at something (or at most things) and nobody knows everything.

Focus on what matters

I was trying many things to become recognizable in the community.

I tried YouTube. It’s super hard for me, requires a lot of skills and time, and although I’m not done with it yet, it outgrew me temporarily.

I tried Instagram Stories, mainly to get comfortable in front of the camera. Guess what? I’m comfortable in front of the camera now and still, nobody knows me.

You know why those things didn’t work? Because I went to the wrong place. Event organizers don’t give a dime about your Instagram account. Nor about your YouTube channel (unless it’s big enough). So what do they care about?

Twitter. Hands down, Twitter is the go-to platform for IT communities (at least internationally. If you focus on Poland specifically, I’d recommend Facebook instead). Literally, organizers go and check your Twitter account. Do you have a good number of followers? If not, they’re not inviting you.

Medium. Organizers are checking your publications online. Did you write? How much? How often? How many readers did you manage to attract? And it’s primarily Medium, although you can try other platforms like dev.to or popular sites like Smashing Magazine or CSS Tricks.

Recordings of past talks. If organizers have a chance to watch your past talks on YouTube and get a feeling of what they can expect, they’re much more willing to invite you. If you want to speak at conferences, look for meetups that publish recorded talks on YouTube afterward (dev.js Warsaw is the one that even had a professional cameraman!).

Pro-tip: normally during meetups, I’d recommend speaking in attendees’ mother tongue — this helps to engage the audience. But if your talk is going to be recorded, you better choose English.

_[Vivek Patel](undefined" rel="noopener" target="blank" title=") having fun in front of the camera.

Have a mission

I got invited to 14 meetups in 11 different cities (not counting Netguru Tech Talks and FrontendCon).

Cities in which I spoke in 2018

This means I failed. I didn’t speak at every frontend-related meetup in Poland in 2018. But that’s not the point.

The mission was there to drive my actions, to give me direction, and to create uncertainty that makes others cheer me on and help me. The mission was there to show the world that I’m dedicated, committed, and am not going away any time soon. The mission was there to get me on stage at an international conference. The mission was there to be big enough so that I could unleash my full potential.

Do I cry that I failed? Should I give up and stop trying? No! I’d rather fail having a big, ambitious mission, than celebrate accomplishing a small, mediocre goal.

Look, without this big mission, none of the above would’ve happened. I wouldn’t have met all those amazing people, listened to all those talks, learned all those things. I wouldn’t have spoken at FrontendCon and you wouldn’t be reading this.

If you’re going to fail, make sure you fail doing something worth your effort. Have a mission. Ask if your mission is crazy enough. Go big. Unleash your potential ✌️

Me explaining how Google used property-based testing to find a bug in LevelDB.

So you have been considering getting into the conference speaking field? Well you’re in luck, it’s a great time to jump in! Maybe you gave a talk at a local meetup and enjoyed it. Maybe you attended an event recently and started to think about ways you could contribute to the attendees. Maybe you ran across a good talk on YouTube that inspired you.

You got this! (source: Getty Images)

I have been speaking at conferences, reviewing proposals for events, and coaching new speakers for the last couple of years. I find that many people have misconceptions on the subject, like “I need tons of experience before I can speak at an event” or “speaking at events is invite only”.

But there is a growing movement in tech to make speaking more friendly to beginners and more welcoming as a whole. More and more events even have a separate application (call for proposals) process for beginners.

Picking a Topic

The process of coming up with ideas for your next proposal can be more similar to that of songwriting than something more systematic, like approaching a technical problem. Inspiration comes from many different places and in many different forms. Here are some ways that I have come up with talk ideas:

Real Footage of Me Brainstorming (Source: Giphy.com)

• I saw a talk with X format and decided to apply it to Y subject.
• While working on a project, I thought, “Wow! I wish I knew X, Y, and Z before I started!”
• A conversation with coworkers about X led me to see the potential for a talk on it.

With these approaches I start out with the idea and then find a way to make it work for the conference. For example, when I applied to speak at Pycon I knew I wanted to talk about computational randomness. So I started there and then added to the Python specific meat of the talk. You can also start with the conference in mind and brainstorm ideas from there. By using this method, my thought process was more like:

• These are the top X, Y, Z ideas people are looking at in this language/framework now.
• This conference tends to have talks in X and Y subject areas every year.
• An event is specifically requesting talks in Z field.

Personally, I have found the first approach to be more successful. Often, starting with the conference in mind can lead you to write talks that you think the conference wants, rather than writing something you are genuinely passionate about. Also, people tend to come up with similar ideas which can put you in a bigger pool of competition (i.e. writing 1 of the 100 talks about the basics of machine learning in Python vs. a unique problem you are particularly suited to solve).

Writing your Abstract

Once you have the idea, it is time to jump into representing it in the best light possible. One of the biggest misconceptions in conference submissions is that you don’t need too much effort into this step because

A. You are too important or

B. Your idea speaks for itself.

Unless you have been specifically invited to speak (at which point you can decide your own topic with some input from the organizing team), your proposal will often go through a blind review process where it has to fend for itself against the other (well-written) proposals.

And details are important! Reviewers are busy people often reading hundreds of proposals for an event. If there is not enough content there, they will not guess what you could have meant. They will mark it down and move on - regardless of your qualifications.

With the importance of this writing stage in mind, here’s a little about my process once I’ve got an idea…

Time to start writing! (Source: Giphy.com)

Write the description first

Conferences have varying requirements for a submission, but I often start with a more detailed description and outline to solidify my ideas as recommended by Alaina Kafkes in this piece. This helps me illuminate the most important stuff that I want to talk about.

Sometimes you start out writing a talk about how brown bears are best, but as you start to sketch out the timeline for what you want to discuss, you realize that you really want to talk about why polar bears are undervalued and really deserve more attention overall.

Answer the question: why should I attend this talk?

The abstract you submit is your selling point. The elevator pitch of your talk. It’s like a dating profile to potential matches. Think about the value of your talk to potential attendees, because this is how reviewers will decide whether or not to include it.

I usually write out a separate section with at least 3 explicit takeaways that I will incorporate into the abstract and often also include that in my description. One of the most common reasons talks get denied is “Can’t think of any takeaways”. As a reviewer, a common litmus test for reading a talk is “Would I have interest in this talk myself?” and if the answer is no, that can be a good reason to favor a different, more compelling proposal instead.

Think about why you are the best person to give this talk

Saron from Code Newbie gave this advice in a webinar on submitting to conferences that really stuck with me. Don’t submit a talk that should be a blog post. As someone who really loves practical takeaways, I often write talks that feel more like “5 reasons to switch to X framework”, but the best talks have a good story as well.

Looking at it from this perspective humanizes my speaking and makes my talks more like a journey than a series of tips that could be easily skimmed. You want to leave your attendees with more than what they would get from a written piece.

Have at least one person read your work

I always have at least one person review my work and I will continue doing this until the one time when they do not manage to catch something really big. These embarrassing mistakes that I somehow missed in the 50 times I read it myself have included:

• basic spelling errors
• weird auto-correct issues
• using “I” instead of “me”
• choosing a word that didn’t mean what I thought it did

This step is really important. To many reviewers, grammatical mistakes both consciously and unconsciously convey a lack of effort.

Grammar Matters (Source: Yourecards.com)

Get feedback

If the conference offers it, get feedback on proposals! Even if not explicitly stated, when emailing and asking for a second opinion I have never been turned down. This makes a world of difference. Some of the useful feedback I’ve received has included cutting irrelevant subjects, adding more detail to a particular technical explanation, and making the takeaways more obvious.

Best of luck in your journey!

Like many things in life, submitting to conferences is a bit of a numbers game, so don’t give up if you are not accepted the first time. Ask them for tips on how to improve! Hope to see you at an event soon.

Good luck! (Source: Giphycat.com)

I’m a web developer. Having spoken at a few tech conferences, I thought I’d share some benefits I experienced through speaking️. If you’re considering speaking, maybe this article can provide some extra insight.

When you decide to speak at a conference, it’s not just that 20–40 minute talk slot you’re involved with. Other factors come into play like preparation, travel and money.

There are some more obvious benefits, such as learning new technologies, getting out of your comfort zone, and personal branding. But in this article, I hope to share some of the less obvious benefits, such as traveling, easier access to future conferences, and some other aspects.

For me, the biggest benefit is travel️. All-expenses-paid trips to new countries can be really great. If you want to go traveling but money’s an issue, being a speaker at an international conference can help with that.

I’ve been lucky enough to explore the Netherlands (??), United States (??)️, Ireland (??)️, Czech Republic (??)️, Switzerland (??)️, Poland (??)️, Ukraine (??)️, Romania (??)️, Greece (??)️, Germany (??) ️and more. All I really paid for was food and additional accommodations.

There are huge benefits to traveling in general which I won’t cover here, but you can research yourself. Conference organizers are usually happy to help you explore their city in a way which makes you comfortable. They can tell you the good spots to go to without you having to read through endless TripAdvisor reviews which have questionable integrity. You can ask organizers for advice at pretty much any stage, and they’ll try to accommodate you.

If you have a partner or a close friend ?, you may both be able to tick off traveling from your bucket lists. If you ask the organizers, your partner can probably attend the conference and speaker’s dinner too. They may not be interested in the conference topics, but it will still be an experience for them to see you speak. On a few occasions, I requested the organizers book a flight for my partner too, and this typically came out of my speaker payment️.

Most of these visits are through conferences. Not shown: U.S. where I attended Google I/O a few times and spoke in New York

I find a good strategy is for your partner or friend to explore the city independently while you’re at the conference. You can meet up afterwards. But the real benefit of the ‘travel’ aspect is through the extra days you book where you don’t have important commitments to attend to.

The trick is to extend the days you’re located within that country. When the conference has a decent budget, the organizers will pay for your flights plus a few nights at a hotel, but you can request the return flight is (for example) one week after the conference️. In between, you’ll want to stay at an Airbnb or a hostel, rather than the expensive hotel they book for you on conference nights.

On one occasion, I negotiated with the conference organizer to cover a very cheap Airbnb for me and my partner for a whole week instead of a fancy hotel for a few nights. All we had to pay for was food and bus tickets for that whole trip.

Accommodations

In my experience, it’s almost always been super fancy hotels by my standards. It feels unusual at times, but definitely an interesting experience. If the conference pays for your hotel, they’ll probably include a hotel breakfast too!

2 fancy 4 me

When you arrive at the conference city, rather than paying lots of money for a roaming data plan, the organizers can hook you up with a prepaid sim card which includes data. Make sure you ask about this if you believe you’ll benefit from it.

Some conference give speaker gifts ?️ too, which is very nice. It’s also very touching to receive a handwritten card. Extra touches like these create strong positive vibes on the trip and makes the overall event a rewarding experience. Be careful to manage expectations with yourself however, otherwise you’ll take these things for granted.

Local snacks, travel card and a sim card

Fancy chocolate

One time, I received a wireless keyboard plus fitness tracker as a gift, which was a surprise!

When you network with conference organizers, it’s not unheard of that you’ll be invited back again in the future, maybe as a speaker or an attendee. I was once fortunate enough to be invited back to run a workshop.

Stole this after the workshop, it’s now my new duvet cover

Networking allows you to gravitate towards people you care about. Here are some types of networking I’ve observed and experienced:

• A previous speaker had returned as a photographer (so there’s room to grow into other roles if you meet the right people).
• Another previous speaker had taken over the video editing work a conference needed. I guess a dedicated audio/video production team would normally be contacted, but in this case the organizers went with someone they knew personally.
• Sometimes, attendees who work at cool companies happen to work nearby, and it’s not uncommon to get invited to their workplace for a lunch and chat…and maybe pool.

Flights

The organizers pay for an economy return flight on the dates I ask for. On multiple occasions I’ve asked if I can stop-over in a new country and usually pay for the extra flight cost.

Tip: You may want to do the stop-over in your return journey since your talk would have finished by that point.

On a few occasions, after arriving at the conference destination, the organizers were waiting for me at the airport to direct me to a taxi which took me straight to the hotel — very convenient.

If you might want to use public transport later on, you can ask the organizer what sort of travel card to buy (airports sometimes sell these) — this can also be useful if you don’t speak their local language.

Subject

A note on recycling talks: that is, giving the same talk at multiple conferences. Generally, this is fine. If in doubt, ask the organizers.

Once you’ve given a talk, you can reuse the following at a new conference:

• ?️ Your talk proposal document (such as ‘In my talk, the audience will learn…’) which you send to the organizers for them to consider you
• ?️ Slides
• ?️ Speech

And those three reusable points can save many days worth of preparation. Realistically, you’ll iterate upon your slides but for the most part things can stay the same.

You’ll have to use common sense to decide when to stop reusing your talk, however one big factor for me is: when do I stop learning? If I continuously reuse the same talk, I won’t have any new topics to learn about. Using a conference talk is a great excuse to learn a new technology, technique or concept.

Branding

Speaking even just once allows you to build and maintain a personal brand. This can help with future speaking gigs and work opportunities. For example I met the CEO of a company which I was later employed by. I met this CEO during the break of one conference right after they complimented my talk!

By building my brand, I’m pleased to say I’ve been a Google Developer Expert for over 5 years ✨️!

Note: conference speaking has helped, but is not the main reason I was accepted into the GDE program.

After

When you arrive back home after a conference, you’ll want to take a retrospective look on what happened️. For example:

• What did you gain and was the whole thing worth it?
• How was timing and pacing during the talk?
• Did you feel fully prepared before the talk? If not, what was left to do?

For myself, it’s inevitable that I’ll feel motivated and passionate to achieve new life goals. This probably sounds cheesy, but that’s the effect of being put into a new location with a new routine!

A while after my talks, I sometimes get:

• ?️ A thank you email
• ?️ Professionally shot photographs of me speaking
• ?️ A video link of my talk

So if ever I need a normal looking photo of myself, maybe to use as a profile picture somewhere, or because an employer is asking, I can use the ‘professional’ looking photo.

Don’t think I should use this as a LinkedIn profile pic

My conference talk videos have helped me out too:

• If I ask to speak at a new conference, I can simply send that video link to the organizers so they get a feel for my speaking skills.
• If done tastefully, you can include a link to your video in job application cover letters, it normally reflects well.
• When I watch my talk well after I’ve presented it, I pick up on all sorts of mistakes which helps me improve for next time.

When I receive the video from the conference organizers, which is after the conference has finished, I embark upon one final task. Getting conference talk material online so others can benefit.

For my conference talk at ScotlandJS, I went through a few steps to get the slides online ?️:

• Removed any references which don’t make sense in a non-speech environment.
• Replaced all live demos with either videos, or code demos.
• Link to the video from the slides.

This combination of steps helps ensures the content is still useful to the tech community after the talk is given. I’ll also leave a comment in the YouTube video linking to the slides. Where possible, I’ll go through the video and collect timestamps️ corresponding to the individual topics. This is so folks can easily jump to parts of the video without having to watch the whole thing.

Timestamps link to a specific point in the YouTube video

All of this post-conference activity doesn’t take very long, helps provide value to the community, and results in building up your personal brand. If your content is good, your talk will live on!

Tip: If you speak about a niche or specialized topic, there’s a chance you’ll be presented with opportunities ? for work as and when others in the industry encounter your slides and video.

Employers

There are many industries where the employer will not support you in attending conferences, but tech is not one of them. I’ve written some advice on this topic before, go and have a read if you think it applies to you.

Almost all of my employers have supported me in attending conferences. This means:

• I can attend a conference during ‘work time’ ?️ without booking holiday.
• I can travel during ‘work time’ as the conference will increase my skill set for work.
• I don’t always get paid for speaking, when this happens, a few employers allowed me to expense transport costs.
• To solidify what I’ve learned and to share knowledge with my peers, they’ll encourage me to give an internal tech talk which in turn increases my evangelism skills.

Some employers ask you to book holiday if you are speaking at a conference. They might do this if they feel the conference topics are unrelated to what you do, or maybe they’ve never allowed such a thing before. If so, consider communicating to your line manager about the benefits of you speaking or even attending a conference.

Here are a few things to watch out for:

Sometimes I end up in interesting situations like:

In this photo, I believe a local television network wanted me to say nice things about the developer community in their city but I get nervous with those things. Looking back, it’s really no biggie if you pass on an opportunity you’re uncomfortable/shy/nervous about…apart from the talk itself!

Another example is a Q&A session after your talk, if you’re not into it, just let the organizers know as early as possible so they can have an alternative plan. Looking back on this opportunity and many others, I don’t regret a single one!

Each Q&A, panel session, group chat and recorded interview was an honor to be part of and I am glad I did it.

People thinking you’re smarter than you are ️

I am a front-end web developer. With all the speaking, some employers and potential employers end up thinking I’m much more skilled than I actually am.

Not everyone makes the distinction between evangelism and web development. Many speakers I’ve seen are real experts at their craft so this won’t apply to everyone.

A wrong way to travel?

I don’t really think there are right and wrong ways to travel since people desire different experiences which changes throughout one’s life. I feel a lot of my traveling for conference were very luxurious (such as airport pickups). This is however totally within my control, if I want a more independent experience, I can simply mention I don’t need an airport pickup and fancy hotels to the organizers.

Just a heads up however, doing conference speaking for long enough can warp your perspective of what it means to travel.

Conclusion / Recap

Speaking at a conference is a unique experience:

• You’ll get out of your comfort zone
• You’ll learn a new technology (assuming your talk is about something you don’t already know)
• You’ll build a network of friends
• You may receive some cool speaker gifts
• You’ll get to explore a new location and culture
• You can get a holiday out of the whole experience while paying very low expenses — your partner or friend can also share this benefit
• You’ll have a bunch of resources and assets from your talk which you can use in CV’s, cover letters and portfolios
• You’ll improve your personal brand and evangelism skills
• You’ll get out of your usual routine and be exposed to a different culture

Public speaking will bring a bunch of goodness to you regardless of the industry. Here’s a big list of call for papers where you can submit a talk proposal and have the organizers consider your talk.

For my next talk, I’ll get some videos up onto my YouTube channel so you can understand exactly what goes into preparing for a conference.

• I post lots of developer tips on Twitter — also, if you have any questions or you’d like to work together, get in touch with me through Twitter.
• I have a mailing list for Chrome DevTools tips.
• I also post on Instagram.

View this post on Instagram

Conference badges

A post shared by Umar Hansa (@umarhansa) on Dec 1, 2016 at 12:32am PST

I’ve been to many conferences over the last twenty years. Mostly the speakers droned on about their topics, which were easily forgotten. Thinking back, only a few big ideas really stuck with me. These are three ideas I’ve come back to over and over again in my career.

There is a big difference between designed well and well-designed.

Graphic design legend David Carson gave a tedious presentation at one of the first conferences I ever attended. However, fifteen years later, I still clearly remember a pair of slides from his talk that looked something like this:

_(photo credits [Bernard Hermant](https://www.flickr.com/photos/stml/3947231477/in/photolist-71NAp8-wSwLaQ-BTHab-mjzdvc-57nyDQ-oU1YMo-7RewhE-6D7qMk-6kfL4o-69XaF-6j8Nkf-bKFqj8-65RPHK-s94ZWv-8z8pYS-6EqKew-6VsTUn-9zYac8-iaRSMQ-dHQqFh-dzKeKM-4zdjFS-6QbtXK-pv9icm-6MSt5M-6gaaae-59T7WL-7HG2uA-9zCa75-78mVco-ban3Wk-6KNV9h-cZFmQh-dpPcsC-VQzu4u-Vkbu3b-5RFCC1-AvRuS-dmLia3-ahdrAT-bQh6LR-SfygU9-9wfKvR-fEqwDw-dKRVsu-9qhz2x-26JPXgA-7GihBU-3KkkXa-HYHfEe" rel="noopener" target="_blank" title="">STML and <a href="https://unsplash.com/photos/aAEpfi8f59Y" rel="noopener" target="blank" title="))

There is a chasm between a concept that looks professionally designed versus a design that truly communicates your message.

The sign on the left says, “Please don’t park here, thanks.” The sign on the right says, “Try parking here PUNK and I’ll rip your head off your shoulders.” The second sign says a lot in just a few strokes. It’s more effective. It’s better designed.

Q: Which No parking sign would you obey?
A: The one tagged by the axe-wielding psychopath.

Take PowerPoint design seriously.

Yeah, you read that right. Over a decade ago, I heard a design executive from Adobe talk about how she got her start. She explained how, during the first few years of her career, she was bored to death designing slides for her bosses. Regardless, she took to the task with an open heart and poured her energy into designing the best damn PowerPoint slides.

In the process, she developed communication skills that served her well later on…and more importantly, an attitude that every design challenge is worthy of her effort. Amen.

PS: I wish I could remember her name or at least where I saw her speak. If you know who she might be, please share. I’d love to credit her and personally say thank you.

Don’t take advice from speakers at conferences.

To put it politely, TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington is loud. When he waltzed onto the stage five minutes late with a talk on “15 Important Lessons for Entrepreneurs”, I was ready to dismiss whatever he was about to say. But to my surprise, the first important lesson held a lot of truth.

Mike addressed the sea of heads: “If you’re going to start the next big thing, don’t listen to anything that I’m about to say.” Out of context, that sounds extreme. However, the way I interpreted Mike’s comment is:

Conference speakers confidently dole out lessons based on what worked well for them. What worked well for them is only ONE path, not the ONLY path. Your way may be fundamentally different, and that’s GREAT. Few people accomplished great things by copying what others have done.

In short, take every damn thing you hear at a conference with a huge shovel-full of salt. Then go find your own path.

Which lessons actually stuck with you from presentations over the years? I’d love to hear your story in the comments…

For several years now, I‘ve been watching tons of online conference talks. I’m always impressed by the willingness of people in the tech community to openly share knowledge with each other. So many people go out of their way to create free online learning materials or help out when you are stuck. These people really inspired me to try to teach what I knew and help others as well.

I really love teaching. It makes me feel fulfilled when I help someone and it also helps me learn. That was why I reached out to the local community over two years ago to help get a freeCodeCamp group started.

We started off just meeting in coffee shops around town to discuss code and possibly work on projects together. After six months or so, the group started to grow and gain traction around town and we decided to start having more formal meetings with workshops and speakers giving talks. Since we needed speakers to give these talks, I thought, “Why can’t I give talks too?”

My first talk I gave was to the freeCodeCampIndy group about “Making a Developer Blog.” Over a year later, with fifteen more talks and workshops under my belt, I’m so happy I took that first step to start teaching and speaking.

First, a list of my talks and workshops

End of 2016:

1. freeCodeCampIndy (local) — Making a Developer Blog
2. Node Indy (local) — Serverless Applications with Node.js on AWS Lambda
3. Indy Software Artisans (local) — Why you should use React Native for your Next Mobile App

2017:

1. IndyJS (local) — Programming Paradigms
2. Indy.Code (conference)— 2 talks, React Native and Programming Paradigms in JS
3. freeCodeCampIndy (local)— Build tools in JavaScript
4. Nebraska Code (conference) — 2 talks, React Native and Programming Paradigms in JS
5. Detroit Code (conference) — 2 talks, React Native and Programming Paradigms in JS
6. Indy AWS (local)— Serverless Applications on AWS
7. Prarie Code (conference) — 2 talks, React Native and Programming Paradigms in JS and an 8-hour workshop on React/Redux
8. freeCodeCampIndy (local)— React Workshop (2-hours)
9. freeCodeCampIndy (local)— Intro to JavaScript Workshop

2018:

1. NDC London (conference) — React Native

Struggles and Things I’ve Learned

Speaking has taught me a lot. I’m much more confident now. I communicate better. I feel fulfilled and more professional. And I’m better at reading people.

Conference speaking has also helped me learn to plan ahead with my schedule and partition my time better. I’m still not perfect by any means, but I am way better at these things than I was when I started.

The hardest thing for me has always been speaking in front of other people — even in a small group setting. I get severe social anxiety sometimes, and I used to have panic attacks sometimes just before I had to give a talk or a workshop. I did think about quitting quite a few times especially while I was alone at conferences in my hotel room.

I tried Toastmasters for a (very short) while, but it was a little bit intimidating for me. Everyone there seemed really extroverted and I didn’t quite fit in.

I’ve found that the best ways for me to practice are to grab a friend or two who will listen to me — even if they aren’t technical. Or to record myself giving the talk a few weeks ahead of time.

Basically, I just need to go through the whole presentation out loud a few times to see where it needs work. I’ve found that knowing what I’m going to say is way different than actually saying it.

Fortunately, I love to push myself and prove to myself that I can do things that I’m not naturally good at. It’s been quite a while since my last panic attack and I feel awesome!

Some Tips for Becoming a Conference Speaker

Start at local meetups.

The first talk I gave was on creating developer blogs at the local freeCodeCamp group. It was a great segue into speaking because there was no live coding or servers running or things that could go wrong. Plus it wasn’t overly technical. It just allowed me to get more comfortable speaking in public.

Meet lots of people.

I got invited to my first conference because I met someone locally who happened to be running a conference. When I spoke at that conference, I happened to be invited to apply to several more conferences. I wasn’t really amazing at anything, I just met the right people at the right time.

Practice in front of real people.

Make sure you set a date about two-weeks before your talk to practice in front of someone. You could alternatively record yourself and send it to someone to watch. (This is especially important if you are a procrastinator.)

This will make sure you don’t fall into the all-too-common habit of speakers to create their entire presentation only days or hours before their talk. More experienced speakers can cover up for this somewhat, but especially if you are new, it could turn out to be a disaster. Plus it adds unnecessary stress.

Don’t put it off — schedule time every week to work on it no matter what.

Always ask for feedback.

You can easily make a survey for free on Google Forms to get valuable tips, comments, and encouragement. This can be automatically converted to charts and tables for future referencing.

If you are speaking at a conference, there might already be some kind of survey set up for every speaker and talk. Just make sure you remind everyone at the end of your talk to go and fill it out.

If it’s a smaller audience, then you might be able to just ask people in person or online afterwards.

My Future Speaking Plans

I will be traveling to London in January. I’ve applied at two more conferences, so far and I’m planning to give some Vue.js and AWS talks next year (and maybe a few more I’ve been kicking around).

I’m kind of shy but I love meeting people, so if you see me at a conference please say ‘hello’ :)

A Call For Speakers…From 40,000 Feet

I’m writing this from a bar…that’s floating somewhere over Greenland. I just enjoyed a complimentary 3 course meal with wine, cheesecake, tea, and Baileys to top things off. After lunch, I finished editing my new Pluralsight course while hurtling through the air at 500 miles an hour above the Atlantic, on my way home from speaking at a conference in London.

I wrote this post sitting here:

Coding from the bar on a Virgin Atlantic intercontinental flight — so cool!

I feel indescribably lucky to be enjoying this life. Especially given that I didn’t pay a dime for this experience. How?

I spoke for a few hours at a software conference.

I’m not writing this to brag. I’m writing this as an invitation to you.

This opportunity is available to anyone. Five years ago, I had never spoken at a conference. Actually, I’d never spoken to a group of any size, period. Like most humans, I found the prospect of speaking to a crowd terrifying…

But I wasn’t simply intimidated by public speaking. At the time I was struggling with general social anxiety. I found the thought of making small talk with strangers at a conference terrifying. Weird huh? Anyway, I often avoided social situations. I was in a shell. I was stuck.

Chase Fear. Pick Yourself.

How’d I get here? I chased my fear. I scheduled a lunch & learn for my team. You can do this too. No big deal. Order some pizza. Ask your boss to pay for it. If he/she won’t, drop the $40 and buy it yourself.

Don’t sit around waiting to be picked. Pick yourself.

That simple, low risk step, started a journey. That little step toward fear is how I ended up here, writing this post at a bar on an international flight. Who saw that coming?!

Of course, I’m glossing over many steps in between. After speaking at my job, I worked my way up to speaking at local user groups, then regional conferences. I presented sessions at over a dozen conferences across the US before I worked up the courage to speak overseas. But that first lunch & learn made all the difference.

I realized two things:

1. I didn’t die.
2. I actually enjoyed speaking because I cared deeply about the topic.

Surprisingly, I was hooked. Since then, I’ve presented over 100 sessions at software conferences around the globe…

Crowd at my “Becoming an Outlier” talk at NDC Oslo, Norway 2014

NNIT, Copenhagen, Denmark 2016

Codestock 2016 keynote

Codemash 2017

Improved Communication = Virtuous Spiral

One of the most powerful changes you can make: Transform your greatest weakness into your greatest strength. Communication isn’t your strong suit? That’s precisely why you need to start speaking.

Public speaking doesn’t just radically improve communication skills. It improves confidence. It’s made me a better writer. A deeper thinker. A better teacher. A better manager. A better husband. A better father.

Communication forms the foundation of your life experience. I used public speaking as the means to conquer my illogical fears and break out of my shell. The odd fallout of speaking a lot: I’m now as comfortable speaking to a crowd of hundreds as I am having a beer 1:1.

If something is hard, do it more often.

Oh, and trust me, once you’ve gotten comfortable selling your ideas to a room of 100’s of skeptical developers, selling your ideas to a few executives is surprisingly low stress. :)

Drop the Imposter Syndrome

I’m frustrated by how often this message is met by the same response:

“I can’t speak. I’m not an expert. I’m still learning.”

We’re all still learning.

Excessive humility is a vice. It’s an excuse — a form of hiding. You don’t need to be the best to help others. You just need to know something they don’t know. That’s it.

Just getting started? Teach introductory topics you’d like to know better.

Have depth in a niche? Teach your strength.

In a world of specialization, there are countless people who are shallow where you have depth.

My Challenge To You

If you’ve never spoken, take the first step by presenting a short session over lunch at work. To get what you’ve never had, you have to do what you’ve never done.

Here’s my recipe for getting started.

Yes, it’s scary. Yes, it’s worth it.

“What’s behind fear? Nothing.” — Jamie Foxx

Cory House is the author of multiple courses on JavaScript, React, clean code, .NET, and more on Pluralsight. He is principal consultant at reactjsconsulting.com, a Software Architect at VinSolutions, a Microsoft MVP, and trains software developers internationally on software practices like front-end development and clean coding. Cory tweets about JavaScript and front-end development on Twitter as @housecor.