reverentgeek

Leadership Guide for the Reluctant Leader

Regardless of the technology you know, regardless of the job title you have, you have amazing potential to impact your family, workplace, community, and beyond. In this talk, I'll share a few candid stories of my career failures... I mean... learning opportunities. You'll walk away with some essential leadership skills I believe anyone can develop, and a good dose of encouragement to be more awesome.

Abstract

Regardless of the technology you know, regardless of the job title you have, you have amazing potential to impact your workplace, community, and beyond.

In this talk, I’ll share a few candid stories of my career failures… I mean… learning opportunities. We’ll start by debunking the myth that leadership == management. Next, we’ll talk about some the attributes, behaviors and skills of good leaders. Last, we’ll cover some practical steps and resources to accelerate your journey.

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FSGD and the Art of Delivering Value

Engineering, DevOps, IT, Marketing, ...you name it, there is a constant battle between going fast and doing it right. Add to the mix the fact that coordination across teams and departments comes at a high transaction cost. How can we minimize the friction?

At my time at LeanKit, we strove to continuously improve our processes across the entire organization. Along the way, we developed FSGD, which we affectionately pronounce "fizz good." FSGD distills many core lean (and agile) principles into an easy-to-remember and easy-to-communicate thinking tool you can use to make better decisions about the work you do.

In this talk, I'll share with you the challenges we faced as we scaled, how we struggled, what we learned, and how we evolved. The goal is for you to walk away with tools and practical processes that will impact you and your team's success.

Shorter Abstract

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Public Speaking without Barfing on Your Shoes

Sooner or later, we are called on to speak. Out loud. In front of an audience. We may have to present something to our team, our management, or even a larger group of complete strangers. Public speaking strikes fear into the hearts of nearly everyone, especially those of us who are very shy. Imagining people in their underwear does not help.

I have been speaking at conferences, user groups, and meetups for many years. However, as a shy introvert, this is not something that comes naturally to me! If I can do it, so can you! In this fun and light-hearted talk, I want to share with you what I have learned from my hard-won experience. Introverts and extroverts alike will walk away with practical tips on preparing and giving effective presentations.

Shorter Abstract

Public speaking strikes fear into the hearts of nearly everyone. Sooner or later, we are called on to speak. Out loud. In front of an audience. In this fun and light-hearted talk, I want to share w

reverentgeek

• Install Visual Studio Code
• Install Node.js v5.10
• Open a Terminal / Command Window
• Change to your documents folder (or where you store projects)

Mac:

cd ~/Documents

reverentgeek

Electron Workshop

2-hour version

Many companies are turning to Electron.js to build amazing desktop applictions that run on Windows, Mac, and Linux using familiar Web technologies. In this hands-on workshop we will learn the fundamentals of building desktop applications with Electron.js. Our goal is to walk away with a solid framework for building and deploying your own applications!

Requirements:

• Laptop running Mac OS X 10.8+, Windows 7+, or Ubuntu 12+
• Node.js v4.4+ or v5.9+

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Short bio

David is a family man, musician, illustrator, software developer, and Microsoft MVP living in North Georgia. He is currently a Senior Developer Advocate for Okta, runs on a high-octane mixture of caffeine and JavaScript, and is made entirely of bacon.

200-char limit

David is a family man, musician, illustrator, and Microsoft MVP living in North GA. Currently a Senior Developer Advocate for Okta, he runs on a high-octane mixture of caffeine and bacon.

200-char limit international

reverentgeek

Cross-Platform Desktop Apps with Electron

Would you like to leverage your HTML, CSS, and JavaScript skills to build cross-platform desktop applications? Electron is an open source application shell created by GitHub, designed to make building great desktop applications easy. You may have already experienced Electron apps such as Atom, Slack, or Visual Studio Code. In this talk, you will learn its features, how to quickly get started, and tips from my experience building Electron applications.

300-char limit

Would you like to leverage your web skills to build cross-platform desktop applications? Electron is an open-source solution designed to make building great desktop applications easy. In this talk, you will learn its features, how to quickly get started, and tips from my experience!

https://youtu.be/Xs3Oc4weZbw

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Node.js Crash Course

Node.js for Noobs

Node.js is a compelling platform that is quickly spreading from startups to the enterprise. Node.js strategically unites developers of all backgrounds through the common language of JavaScript. Why should you learn Node.js and where do you start? You will come away from this talk with the evidence to support Node.js, and tools you need to be productive. We will walk through a typical workflow of creating and debugging a web application. You will learn how easy it is to deploy, including Microsoft Azure. We'll also look at popular frameworks and modules, and other learning resources to give you the best start.

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5 Proven Practices for Building Quality Software

Are you and your team tired of being on the hamster wheel of fighting bugs and brittle code? How can your software team advance from good to great? Join David Neal as he shares practical and proven approaches to software craftsmanship. You will learn to improve areas such as workflow, testing, standards, and code review. You will come away with effective practices and tools for developing high quality software while cultivating a culture of continuous improvement.

About David Neal

David is a husband, father, geek, musician, motorcyclist, speaker, software developer, and Microsoft MVP living in North GA. He's currently a Developer Advocate for LeanKit. David served as president of the Nashville .NET User Group for 2012 and 2013. He runs on a high-octane mixture of caffeine and bacon.

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Take Back Project Sanity: The Kanban Journey

Kanban is just sticky notes on a whiteboard, right? There’s more to this methodology than you might think. Kanban harnesses the power of visual information to turn your team’s work into brain candy. However, visualization is only the beginning.

Whether you work in software development, operations, or professional cat wrangling, Kanban can help you continuously improve your process (yes, you have one!). That can help your team boost things like delivery speed, predictability, and quality.

In this fun and entertaining talk, you’ll learn the core principles and practices of Kanban, as well as how to maximize its potential to evolve how you, your team, and your organization works.

Shorter Abstract