October 2017 – 3rd birthday and lightning talks

Our thanks to everyone who has attended and spoken over the past year. With your support we’ve reached the grand old age of three!

October’s meetup went down well, with excellent talks from Mark and Marc, followed by Trevor’s famous open discussion session. We celebrated with tasty cupcakes, thanks to Ann and the team at The Bakehouse!

A massive thank you to our sponsors – iWeb and The Deskspace Project, run by TopCashback’s Charity (TopCharity).

Talks

Do you want to Inspire and Engage Young People in the World of STEM?

Mark Robinson

Please come along and hear how together we can tackle the STEM Skills Shortage and provide the link between employers and the workforce of tomorrow. Learn how you will be able to join a community of over 35,000 volunteers and become a role model in schools and colleges and also establish links with educational establishments that may enhance recruitment within your own employment area.

Learn more about the STEM Ambassador programme.

Building a successful freelance business without going crazy

Marc Jenkins

Freelancing is hugely rewarding, lucrative, and provides lot’s of freedom but can also be stressful, put a strain on your relationships, and impact your personal health. Marc shares his experience of building a successful freelance business without it running him.

Marc has published a write-up and posted his slides over on his website.

September 2017 – DWP @ GOV.UK – Imposter Syndrome

Thank you to everyone who made September’s meetup. We were grateful to be joined by our guest speaker who gave an open and honest talk on imposter syndrome.

A massive thank you to our sponsors – iWeb and The Deskspace Project, run by TopCashback’s Charity (TopCharity).

Talk

Imposter Syndrome

Gavin Elliott

When imposter syndrome got to be too much for Gavin Elliott, he had to confront his own deep, sophisticated mental health challenges. In a personal talk, Gavin shares how he learned to handle anxiety and imposter syndrome in a society that’s uncomfortable discussing it. As he says: “Being honest about how we feel doesn’t make us weak — we can overcome our imposter.”

This talk will discuss mental health support, recognising imposter syndrome, the effect it has on our personal and professional lives, how to deal with it and ultimately overcome your imposter.

Gavin has published a write-up over on his website if you missed out on September’s meetup.

August 2017 – Mental Health

August saw us coming together to discuss the importance of mental health within the tech industry.

A massive thank you to our sponsors – iWeb and The Deskspace Project, run by TopCashback’s Charity (TopCharity).

Talk

Open Sourcing Mental Illness

Trevor Adams

In some parts of the world, the burden of mental health disorder is the largest of all disorder categories; but it seems like very few people are talking about it. A world wide problem will undoubtedly impact upon our narrower technical community.So, when it comes to mental health in our community and workplace; where do we begin?

This presentation will provide some context to mental health in the tech community and highlight some of the work being done by Open Sourcing Mental Health.

July 2017 – The value of side projects

In July we focused on the value side projects. Adam presented a talk where he demonstrated building custom applications on the Amazon Alexa smart home platform. Talking us through the process and some of the things learnt along the way.

A massive thank you to our sponsors – iWeb and The Deskspace Project, run by TopCashback’s Charity (TopCharity).

Talk

The value of side projects

Adam Davis

Side projects are important, you can exercise your own creativity and build all sorts of random things. They allow you to pick up new skills and expand your knowledge along the way. They can just be for fun, or they may even turn into commercial success stories, or sometimes fail… but ultimately they allow us to learn something new, and more importantly, you’re the boss! In this presentation I will go through the value of side projects in more detail, running through some success stories and also showing you a side project I’ve worked on using an Amazon Echo Dot.

June 2017 – Welcoming our new venue

We saw a great turnout for June’s meetup. Thanks to everyone who came along to see our new venue and learn about mobile first SEO.

A massive thank you to our sponsors – iWeb and The Deskspace Project, run by TopCashback’s Charity (TopCharity).

Talk

An Arbitrary Number Of Things You Should Know About Mobile First SEO

Joe Turner

Slides

When Google’s Gary Illyes revealed plans to create a ‘mobile-first’ index in November 2016, it sent the SEO world into a tizz. But really there wasn’t any need. Fast forward seven months and we’re still waiting for Google to confirm when it will be fully rolled out.

So, while we wait, let’s address some of the fundamentals:

  • What the heck does ‘mobile-first’ even mean?
  • What can we do to prepare?
  • And how can we use to our advantage?