Defining the Roles within Developer Relations v0.1.0

A presentation at Flyless by Phil Leggetter

About Phil Leggetter
About Phil @leggetter
Software Engineer ➡ DevRel (2010)
Developer Evangelist @ Pusher
Developer Evangelist @ BladeRunnerJS
Head of DevRel @ Pusher
Snr. Director Platform & Developer Experience @ Nexmo/Vonage
Developer Experience & Relations @ **tru.ID**

Why Role Definitions Matter
Clarity for the individual in the role
Guidance for those interacting with someone in a role
Identify an entry point into DevRel for others
DevRel has matured. There is now specialization.
Roles within a team represent the implementation of a strategy

A Note on Strategy
📝 A Note on Strategy
Don’t Start with the Roles
Start with the Strategy
We’re looking for a “Developer Relations… Person” *— Any company that doesn’t yet have a strategy*

What are the Roles within Developer Relations?

Role "Popularity": Google Search
| **Role** | **Hits on Google** | | :——————————————-| :————————- | | Developer Relations | 612,000 | | Developer Advocate | 736,000 | | [Developer] Community Manager | 410,000 | | Developer Educator | 241,000 | | Developer Evangelist | 168,000 | | Developer Relations Engineer | 26,000 | | Developer Experience Engineer | 18,900 |

Role "Popularity": DevRel Weekly
| **Role** | **DevRel Weekly** | :——————————————-| :————————- | Developer Relations | 100
| Developer Advocate | 159
| [Developer] Community Manager | 19
| Developer Educator | 3
| Developer Evangelist | 31
| Developer Relations Engineer | 21
| Developer Experience Engineer | 3

Role "Popularity": LinkedIn
| **Role** | **LinkedIn Job Titles** | | :——————————————-|————————————-| | Developer Relations | 2,600 | Developer Advocate | 1,600 | [Developer] Community Manager | 1,000 | Developer Educator | 1,700 | Developer Evangelist | 576 | Developer Relations Engineer | 234 | Developer Experience Engineer | 363

Phil Leggetter
@leggetter

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This is a Work in Progress talk with associated blog post

Developer Relations continues to evolve and with that comes specialisation. That specialisation results in different perspectives on what it is to “do Developer Relations”, new role definitions and job titles. In this session, I’ll share my experience and observations on the roles that are most commonly seen and will provide my take on the definition of them.

Resources

The following resources were mentioned during the presentation or are useful additional information.

Buzz and feedback

Here’s what was said about this presentation on social media.

Excellent @flyless_dev meetup this week. Love hearing interesting talks (good job @leggetter) and genuinely insightful and useful discussions with no grandstanding and BS (artfully enabled by @monkchips)
— Robin Moffatt 🍻🏃🥓 (@rmoff) February 24, 2021
Great meeting today and conversation about roles in DevRel. Thank you @leggetter for steering it :)
— Rich Burroughs (@richburroughs) February 24, 2021
good slide by @leggetter pic.twitter.com/Jc3f1LayuQ
— flyless.dev (@flyless_dev) February 24, 2021
.@flyless_dev thanks for letting me share my thoughts and get such great input from the rest of the community 🙌

Oh, and for finish up so I could have my dinner 😊 pic.twitter.com/lMlbfPfPql
— Phil Leggetter (@leggetter) February 24, 2021
My "work in progress" slide deck from today's @flyless_dev weekly session on "Defining the Roles within Developer Relations".

👉 https://t.co/csP6YUwnPh

Blog post coming soon. And maybe another #flyless session in the future too.

Feedback and ideas appreciated 🙏#devrel
— Phil Leggetter (@leggetter) February 25, 2021

Defining the Roles within Developer Relations v0.1.0

Defining the Roles within Developer Relations

About Phil Leggetter

About Phil @leggetter

Why Role Definitions Matter

A Note on Strategy

📝 A Note on Strategy

Don’t Start with the Roles

Start with the Strategy

What are the Roles within Developer Relations?

Role "Popularity": Google Search

Role "Popularity": DevRel Weekly

Role "Popularity": LinkedIn

Role "Popularity": LinkedIn

What are the Roles within Developer Relations?

Any Obvious Role Omissions?

Help Me Define the Roles

Thanks, Flyless!

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Resources

Defining Developer Relations

What does being ‘technical’ mean?

Defining a career path for Developer Relations

Buzz and feedback