From Engineer to Leader: A Workshop for First-Time Tech Leaders

A Developer’s Guide to Communicating, Convincing, and Collaborating Effectively With Stakeholders
It’s a tale as old as time - collaboration between developers and business stakeholders has long been a challenge, with a lack of clear communication often leaving both sides frustrated. The best developers can deeply understand their business counterparts’ needs, effectively communicate technical strategy without losing the non-technical crowd, and convince the business to make the right decisions. Working at a consultancy, I’ve both failed and succeeded in architecting and “selling” technical visions, learning many lessons along the way.Whether you work at a product company, are a consultant/freelancer, or want to venture beyond just being a developer, the ability to convince and clearly communicate with stakeholders can set you apart in the tech industry. This becomes even more important with the rise of GenAI and the increasingly competitive developer market, as problem-solving and effective communication are key to positioning yourself.In this workshop, I’ll share real-world examples, both good and bad, and guide you through putting the theory into practice through dojos.

Ready to kickstart your freelance career or just getting started on your freelance journey? You’re in the right spot. Learn from the world’s largest fully distributed workforce in the world.
The independent talent movement is the future of work. If you’re considering leaving full-time employment for a career as a freelancer, now is the time to find your successful space in the independent talent workforce. More people are working freelance today than ever before, with the freelance marketplace now contributing $1.2 trillion to the US economy. Some of the most in-demand roles for freelancers right now are senior developers with professional experience in React, Python, Blockchain, QA, and Node.js.
This workshop will help you design a sustainable and profitable full-time (or part-time) freelancing/contracting career. We will give you tools, tips, best practices, and help you avoid common pitfalls.
At the end of the workshop there will be a Q&A session with a Freelance Developer who can answer your questions and provide insights and tips into their own success.
During the Workshop break, we will be running a speed-coding challenge! At the end of the workshop, we will award a prize for the winner and display the leaderboard.
We will have you login to our portal and complete the challenge as fast as you can to earn points. Points are assigned based on difficulty and the speed at which you solve the tasks. In case you complete all tasks, you get extra points for the remaining time. You’ll see your score, ranking, and the leaderboard once you complete the challenge.
We will be giving away three Amazon Gift Cards ($200, $100, $75) for the top three winners.

Would you like to pursue your passions and have more control over your career? Would you like schedule and location flexibility and project variety? Would you like the stability of working full-time and getting paid consistently? Thousands of companies have embraced remote work and realize that they have access to a global talent pool. This is advantageous for anyone who has considered or is currently considering freelance work.>> Submit your interest on becoming a freelance engineer with Toptal and get a call with Talent Acquisition specialist <<

Freelancing is no longer an unstable career choice.

This workshop will help you design a sustainable and profitable full-time (or part-time) freelancing career. We will give you tools, tips, best practices, and help you avoid common pitfalls.
Table of contents

Module 1: Dispelling common myths about freelancing
Module 2: What does freelancing look like in 2021 and beyond
Module 3: Freelancing choices and what to look for (and what to avoid)
Module 4: Benefits of freelancing from a freelancer + case study
BREAK
Module 6: How to get started freelancing (experience, resume, preparation)
Module 7: Common paths to full-time freelancing
Module 8: Essentials: setting your rate and getting work
Module 9: Next steps: networking with peers, upskilling, changing the world
Module 10: Freelancer AMA

Renaud Bressant (Head of Product), Nathanael Lamellière (Head of Customer Success and Solution Engineer), Nouha Chhih (Developer Experience Manager) will be looking at the different developer jobs that you can accounter when looking for your next developer role. We'll be explaining the specifics of each role, to help you identify which one could be your next move. We'll also be sharing tips to help you navigate the recruitment process, based on the different roles we interviewed for as recruiters, but also as candidates. This will be more of an Ask Us Anything session, so don't hesitate to share your thoughts and questions during the session.

Onboarding to a new project can be difficult, no matter your background and experience. But it can be especially challenging for new developers straight out of school or a coding bootcamp. Drawing on personal experience as a bootcamp grad and JavaScript consultant, this talk will discuss tips and strategies for managers to help the new developers on their teams get their bearings in an unfamiliar codebase, so they can make more of an impact, faster!