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Rissa Jackson joins Greg and Michael to discuss her journey from English teacher to engineer, on her way to completing the Laracon Grand Slam tour in her first year as a conference speaker.
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What is Ripples?
Greg and Michael discuss the thrill, the uncertainty, and all the other emotions that come with putting yourself out there and never really knowing where or when the ripples you send out into the world will overlap again.
Hello. My name is Rissa Jackson, and this is my podcast, Ripples. Joining me are my guests, Greg and Michael. Welcome to episode 7.
Michael:Hello. Thanks for having us.
Greg:Hey, Rissa. Alright. How's it going, Rissa? You've had a busy, busy few months, year even.
Rissa:Yeah. It's going great. It's definitely been pretty busy. I would say that this part of the year has been particularly busy. Laracon Europe and Laracon India were kind of just, like, on each other's heels, And now there's, like, a bit of a break before Laracon US, but, definitely, it felt like a lot in between them and afterwards just kind of recovering.
Michael:Mhmm. It's good that it's good that you get the break, and you can really set yourself in the head space for what will be, I guess, the biggest Laracon India is the biggest by attendance, Laracon that there is. But I think Laracon US is still holds the the title, you know, obviously, being the the premier. Laracon being, like, the biggest in terms of, I don't wanna say expectation, but in in terms of, like, the experience of the people, that that attend and things like that. So it's very, very cool that you went from being hesitant to to submit to speak at Laracon AU to now being on your way, like, 4, I think, 4 short months away now from doing the full grand slam of all of the the Laracons in your 1st year as well, which is an incredible achievement.
Michael:Congratulations for that.
Rissa:Thank you. Yeah. It sort of just came together, but, obviously, Lair Con Australia was a really fantastic start to it. And I also think it was, like, a really nice kind of way to get started with Laracon. So, like, if anyone's, like, thinking about trying it out, Laracon Australia is a fantastic way to start because it's a little bit smaller, but I feel like then you get to, like, know everyone even more, and it's a little less intimidating.
Rissa:And I think you as an organizer do a really fantastic job making it easy for first time speakers. And so I'm really glad I started there. I know some people start with Laracon US or Laracon India, and I think both of those sounds like very intimidating ways to start. But I guess if you get it out of the way, you're good also. And you know it can't get worse or it's
Michael:scarier. That's right. Yeah. It can't get scarier than than taking the stage there. And I and I know that there have been a few people that have spoken there sort of once and then not spoken again in, like, the following year, or they've taken a couple of years off, or they just haven't spoken again.
Michael:So whether that's you know, sometimes you you work yourself up to the big idea, you know, the big thing that that gets your break at Laracon US, but you don't like, the follow-up is hard. Greg Greg's going through that at the moment a little bit with with AU as well. Mhmm. Yeah. Before before we open speaker submissions, Greg, you had, like, all of these ideas, and it's kind of really boiled down to to one main one for you now, I think, hasn't it?
Greg:Yeah. More or less. I mean, there's still a couple of other ones kicking around, but I don't know about about Rissa, but I find that ideas are kind of reasonably easy. Like, you can sort of, like, come up with an abstract for a few things you might be able to talk about. But then you think about it for a little while, and then only a few of those kinda coalesce into anything that you think that you could speak in a semi compelling way for half an hour.
Greg:So, yeah, it's, I I think I had 3 or 4 sort of basic ideas, and then one of them sort of fell out of that. Still working on, hopefully, get one more submission in before submissions close. But however you come up with 4 well, it'll be 5 talks because you did, Laracon online as well, didn't you?
Rissa:I did Laracon online. I will say that I got a little bit of a pass on submitting talks because Laracon India was kind enough to let me redo my Laracon Europe talk, which honestly I really needed to be able to repeat a talk because there's, like, barely, like, there's a bit more, but barely more than a month between them. And, like, pulling from 1 and then just immediately starting planning on another talk, and then going on that travel and trying to speak, like, you know, jet lagged and everything.
Michael:Yeah.
Rissa:I just I couldn't imagine a way where I could do justice to that. And so I was really grateful they let me redo it. But so far, besides that, I've been doing different talks for each. And you're right. Like, there's, like, a lot of ideas out there, and it's good to maybe explore them a bit.
Rissa:But I also think sometimes people get really hung up on this concept of, like, I have to have this talk, like, figured out before I submit it, and I don't agree with that. I think that have, like, a good, you know, 30 minutes or maybe a bit more where you think it through and are like, I could really do this, and I have, you know, some concept of a framework for this talk. But but submit talks that are not, like, fully baked because you don't know what the organizer is looking for. Are they looking for another tech talk? Are they looking for another soft skills talk?
Rissa:Are they just wanting a different, different topic in general? And honestly, usually, when I submit talks, I don't know what I'm gonna say. But as I'm preparing the talk, like, I learn more about that topic. I learn what I my angle is. And and I think that can be, like, a really cool way to force yourself to learn something that you kind of know and reinforce it and maybe just teach yourself better.
Rissa:Like, I don't I don't think you need to be an expert when you submit a talk on this idea.
Michael:Yeah. I think that's something that's overlooked by people looking to submit their first talk. Something that that we say, in in the Laravel community, especially, is that the best time to teach a topic is when you're learning it for the first time. It is very hard to put yourself in the mindset of, like, how how did I feel? How did I approach this thing that I learned a year ago?
Michael:Like, it's hard to do that, and there are exceptionally talented people out there that can. But I think if you're looking to to break into speaking, then, certainly, it's something that, like, teach something that you're in the moment. It might be something new that, you know, you something that's new in the framework that you're just learning for the first time or picking up for the first time, or some technology that's kind of around the edges. But from from my perspective as a conference organizer, I don't need you to have, like, a fully fleshed out. I I don't assume that you have a talk at the time that you submit.
Michael:I assume that you've got an idea. And when you submit, we make it really easy. We ask for a title and an abstract, and that's really it. We ask a couple of auxiliary questions so we know, you know, we've got a certain budget allocated, so we know that we can get a certain number of speakers from overseas, a certain number have to come from Australia. And so we ask for, like, where you're coming from.
Michael:But other than that, like, a title and an abstract is really all that we need, and and it's your job in, like, a few sentences to a paragraph to sell what that idea is. And then once you submit it, you know, we will review it, and we'll give you plenty of time. You know, the the submissions for Laracon Australia are open until the middle of May. So you will have, you know, from May until November to really flesh that out. And so, you know, having a portfolio of talks is is good if you're going to be, like, speaking a lot.
Michael:I think in Laracon, it's more difficult if you're gonna try and give the same talk at different Laracons. It's gonna get better the more you give it. Sure. You're gonna add bits and pieces. You change bits that don't work, things like that.
Michael:But because of the public nature of those conferences, Europe, US, Australia, I don't know if India records, but, like, the talks are recorded. So the the trick is if you're going to give another version of the same talk, lots of people in that audience will have seen it. It's okay to shop that talk around, I think, between conferences. If you've got something that's, you know, not Laravel specific and you can give it at different conferences, That's totally fine. We bring in speakers from other events because, you know, they're good speakers and those things kind of translate into our community.
Michael:But I don't mind if those have been recorded because it's unlikely that there's an overlap between those communities, but it's hard in our community to to do the same talk at multiple laricons, I think.
Greg:Yeah. I I, when I submitted last year, we have told the story a few times. I it was just an off the cuff sort of abstract, but I was relatively confident that I could speak on that topic. So I guess when I'm sort of talking about ideas coalescing, it's more, like, am I confident that I could turn a one paragraph abstract into a compelling, like, 30 minute talk? And, like, I think I could do that once a year.
Greg:I think that's definitely possible, but it's pretty amazing to be, like, sort of first time or coming up on 4th time speaking, just doing that in your in your 1st year, being able to come up with what's going to end up being 3 separate talks. Although the one in India, even though it was like a repeat of the one in, Europe, I'm imagining you've made some tweaks and changes along the way. It wouldn't have been a straight carbon copy.
Rissa:It it wasn't. I would say that I had a lot more ambitions for changes, and then we all got super sick. I'm sure some of that news came out. I believe that they talked about that on their plans to merge, and I think I heard my name on that podcast about us all getting sick. But, because of how sick we were, I didn't really feel confident going with, like, a lot of the changes I had planned, and so I had to stick a bit more to kind of the script.
Rissa:Like, I still made some changes and some tweaks, and I I liked a lot of the changes ultimately. But, honestly, like, I felt like I wasn't fully there because I hadn't slept much. I was jet lagged and and, like, sick. And, like, before my talk, I was just laying backstage, like, trying to make sure I didn't, like, you know, go on stage and, like, throw up or something. And I was just like, okay.
Rissa:We can do this. So it was definitely
Michael:a challenge. How did how did that go when you then walked onto stage to a room full of people screaming your name? That did that help or hinder?
Rissa:It was really helpful. It was so kind. Like, I feel like, Vaishal was, like, trying to like, he saw how, like, awful I was backstage, and I feel like he was, like, trying to hype me up. And, honestly, I, like, was building off that energy. I was like, okay.
Rissa:Like, I feel, like, good enough to get on the stage, and, like, there's this wonderful group of people who are supportive and, you know, are happy to be here. And, like, I wanna do the best job I can do for them. And, yeah, I was really grateful for that. And also, like, how many times you get to have a room full of people share your name. It's a pretty fun experience.
Michael:Yeah. Like, a 1,000 of them. That that was I saw that video, and I was like, that is certainly certainly something. Like, it is either gonna hype you up or it's gonna scare the crap out of you. So I'm glad I'm glad that it served only to to hype you up for your talk.
Rissa:Yeah. Definitely. So, ultimately, you know, sometimes you kinda have to just go back to what you've done before. Things change. But, I do think that there are benefits to getting to repeat a talk because you get to make those changes that you had in mind and and remember the things that you walk off stage and you're like, I didn't say that thing.
Rissa:You can go back. But, also, it's delightful to come up with something new for the community and keep them guessing. Like, Laracon US will do a brand new talk, and I'm very excited about that.
Greg:Yeah. I think the only person who perennially runs the same talk that I can think of is Steven Rees-Carter, but it's all it the talk's always called the same thing, but it's always full of it's always full of new and surprising ways to terrify people. Yeah. So 1st year in, 1st year speaker, you're, it's probably fair to say sort of a bit more early career than than some of us who've been sort of around for a while. That's sad.
Greg:How how have you found that in terms of, like, it's like, I think it's pretty incredible to sort of, get all of these opportunities and and have a community that's willing to support, people who are at the early stage of your career. And we we have spoken to a lot of people who have been around for a really long time, and it'd be interesting to get your sort of perspective sort of from where you are in your career around that journey.
Rissa:Yeah. It's a great question. I think, like, it's really fun to be new to this field because there's a lot of things that I am just learning that I get to share. And instead of assuming that, like, this is stuff everyone's heard before, like, maybe I get a chance to it's new to me, and I get to share it like it's new whether it is or not. But that does lead to some really delightful experiences with imposter syndrome.
Rissa:There are multiple times where I'm preparing a talk, and it's like, who am I to talk about this? Like, there's gotta be someone better out there, and there's that concept of, like, you know, I'm not an expert. That's why am I the one talking. And I've had, people much more experience than me mention, you know, feeling like not an expert about something. They shouldn't give a talk.
Rissa:And because I feel like I'm not an expert at anything, being so new to this field, I've been here almost 4 years professionally, which is pretty pretty new. I'm not an expert at anything, so sometimes that's also freeing because I know everyone could possibly be better at doing this. But I don't think the point of the talk is to be the expert or to be, like, the voice to talk about it. I'm just giving my take on it, and maybe my take works for someone. I've seen a lot of tweets recently talking about, you know, even if you've seen something before or even if someone's already doing something, still do it.
Rissa:Maybe the way you say it will resonate with someone. And I think that is something that everyone should take into account if you're wanting to submit to a Laracon or to just a tech conference in general and you're thinking, oh, someone's already talked about this or I can't be the expert on it. Maybe the way that you interpret things, maybe the way you learn things is gonna be the key that unlocks things for people, and use that as a superpower instead of something to stop
Michael:you. Mhmm. Yeah. I agree a 100% with that. And that's something that's that's a phrase that I always go back to and something that I think you and I have a common mentor on that in in Matt's alpha where that was always a line of his.
Michael:Is that your perspective, your take may be the one that resonates, and don't let learning something, you know, being in the moment stop you from from sharing that perspective. As I said earlier, it's very difficult for someone who is an expert to put themselves into a beginner's shoes and teach something in such a way that that they will grasp it. And there are very few people that are good at that, so it's always always important, I think, for for anyone and everyone to to share that. And, you know, if you can, if the excitement comes through in your abstract that you're ready to to talk about it, someone that's been doing something for 10 years, 15 years, they don't have the excitement for it necessarily. That's someone that's like, ah, this this thing, form request, you know, like, creative ways to use form request.
Michael:Like, for everyone else, it's like, yeah, I just use a form request because it encapsulates logic. But there are there are crazy things that you can do with them that someone who, you know, who doesn't quote, unquote know better, that that they might be doing the wrong thing or or whatever, you know, whatever those subjective points of view are. I don't know. It's just look at this cool thing that I did with a form request kind of story. So, but you say you've only been at this for 4 years, and I was sure at some point, you you worked at Titan.
Michael:So that was that was, like, your first or second role. You were only there for a short time?
Rissa:That was my second role, and I was there for a year. And there were really fantastic people there. So smart. I mean, yeah, you mentioned that software, and then there were just wonderful people. I was working there when Susana was working there, and it was wonderful to get to work with her.
Rissa:And she's mentioned on her stage, like, being mentored by Sarah Vine, and I have also gotten the opportunity to be mentored by her. And there's just a lot of really fantastic, super smart people there.
Michael:So what what was the journey? Because you didn't you didn't study computer science. You were at you taught English in China or something for a while. Is that right?
Rissa:Oh, yeah. Good memory. So let's see. I've had a couple different chapters. I taught English in China for 2 years, and, then I was going back to school and studying international relations in Chinese, which is very different from programming.
Rissa:And while I was working towards that, I realized that the job opportunities for that, while could be interesting, were not quite fitting what I wanted for my life. And so I pivoted to studying, computer science. I got a computer science certificate, which is kind of like a minor. I don't know if that's something that is under okay. Something you get
Michael:in the Yeah. Yeah. Yep.
Rissa:Perfect. And so, you know, going into the job market and just being like, I don't have a degree, but I have some hours. You know, I'm excited to learn. Definitely challenging, especially, you know, 2020. Even then, it wasn't like a super kind market to new developers, junior developers, which is kind of why I wanted to do that talk at Laracon Australia about, like, junior developers and how to, like, set them up for success.
Rissa:And I'm really excited you let me do that talk because I've been wanting to do it for ages. But I I like one thing you said about being being closer to beginners, and I do think that is the superpower that I get to have. I learned programming as an adult, and, there's a lot of people who have been doing it since they were 10, 18, you know, a long long time and they know programming inside and out. But because it's newer to me, I do think that gives me the benefit of being able to talk to newer developers and really understand where they're coming from because I remember not understanding loops. I understand, you know, not understanding frameworks and functions and, just all these things that, like, some some of us take for granted after a while.
Rissa:Like, I'm just like, oh, yeah. I remember how confusing that was, and so that can be a way that I can connect with people, and same with talking. But I would also say, like, talking to nontechnical stakeholders. Like, these are superpowers, and a lot of people don't realize that people who pivot into tech or join tech later in life bring some of these superpowers along with them.
Greg:Challenges are, my career has kinda moved on to managing people, and the the instinctive thing to do when you pull a a graduate or a junior onto a team is to pair them up with the most experienced person that you've got, because, surely, this person is going to drag this poor newbie kicking and screaming into productivity. And one of the interesting things that I read about quite recently is around the around who best to pair together to learn. And sometimes, the super expert is the wrong person because they've, whilst they know about stuff, they've internalized everything so much that they can no longer explain it. They can't, you know, loops work because loops work. Like, I don't I I would struggle to explain, like, the constituent parts of a loop because, like, I've done it so many times.
Greg:And that can be deeply frustrating, not only for the junior who is, you know, asking legitimate questions that to an expert, sound very silly. And it's almost I mean, I've I've seen cases where, had senior engineers almost doing this sort of Homer Simpson Bart Simpson strangling by the neck. Why don't you understand this thing? And, yeah, I I I think sort of having, you know, slightly more experience, like, sort of mid career, engineers or, like, junior engineers, coaching graduate engineers and mid career engineers, coaching junior engineers. And then what when people start to internalize these things more and become experts and want to sort of elevate themselves to or sort of that that sort of transcendent state of sort of just knowing things, That's the time when sort of putting them with the master kind of thing is where it where it makes a lot of sense.
Greg:And and, like, that concept makes a lot of sense to me when I sort of think about it now. But, yeah, I think I think you're sort of right that having matching people who understand things, who are closer to the business, probably closer to understanding things that nontechnical stakeholders are and closer to understanding you know, have have the the the very real memory of what it was to be very confused about things Yeah. Is is really, really useful.
Michael:Yeah. I'm, very cognizant of that now with, like, a 3 year old who's who speaks, but, like, doesn't know how to read yet, and a 5 year old who is learning to read in school. And it's like, I learned to read 30 years ago. I don't know how to teach someone to read. And they're coming back, and there's all of this stuff they're talking about, phonics and learning sounds and and getting, you know, individual letters and and sounding them out and then joining the sounds together to form words.
Michael:So that's just if you put that into a programming context like Greg suggested, you know, if I had to explain to someone how a control structure works or a loop works, I don't know. It was that long ago that I learned it. It's just it's just foundational to my understanding of programming. But in terms of, like, how this works, I couldn't explain it. It's it's something that you've, like, you've either got to be a teacher or you've got to be really close to that that point in your career where you where you understand that kind of stuff.
Michael:So I I'm glad that he has that Eli's got good teachers because when I was trying to teach him before he started school, it was just it was kicking and screaming.
Greg:The really fun the really funny thing is there's a 3 year gap between my 2 kids.
Michael:Mhmm. And
Greg:Madeline was about to enter prep, which was, like, I guess, kindergarten or preschool or whatever it might be. Mhmm. I don't know what what you'd call it in the US. And Khloe, knowing that she was going to learn to read, started teaching her to read. And I'm just watching this this kid who's, like, in grade 2 teaching someone who's about to go into prep how to read.
Greg:I'm just like, that's astonishing. Like, I because I I like you, I couldn't teach Chloe to read. Read through repetition and things maybe, like Yeah. She could sort of pretend to read because she knew what the story was, but that fits
Michael:what she's
Greg:actually doing.
Michael:And that's
Greg:And, yeah, it's it's yeah. There there's definitely, like, huge not just not to sort of sound like we're calling junior engineers
Michael:children Children.
Greg:But, yeah, it's it's I I think it's it's it's principally the same same kind of other. There's so much stuff that we just take for granted that's almost no longer in our brains. It's completely at our fingertips. Yeah. And, yeah.
Greg:It's it's really easy, I think, for for late career people to just assume that they can say, use a constructor here. Well, what's a constructor?
Michael:Yeah. Yeah. It constructs the thing. But, I mean and and technology is even more than, like, learning to read changes rapidly. We went to an information night at the school, and there were parents in there who had kids in, like, 2nd and third grade where Eli is in in prep and reception.
Michael:And they're saying, what is all this stuff? Like, even in that short span of time between, like, their first child coming through and and their second child, things had changed enough that they didn't didn't know what what was being taught, how it's being taught. So we, you know, we are extremely susceptible to that in in tech because things change and move. Like, fundamentals don't change, but, like, where people are learning. When I went to university, it was Java.
Michael:People learnt c before me. Now there's a lot of JavaScript being taught, but there's still Java there's still Java being taught in in universe universities and stuff. It's Mhmm. Like, yeah, cool. But there's not, like, enterprise y stuff.
Michael:Sure. But it's not it's not approachable to new people necessarily. So, yeah, it's interesting.
Greg:I I I think the other thing that's interesting to remember and you're right about the the sort of foundational stuff. I mean, the foundational stuff probably isn't going to change unless there's some massive revolution around the corner. But we tend to think of people as being senior engineers, staff engineers, principal engineers, those kinds of things. But I don't think anyone, unless they're very, very good, understands everything. Like, we we're all sort of junior or graduate at something at all times if we're continuing to learn.
Greg:So, yeah, there's there's something sort of in that that you can you can be an expert at a thing, and then completely lost on
Michael:Yep.
Greg:On something else. So, yeah, I, I did really enjoy your your talk at Laracon AU because it's it gives a gave me a lot of reflection on well, actually, like, she's completely right about all of this stuff. And we need to be kinder to our new people, because they're the they're the next group of people who are gonna be
Michael:Next group.
Greg:Yeah. They're in in 5 to 10 years time, they're gonna be sort of where we are. And they're gonna, you know, I think what we how we treat them is going to influence how they treat the next cohort of people that are coming up behind them.
Michael:Yeah. Yeah. A lot of a lot of when I was growing up, you know, when you say why it's like, it's because I said so. It's because the way it is, it's, you know, whereas now, it's like, we we should embrace those kinds of questions. Why do you do this?
Michael:It's not because this is how it's done. It's, you know, maybe the the new person is trying to or maybe they do understand it, but they go, why are we doing it this way and not another way? So those perspectives really do help, in an organization. And and if you haven't seen Risa's talk from Lara Connor, you check it out. It was it was as Greg said, it was good to to reflect inwardly, but it was it was thought provoking as well.
Michael:So, Risa, what what is on the horizon? Like, you're gonna complete this grand slam in your in your inaugural year? Are you gonna you gonna take a second lap? Are you gonna take a break? Are you gonna be more selective about which conferences you submit to?
Michael:It's it's, like, it's something to keep up with, you know, and a fresh talk at every event that you speak at.
Rissa:Yeah. It's a great question. I definitely hope to continue talking at least at some more Laracons. I did send some more submissions to Laracon Australia today for this chat because I was like, I've been meaning to send more, and this is a great, like, deadline to push me to do some more. I had a really fantastic time in Australia, and I'd love to go back if possible.
Rissa:But, yeah, I guess, like, probably it's tough to do all 4 all the time, and I I highly doubt that they want that all the time either. I'm sure they wanna give new people a chance and, like, keep, you know, the lineup changing sometimes. But it's such a fantastic way to, like, meet the Laravel community in other parts of the world, and I love seeing how similar and different it can be. You know, obviously, India could be very different from the US or Australia, but they also are just very excited just as the other communities are. And it's lovely to see that even if the culture can be quite different, we're all kind of connected by this shared love and this shared language that we can talk about and be, you know, able to immediately connect on, and I would definitely love to go to some more.
Rissa:We'll see how many will happen. I do think that at some point, it's it's tough to keep coming up with new things to talk about, but also it's kind of a fun challenge. Like, you know, what have what's not been covered, or what could I bring something new to? You mentioned earlier about, about I'm trying to remember my thought from earlier, about explaining why we do things and I wanted to just touch on that briefly. I think one thing that gets missed a lot, especially in classes or just in organizations, is why certain things solve problems, like, just for example, like REST APIs.
Rissa:A lot of people who've been in tech and developers for a long time understand what it was like without that or, you know, without Bootstrap, for CSS. Like, there's all these problems that you saw and then you saw them get solved by these things. And I think for new people, we didn't see the problems. We're just seeing the solutions in this, like, you know, void. And it's really helpful to think back to what problems these solved and maybe start talking to juniors about that.
Rissa:And so I just wanted to touch on that briefly because I I think that juniors get to take for granted these solutions, but they also don't get to they don't get to understand the history. And as people have been working in tech a long time, I think you are holding a lot of history that you can bring to juniors.
Greg:Knowing the problem, I think, is often very, very like, if you just tell someone what the solution to a problem is, you get no creativity. You get no, no advancement. And if you can if you explain the problem to somebody and then show them, you know, this was the problem. This is our current best understanding of how to solve that. I think the older I get, the more kind of rusted on I get.
Greg:I actually need to deliberately and consciously decide to try new things, because I I've done things, they work. I keep doing the things that work. And I think there's another by by by explaining the problem, like you say, to to to people, when they're, like, fresh and their brains are like sponges, and they just want to, like, take things in and learn. I've learned things from people who are in earlier parts of their career precisely because of that. Precisely because they don't have their brain just loaded up with a whole bunch of recipes that they can throw at problems that look sort of roughly the same shape.
Greg:So that's, I think that's definitely, like, a super important point.
Rissa:Speak. I just thought of, like, a really good example. So I, like, really take for granted GitHub and version control. I don't remember a time programming before this. And I just spoke to a developer recently, and his company still doesn't use version control.
Rissa:They don't use Git. And I'm just like, but then what do you do? Like, I just, like I I can't even envision it almost. And I'm sure
Michael:the answer to that question.
Rissa:And I'm I'm sure, like, you know, not necessarily all of us have experience of a time before. But, like, I'm sure you you know that there are, like, worse, you know, paths out there or worse, you know, companies that you've worked for because they were before some of these tools that I, like, take for granted. I don't understand Yeah. Like, the problems this is solving.
Greg:Subversion. I I I don't think Git solved the version control problem, but it did solve the subversion problem. Yes.
Michael:Yes.
Greg:And I'm very, very thankful that you've never run into that if you haven't run into that. That was the worst. Yeah. Merging subversion branches is, like, hell.
Michael:Yeah. Back then. And then, you know, in the transition period between subversion and Git was, like, all of this SVN to Git stuff and trying to push subversion repositories into Git so that you could, like, start to make the transition. But all the senior developers then were, like, rusted onto SVN, and the people before that, it was CVS. And and then there was, like, this material phase.
Michael:I I started to I started I started to watch a talk the other day from one of the cofounders of GitHub. And the first thing he said to the audience was, like, who here has ever used something other than Git? And if the number of hands in that room is more than or or less than 10, you're in trouble. Like, that's where you start to feel real old.
Greg:In the edit, I think Michael's gonna just put that sort of overlay of the Vietnam flashbacks. Yeah. But I there's a really I I don't know whether or not you you came across this in your research for your talk or not, but I I do recall, an anecdote from an uncle Bob talk, years ago where the number of software developers is roughly doubling every 5 years. Wow. So that means that if you've got 5 years of experience, you're in the 50%.
Greg:You're you you you know, there's there's twice as many people, who are less experienced than you. And that that's a really sort of humbling thing, I think.
Rissa:Didn't we find out a bunch of people at the last Laracon Australia were, like, pretty new? Who is
Michael:Yeah. I don't I don't I think it was, like, 60% of people were what we would, like, had 2 years or less of experience. I think I think just not not so much new developers, but first time attendees. I know that was fairly consistent. Laracon EU was 80% first time as Laracon US had, I think, a big big turnout of first time attendees.
Michael:We certainly would. 65, 70 percent were first timers. So,
Greg:Be interesting to see if COVID had anything to do with that.
Michael:Yeah. Like, people were People
Greg:were really, like, hanging out to come to Alarcon, and then all of them had to
Michael:Yeah. And and so I think part of that is people that were wanting to and then couldn't. And part of it was that during that COVID time, you know, people lost their jobs or people change jobs or or whatever else, and so they went and explored other opportunities. And I think we lost a lot of PHP people. You know, a lot of Laravel people, they went and they started learning, Go or Rust or, you know, TypeScript, that that kind of stuff.
Michael:They went into the those other communities. And so, you know, obviously, the the Laravel community is still vast and and, you know, there's lots of people involved in it. But I think a lot of a lot of the senior people, they they find they go and do other things eventually. So it'll be interesting to see what the demographic looks like this year, and I'll do a much better job of capturing that information this time around.
Greg:So we're I think we're pretty close to wrapping up. Did you have any last thoughts for us, Risa? Putting you on the spot now.
Rissa:Let's see. I thinking back to, like, my talk at I do really like in your talk, Greg, when you talked about, you know, you don't rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems. That was, I think, referencing the, like, atomic habits book. Yeah. I think that's something that, like everyone can kind of learn from and I think it's particularly relevant for junior developers, you know, if you if you have vast goals of, like, they are gonna be awesome and they're gonna have a great time and, you know, be your future rock stars, but you don't have any systems to set them up for success or you don't have any plan for how they're gonna get there.
Rissa:You're gonna you're gonna maybe not have the outcome you're looking for. And maybe, you know, similarly with speaking at tech conferences, if that's a goal for you and you're not applying to them and you're not giving them maybe multiple talks to choose from, you know, you're not really setting yourself up for success. So create a system. You know? Keep keep track of your talk ideas and flesh them out and and keep applying and and find ways to, you know, bring your systems up so that you can reach your goals.
Greg:Yeah. For sure. So, I think we're close to wrapping up. This has been really great, Rissa. This is, we've we've been talking about having you on for a little while and
Rissa:Oh.
Greg:Really thankful that you jumped on. If anyone else would like to speak to us, you can find us in all the usual places. And if you wanna have a crack at emulating Rissa's grand slam, it doesn't matter where you are in your career. Just start submitting. The season of Laracon starts in Brisbane in November.
Greg:We've unilaterally decided that that's what the Laracon year starts. Right. Well Not self serving at all.
Rissa:Well and we need to make sure to give Aaron Francis a shout out. I feel like he's supposed to get one at least once per episode, and, you know, you have to you have to put yourself out there and share your work to, increase your luck, and, we'll definitely connect that to to ripples. I loved your talk, Michael, opening up Laracon Australia with you talking about the ripples that you put out into the world, and So keep on May
Michael:I have
Greg:made a
Rissa:sharing that.
Michael:I know. I may have made a terrible mistake. That's true. I don't think this year's welcome. Yeah.
Michael:I don't think this year's welcome is gonna be anywhere near as impactful as that one.
Greg:He's, he's he's shot his shot. It's it's all downhill for me.
Michael:Make up with it with, fancy theatrics.
Rissa:I I would love to see you just, like, bring out a video on stage of last year's talk and just being like that.
Michael:That again. Let's do this again. We we we have the the final branding. Like, I received the final branding stuff yesterday. So we we are going to build on the messaging from last year for sure.
Michael:There there will be a distinct theme for 2024, and I look forward to sharing that in the next week or 2.
Rissa:Can I see it?
Greg:Well, until next time. I've been Greg.
Michael:I have been Michael.
Rissa:I've been Rissa, and, thanks for joining for episode 7 of my podcast, Perfect.
Michael:Bye.