Events

Once you’ve got your idea, and you know who you want to tell it to, the next you need somewhere to present your talk.

This is a lot easier than it used to be. When I started, a lot of today’s events simply didn’t exist. Now there are lots of conferences and lots of meetups. Broadly, you’ll either want to do a meetup or a conference.

My recommendation, if you’re starting out, is to pick a meetup and there are two good reasons for that.

First, the audience is smaller. If you haven’t done much public speaking, standing up in front of people can be a little daunting. It’s much easier with a smaller crowd, especially if some of them are people you know because you’ve been to the event before.

Secondly, and here’s a tip from someone who’s organized meetups in the past,meetups are almost always desperate for speakers. I used to organise meetups in Scotland, and one of the reasons I got speaking experience was having to fill gaps in the schedule because we couldn’t find enough speakers.

Meetups run every couple of months and typically can’t fly people in from hundreds of miles away like a conference can, so they’re drawing from a smaller local pool. They’re always keen. Most of the time, if you have something close to what the meetup covers, and it doesn’t always even have to be that close, the organizers will be keen to talk to you :)

You can also do conferences, and there are lots of them. Some are smaller, and those, especially ones where you know the event and the people, aren’t a bad place to start either. But pick your event, and you’re ready for the next step.