A presentation at San Francisco Reliability Engineering Meetup in in San Francisco, CA, USA by Mary Thengvall
@mary_grace Hi everyone! My name is Mary Thengvall, and this is a snapshot of my community. I’m a people person. I love connecting people, both personally and professionally. And these people you see on the screen - some of whom are here today! - are all part of the greater tech community. But have you ever known without a shadow of a doubt that you belong — truly belong! — in a community. That these are YOUR PEOPLE! And yet not feel accepted by them because they don’t truly understand what it is that you actually do? Welcome to Developer Relations. How many of you are familiar with this term? How many of you are familiar with the debates about Developer Relations that have been happening on Twitter over the last six months? For those of you who aren’t familiar with these debates… congrats on staying out of the drama!! But let me show you a bit of what’s been going on and what people — people, who, mind you, aren’t in Developer Relations — have been saying about this industry. These are real quotes from Twitter and Reddit, but I’ve removed the names and changed a word or two to protect the innocent.
@mary_grace Developer Relations involves being a social media influencer on behalf of big corporations — without being honest about that fact. Unfollowing DevRel folks here has been a good move. Developer Relations involves being a social media influencer on behalf of big corporations — without being honest about that fact. Unfollowing DevRel folks here has been a good move.
@mary_grace There should be no full-time DevRels. They should all rotate, working on real code and real products half of the time, especially those in dire need of what they are preaching. There should be no full-time DevRels. They should all rotate, working on real code and real products half of the time, especially those in dire need of what they are preaching.
@mary_grace Am I the only one to whom “developer advocate” sounds like a career path that’s a bit like “dermatologist”? …in the sense that it’s people who went to medical school but didn’t quite cut it as REAL doctors? And lastly… my favorite: Am I the only one to whom “developer advocate” sounds like a career path that’s a bit like “dermatologist”? …in the sense that it’s people who went to medical school but didn’t quite cut it as REAL doctors?
@mary_grace These quotes, and so many others, are just another example of people not understanding what Developer Relations is and the value that we provide to our company, sure, but more importantly… the value we bring to YOU — our technical community that we so desperately want to connect with, NOT so that we can sell you on our product, but so that we can empower you to do your jobs better. Because what most people don’t understand is that Developer Relations isn’t just coding… it’s not just folks like me standing on stages… it’s not sales… it’s not really even marketing (tho it has some similarities at times)… it’s not quite engineering or even product.
@mary_grace As Roach says… Developer Relations involves a lot more than writing code. DevRel is: - building relationships and fostering trust. - Collecting and relaying feedback to other teams - Helping people work through challenges - Inspiring people to build - Building tools to empower - and… - Mentorship
@mary_grace Greg Bulmash puts it this way: Developers are like Microsoft or Amazon. What they do is well-known. Advocates, evangelists, and community managers are like a Series B startup… well-regarded in their niche, but harder for people outside it to understand.
Who @mary_grace Why How When What Where And this is why I’m here today… to help you understand the essence of Developer Relations. CLICK The who, what, where, when, why, and how of this largely misunderstood industry. My goal is to not only answer your questions about Developer Relations but to help you understand why Developer Relations professionals are so passionate about you and how we apply that passion toward empowering you.
But first… for those of you who don’t know me… you may be asking, who am I, and why am I here on this stage today? @mary_grace Who Am I?
Who’s the Dog? @ember_dog Who Am I? More importantly, you’re probably wondering who’s up here with me. Most people notice him before they notice me anyway! This is Ember Dog — full name EmberDog Pups McGee Captain Underfoot III — you can follow him on twitter at @ember_dog — you’ll see I’ve changed the Twitter handle on the upper right hand corner of the screen there. He’s a medical alert service dog for me — I’m a T1D and he lets me know when my blood sugar is starting to get low. But that’s a whole other talk about monitoring and performance… not for today.
@mary_grace Who Am I? As for me… I have a journalism background, but I entered the journalism world right as most newspapers were laying off their writing staff, which wasn’t ideal. So, like most tech companies, I pivoted! I’m now using my feature-writing and storytelling abilities to show the business value of building technical communities. I’ve personally worked with various developer communities for more than 10 years now at companies like O’Reilly, Chef Software, and SparkPost — some of you here today know me because of the time that I’ve spent at Gluecon interacting with you all on behalf of these companies! — but my favorite thing about working with technical communities has always been finding the best solutions for the problems that you’re facing.
@mary_grace Who Am I? And as I worked with all of these various technical communities, I found myself going back to my journalism training: recognizing patterns, drawing conclusions, and telling stories about how these communities were not only beneficial for technical folks who were trying to understand a new concept or product, but also beneficial for the companies that were taking the time to invest in them. It started to become clear to me that while some companies could absolutely succeed without a community behind them, the best companies… the most successful — the ones whose communities were loyal and consistently praising them (without any type of bribery!) — were the ones who took the time to invest in the technical communities around them. But I also started to realize that most companies didn’t understand what the true value of Developer Relations was, and for the most part, DevRel teams were underestimated, underutilized, and overworked. We also lacked the resources to know how to make things better on our own. So I left the corporate world and started out on my own in 2017, with this mission:
@mary_grace The mission of Persea Consulting is to provide resources about Developer Relations & Community Management for those who are practicing in those areas as well as business decision makers who are trying to understand the business value of these initiatives. In doing so, we move the entire industry forward. I want to create resources about Developer Relations and Community Management, educating and providing professional development opportunities for those who are practicing in these fields, as well as their managers and stakeholders who are trying to figure out what these terms mean and how they fit into the rest of the business. My hope is that by providing resources and working with companies 1:1, the industry will slowly start to understand the business value of Developer Relations and the tremendous advantage that connecting with a technical community can give them in this day and age. In fulfilling that mission, I provide a number of resources for the DevRel community — DevRel Weekly: a weekly newsletter that covers industry news as well as a curated list of blogposts and tweets; Community Pulse: a podcast that covers all sorts of topics in Community Building & DevRel; and The Business Value of Developer Relations: my book which came out in October of last year.
Who @mary_grace Why How When What Where I’m also working to make sure that you, the technical audience, understands the true value that we bring to you… which brings me back to my topic for today.
@mary_grace But before I move into answering these questions… I have to say that I had a lot of help from folks on Twitter and The Practical Dev for this talk as you can see from this slide. So many DevRel professionals were passionate about sharing why they love their job and what they wanted all of you to know about Developer Relations! I’ll be quoting from a few of these comments throughout my presentation, but the thread is also linked in the blogpost that includes my slides and a written version of this talk which is pinned in my Twitter profile.
@mary_grace What So… let’s get started. The first question I want to answer is “WHAT.” I’m starting here because I firmly believe in making sure everyone’s on the same page with definitions. First off before we even get to Developer Relations… let’s define Community.
@mary_grace What Community A group of people who not only share common principles, but also develop and share practices that help individuals in the group thrive. Community is a group of people who not only share common principles, but also develop and share practices that help individuals in the group thrive. How we define who falls into the realm of community at a particular company depends on the company’s goals and intentions, but for our purposes today, “community” includes a company’s employees (at the very least, the relevant product division), current customers, as well as prospects, and anyone who could in the future be interested in using the product… which is a fairly broad group of people that could include many of you here today.
@mary_grace What Developer Relations So how does this fit into Developer Relations? First of all, Developer Relations isn’t just another name for Developer Advocates. Developer Relations is the umbrella term for the team whose primary responsibility is building a community both online and offline. This includes Developer Advocacy, Developer Experience, Events, Community Management, Content, etc. It can even go so far as to include roles like documentation and training at some bigger companies like Twilio. In other words… it’s a big umbrella, like one of those huge golf umbrellas that your parents used to have when you were a kid. You might feel like some of the things that I’m talking about today are reflected in your own roles as well — the tasks that DevRel is responsible for aren’t limited to the DevRel team. They can often reach into a variety of teams around the company… we’ll touch on more of that in a bit.
@mary_grace Where Developer Relations I’m going to take a quick detour into “Where” for a moment… because for those of you who have been in tech for a while, particularly open source tech, this might all be sounding very familiar. So where did this term come from? You’ll hear some folks say it’s brand new. Others say that it’s been around for decades. And in some ways, they’re both right. The term “Developer Relations” is relatively new — the earliest searches for it that I can find are 2012. But “Developer Evangelists” first popped up at Apple in the 80s thanks to Mike Murray, Guy Kawasaki, consultant Terri Lonier, and others on the Macintosh team. However… Open Source or Technical Community Management has been around for decades, since Open Source began in the 1950s and 60s, and broader “community management” in the sense of community organization and forming groups of like-minded people has been around for centuries. I believe that Developer Relations is, at its core, community management for a technical audience, which of course has some nuance to it and a few more technical roles, but at the end of the day, we’re not reinventing the wheel… we’re at best trying to improve it. In other words, it’s nothing new — it’s just new terminology. Language is fluid and just like data scientist is the new trendy name for statisticians, Developer Relations is the new trendy term for Technical Community Management.
@mary_grace What Developer Relations Which leads us back to the “what” — what IS Developer Relations? At its foundation, the purpose of Developer Relations (or DevRel) is to build relationships with and enable our technical communities. DevRel professionals act as a liaison between their company and the technical audience—typically the end users of the product. While most professionals have the best interests of the business at their front of their minds, driving their day-to-day decisions, DevRel professionals have the best interests of the community as their driving factor. They of course care about the success of the business as well—it is, after all, what pays their bills—but they understand that if the community is happy and successful as a result of using the product, the business is far more likely to succeed as well.
@mary_grace What Developer Relations To the community, I represent the company. To the company, I represent the community. I must have both of their interests in mind at all times. I like this mantra to explain that symbiotic relationship: To the community, I represent the company. To the company, I represent the community. I must have both of their interests in mind at all times. We’re the connective tissue between the company and community as well as the connective tissue at our companies, connecting product & marketing, sales & engineering, customer support & product, and more, all for the sole purpose of serving you — our technical communities.
@mary_grace What Developer Relations So if Developer Relations is the name for the industry or the team of people at a company… who makes up this team? We’ve got Developer Advocates… we’ve got Community Managers… we’ve got Technical Evangelists or as I prefer to call them, Technical Ambassadors… you might also find a Developer Experience Manager within this group, as well as an Events Manager, Project Manager, and even a full-time engineer or two. So what are all of these roles? Here’s your TL;DR:
@mary_grace What a. Developer Advocate A Developer Advocate is someone who likely has some sort of coding experience… whether that’s an official CS degree, code school experience or been a developer in a past life. They’re often building sample apps, live coding, or giving demos, and engaging with the community on a technical level.
@mary_grace What a. Developer Advocate b. Community Manager A Technical Community Manager may not have this coding background — tho they could! — but they will absolutely be tech-savvy. They need to be able to carry on conversations that take a fairly deep dive into where your product fits within the broader technical market as well as answer questions about the technical aspects of your product.
@mary_grace What a. Developer Advocate b. Community Manager c. Developer Evangelist Technical Ambassador Next up: Technical Ambassadors, aka Developer Evangelists… renamed due to religious arguments within the developer community. These are the folks who excel at promoting the importance of this particular product within the larger technology industry.
@mary_grace What a. Developer Advocate b. Community Manager c. Technical Ambassador d. All of the above All of these roles play a part in accomplishing a singular goal: Enabling our technical audience — the developers and ops folk — YOU! — who use our product to be the best that they can be at their jobs. When led by an experienced manager who believes in the business value of Developer Relations and has the ability to create a strategy that will set both the team and the company up for success in the eyes of the community, there’s no end to the value that this team can provide! PAUSE So that’s most of the popular titles that you’ve likely heard throughout the industry. But there’s one more thing I want to clear up… because I know if I don’t, I’ll get questions about it later.
@mary_grace What WTF is a Dev 🥑? WTF is a Developer Avocado? Why are there personified avocados on the screen and on the cover of my book, what does this little emoji mean, and why has it taken over Twitter (besides the fact that avocados, have in general, taken over the millennial generation of tech professionals). This all started over 3 years ago when I was working with the DevRel team at SparkPost. One of our Project Managers had a hard time saying “Developer Advocate” when she got to talking quickly. Instead, it often came out as “Developer Avocado.” Given how much we all loved avocados, we took on the mantle without much prompting, and soon came up with an analogy for it that helped our coworkers understand our jobs: You see… DevRel is often referred to as the “fatty” part of the business given that we usually ask for a fairly large budget for our community endeavors, speaking engagements, and conference and open source sponsorships among other things. But we believe that used in the right ways, at the right times, with the right combination of items, we can contribute to the health of the company as well as the overall community of tech professionals.
@mary_grace What Therefore, DevRel is, officially, “the good kind of fat.”
@mary_grace When Now some of you may be wondering… Can’t engineering and product collect their own feedback? Why do I have to talk to this intermediary group that I don’t really understand in order to get information back to the engineers? When is DevRel actually necessary? So let me play Devil’s Advocate for a second, because there’s a somewhat valid question here if you aren’t familiar with the value that Developer Relations brings to the table:
@mary_grace When But we could do this with Product or Marketing… When is DevRel necessary? Why do we need a DevRel team to get this feedback and improve the Developer Experience? Couldn’t this be done with a combination of Product or Marketing surveys, engineering support, and a technical writer hired to write a good blogpost or two or improve the documentation? It’s just a mindset, right? Which leads us back to this mantra from the beginning of the talk:
@mary_grace When Developer Relations To the community, I represent the company. To the company, I represent the community. I must have both of their interests in mind at all times. To the community, I represent the company. To the company, I represent the community. I must have both of their interests in mind at all times. What sets DevRel apart… what makes us uniquely able to fulfill the relationship-building and listening and understanding that goes hand in hand with building a community of loyal customers, is that our primary focus and our goals are first and foremost based around the community. It’s not just a mindset for us — it’s not just a set of skills — it’s the continuum of skills and approaches that are impactful, maybe even moreso than the term itself. This focus and attention gives us the opportunity to build up trust among the community. When you know that we’re asking you for feedback so that we can advocate for your needs internally, you’re far more likely to be honest with us. Authenticity breeds authenticity, and while it’s entirely possible for Product & Marketing Professionals to have this viewpoint as well, their priorities are split between feature releases and lead generation, respectively. Which means the Developer Relations team is the only one that has your best interests at heart 100% of the time.
@mary_grace Who So now that you have a basic handle on “what” DevRel is and some of the terms it includes, as well as “when” it’s necessary for tech companies, let’s move on to “who.”
@mary_grace Who First of all… we are among you. There are many of us here at this conference. We take part in discussions in your community chat rooms. We watch the conversations happening on Stack Overflow, Reddit, The Practical Dev, and other public forums.
@mary_grace Who On a serious note though, we hang out in these places not to be creepy or to ferry company secrets back to our coworkers, but because the better we understand your pain and the problems that you’re facing, the more equipped we are to help. But why do we care about this? What’s our motivation? Let me share a few things that I heard from the DevRel community…
@mary_grace Who We live for the moments when someone tells us that our work has helped them. I’ve had a “wins” folder for years that has traveled with me from computer to computer that has screenshots of emails, tweets, DMs, and more from community members who have sent me thank yous for the work that I or my team has accomplished.
@mary_grace Who We also want to make your jobs easier which means hearing ALL of your feedback… not just the happy bits. As you can see from Ken & Greg in their tweets, we want to make your lives easier because we genuinely care about people and as I mentioned in the previous slide, we live for your “a-ha” moments. Even having to take hard feedback to the team is worth it because we feel your pain. We’re just as frustrated (if not moreso!) when things don’t work right because we want to do better by you.
@mary_grace Why All of this background information leads me to the core question that I’ve heard from so many technical folks: Why should I care? After all… DevRel professionals are simply folks that travel to a whole bunch of conferences, give talks, host parties, and complain (or humble brag) about how hard it is to be on the road all the time… right?
@mary_grace Why This meme went around Twitter a few years ago and it’s right in some cases… I’ve lost track of the number of flights that I’ve fallen asleep on (or tried to). But it also shows a very, very narrow view of DevRel, which is a problem that I think we’re somewhat to blame for ourselves… and one that I’m working to fix.
@mary_grace Why This tweet from John Cavnar-Johnson sums it up perfectly: “Most devs undervalue the skills and commitment DevRel brings to the table… change that by doing more talking WITH and less talking TO.” And while I recognize there’s some irony in my saying that from up on this stage where there’s not Q&A happening when I’m done with my talk… I’m hoping all of this context will help you better understand the value that Developer Relations has, not for their company, but for YOU, the technical audience we’re trying to serve.
@mary_grace Why tes have a c o v d A Dev skills; we l a c i n h c e t ve talks. i g t s u j ’t d on We are not talking heads. Traveling a nd shows can actually be grueling and brutal. I think it’s worth noting that out of the several dozen responses that I got from Developer Relations professionals when I asked this question — what do you wish developers knew about your job? — the only ones that mentioned anything about conferences and travel were statements like these: - Dev Advocates have technical skills; we don’t just give talks. - We are not talking heads. - Traveling and shows can actually be grueling and brutal - not fun.
@mary_grace Why Daniel Appelquist put it well in this tweet: DevRel is not just about talking to devs about “some technology” — it’s also about participating in, building, and maintaining community and ecosystem.
@mary_grace Why So if our jobs aren’t made solidly up of travel, conferences, and speaking, despite what it looks like on our Twitter feeds, what is it that we do? And again… why should you care? Here’s a small glimpse into what we do that directly impacts you.
• • • • @mary_grace Why What Do We Do? Advocate Transmit Feedback Create Content Research Good Practices • Amplify Your Work
@mary_grace Why Also, we talk about you. All. The. Time. like… ALL the time. It’s almost embarrassing.
@mary_grace Why So, why do we do all of these things? Because we value people first and technology second. This may seem backward… after all, we work for tech companies, the success of whose products pay our bills. But here’s the thing… we all know that the best sales people, the best marketing folks, the best… well… PEOPLE — the people we most enjoy being around! — prioritize people over product. This is just another reason how Developer Relations is related to product, marketing, even sales, but isn’t quite the same.
@mary_grace Why Developer Relations To the community, I represent the company. To the company, I represent the community. I must have both of their interests in mind at all times. But this takes me back to the mantra I’ve referenced twice now in this talk… To the community, I represent the company; To the company, I represent the community, and I have both of their interests in mind at all times. Again, this is the core of Developer Relations, because when we have both of these goals in mind, we are able to not only help the community by providing relevant content, but we’re able to provide valuable feedback to the company, which, in turn, should help you as well. This is a difficult balance to maintain, but it’s crucial for a successful DevRel team. Why? Because we recognize that if we put the community first, above our company, and above the technology that we’re working with, we help the community to succeed. But we also know that when the company makes a decision that sets the community up for failure, there’s often no coming back from that mistake, which of course impacts the company, but also impacts the community, because you all now have to find a new solution for whatever problem we were solving.
@mary_grace How So we’ve covered What, Where, When, Who, and Why. All that’s left is How… and this is where I’m going to ask something of all of you here today. You now (hopefully) understand the value of Developer Relations as it relates to you, our technical communities. But how can you get involved as a developer or ops person? How can you help us help you? There are a few key ways.
@mary_grace How How Can You Help? (the passive version) • Be patient. • Recognize that we don’t know it all. • Know that you’re our first priority.
@mary_grace How How Can You Help? (the active version) • Flood us with feedback. • Tell us what you need. • Involve us in conversations.
Where Why @mary_grace What Summary Who How When • DevRel professionals exist to empower you to do your best work. • We do this by advocating for you within our companies - people first, tech second. • Help us help you by keeping an open line of communication. In summary… What is Developer Relations? It’s a group of Developer Advocates, Technical Community Managers, Technical Ambassadors, Documentation Writers, Trainers, and more who all exist to empower you to do your best work. Why do we do this? Because we care about our communities and we put people first, knowing that when we do so, the community, as well as the company, will succeed. And how can you help? Keep talking to us! Provide us with feedback about our own products, loop us into conversations, and let us know what you need.
Anastasiya Flynn David G. Simmons Jay Gordon Gene Chorba Ken Mugrage Greg Bulmash Alyss Noland Brandon West Sharat Chander Swarna Podila Tierney Cyren Emily Fortuna Aaron Bassett David Christian Liedle Jon Barlow Jason St-Cyr Daniel Appelquist Anthony Kiplimo Yulan Lin Knut Melvær Brian Weber John Cavnar-Johnson @mary_grace Special thanks to… Jesse Butler Aman Alam Peter Kim Frank David Wickes Andy Piper Max Ong Zong Bao Vincent Milum Jr. Steve Pousty Kay Plößer Dr. Erik Riedel Emily Freeman I’d be remiss if I didn’t call out all of the wonderful people who contributed to the conversations I’ve been having on Twitter and The Practical Dev as well as in the DevRel communities I’m a part of. This is an illustration of one reason why I love this community… everyone’s invested in helping each other and doesn’t think twice about offering advice, answering questions, or simply amplifying someone else’s work.
@mary_grace Thank You! Mary Thengvall Founder, Persea Consulting persea-consulting.com The Business Value of Developer Relations: Apress.com 20% off - GlueConDevRel @mary_grace mary@persea-consulting.com And with that… thanks so much for having me here today. I’ve got my details up on the screen and information about my book in the lower left-hand corner of the screen with a discount code that will be good for the next few weeks in case you’re interested in learning more about Developer Relations. As I mentioned, you can find a written version of this talk as well as the slides and more resources if you follow the link in my pinned tweet. As always, I love chatting about this topic and helping companies figure out how to build a successful and thriving technical community. If you have in-depth questions or would like to follow up after the show, I’m more than happy to continue the conversation. Thanks again!
You’ve probably heard the term “Developer Relations,” but what does this actually mean, and more importantly, why should you care? In this talk, explain the difference between Advocates, Evangelists, and Avocados, as well as help you understand how to interact with this new group of folks in a way that is beneficial to everyone.
The following resources were mentioned during the presentation or are useful additional information.
This blogpost refers to a previous talk, but covers the same topic as my webinar presentation, with links to additional resources in a shareable form.
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