A case against showmanship

A talk I gave at eurucamp 2015. Its purpose is twofold: to encourage people interested in speaking at tech events to give it a go and to encourage seasoned speakers to look at their talks and evaluate whether they aren't engaging in showmanship.

Transcript

1. A A case case against against showmanship showmanship
2. Marta Paciorkowska Twitter: a_meba Github: xamebax (currently unemployed) software engineer
3. Marta, why do you hate fun?
4. Think about how we portray ourselves
5. Edgy is just another word for mainstream
6. Strong language Strong opinions Homogeneous audience
7. 56% of women in technology leave their employers mid-career. Of the women who leave: – 24% take a non-technical job in a different company, – 22% become self-employed in a tech field, – 20% take time out of the workforce. This is double the turnover rate of men. - National Center for Women in Technology, http://www.ncwit.org/sites/default/files/legacy/pdf/NCWIT_TheFacts_rev2010.pdf
8. Speakers get the benefits
9. Highly-specialized technical industries tend to hire from their networks more often than average. - Peter Rigano, “Industries where your network matters more...” http://blog.linkedin.com/2015/03/09/industries-where-your-network-matters-more-than-you-think/
10. http://blog.linkedin.com/2015/03/09/industries-where-your-network-matters-more-than-you-think/
11. Beyond the ego cult: An ode to the conference speaker
12. Relax, you don't have to show off. Strong language and strong opinions are strongly disadvised. This is not a conference on applied memology.
13. [t]he problem is thinking that what matters in your presentation is you. Because unless you're a paid performer – musician, comedian, motivational speaker – you are not the reason [the people] came to the conference. - Kathy Sierra, “Presentation Skills Considered Harmful” http://seriouspony.com/blog/2013/10/4/presentation-skills-considered-harmful
14. Thank you. Questions?