Let's wander around the lake and chat about tech &amp; life! Come rain or shine, and we'll be walking at 7pm! Bring a dog, your significant others, kids, a friend and your face! Join our friendly group for some healthy activities! Our current walk is Whitlingham Lake, a 2.5-mile walk at an all-inclusive pace!

Norfolk Developers - nor(DEV):

nor(DEV): Wander

**FREE FOOD** Let's gather at the Junkyard Market again. nor(DEV): will pay for your meal and first drink. All are welcome, significant other, dog, child!

Food & Drinks at the Junkyard Market

## What a conference! We're grateful to the sponsors & speakers. They make the conference possible and our thanks to all who attended for making it a welcoming, engaging, and rewarding event…

As you might expect, organising a conference the same year as we emerge from restrictions on events and gatherings has proved challenging with many uncertainties in the run-up. A shuffling of dates knocked around our timeline and added to those challenges until we settled on June. Rest assured we will be back in February for a cooler venue from next year.


In the post-conference haze, we recognised how energising and rewarding the conference has been for all. The feedback and excitement over the two days was fantastic. Whilst it can feel chaotic behind the scenes, we heard many commenting on the event being well organised, friendly and welcoming to those that are usually intimidated by crowds. It shows that the hard work is always worth it 🤗

>>> I am perpetually proud that Norwich has such a friendly and supportive tech scene.
@MattB

## Two days for the community!

So many connections were made! Many in our community formed friendships over lockdown on our Discord, online socials, and events. This was the first time they met IRL and made the link between avatar and face!

>>> The learning to be gained from the talks is interesting, but you can watch most of those on the internet. It’s the corridor conference which is the best part!
Dom Davis

People were making that important first step into the industry. Our scholarship program saw its most use in several years, with 32 tickets bought through the scheme. It enables students, and those with a low income to get either a free ticket or pay just £7 to attend both days and the social events surrounding the conference too! This program is operated on an honour basis, you need not apply and in 2023 we’re making it even easier too!

![A packed Conference Room 2](/static/images/pages/posts/2022-06-25-nordevcon-2022-retrospective/conference-room-2.jpg)

## Insights

We were overwhelmed with incredible tips & useful feedback in 2020, we listened, and in 2022 we used them. The speaker warning boards, the large signage, the smaller programme, and many many more...

This year, again, we’ve had some great advice and you can [submit your own](https://forms.gle/4HUMDQrTAwT3Cds19). It will guide some considerable changes next year, a priority is to enable more time to socialise and to give more time between talks and the schedule will be refreshed accordingly.

## The plans for 2023

We’re excited and are already planning for 2023. Many of this year’s amazing sponsors have already confirmed their support for next year and we’ve some great ideas (more on that soon)! ❤️

In 2023, we return to our regular schedule, at the Kings Centre again. February, the 23rd & 24th. For a limited time, we're offering ["Super" Super Early Bird tickets](https://nordevcon.com/tickets) at **80% off** the standard price.

We invite you to submit your talk on our [Call for Papers](https://forms.gle/utZHU63XZRiuvJPs9). As a speaker; you get a **free conference t-shirt** featuring your name in the credits adorning the back, **free tickets for you and a friend** (which can be used to refund existing tickets), and your **travel & accommodation expenses covered**!

Thank you!

![The Norfolk Developer's 2022 Conference Team](/static/images/pages/posts/2022-06-25-nordevcon-2022-retrospective/conference-team.jpg)

nor(DEV): con 2022 Retrospective


All conference speakers, regardless of, well anything really, share one thing in common. They all had to deliver their first talk. The first time they stood up in front of a group of people and imparted something. I cannot be more specific, because each and every one of those experiences would have been unique, but I can be reasonably sure about one thing: those speakers  would have been scared. Probably terrified. 
 
## Stage nerves

Talking to a large group of people is scary. That fear lessens the more you do it, but it never quite goes away. Recently, a well respected keynote speaker at a large conference told us their heart rate was over 140bpm before starting. The talk was excellent, so arguably they had nothing to worry about. And yet, there was The Fear. Fear, the talk won’t go well. Fear people won’t find it interesting, or useful. Fear that you will somehow fail.
 
I mention this because, great as it is to see the same old faces [quite literally in some cases,] I also love hearing from new people. What may seem blindingly obvious to you, like doing something in Blender or coding a little electronics project on an Arduino, are actually fascinating to people like me whose experience doesn’t encompass these fields.
 
“But,” I hear you say, “The Fear!”
 
To which I say Tish and Pish. Provided you can tell a story, you can give a talk. Granted, not everyone can tell a good story, but you may surprise yourself if you tried. 
 
## Adrenaline rush

The Fear is very real. As is the stress. But then so is the rush when you’re done. And the discourse after the event. Which is why, time after time, I willingly put myself in the situation of standing up in front of a whole bunch of people who know a lot more about a whole bunch of stuff than I do, and open my gob. And then I tell a story. Usually about tech.
 
Despite coming across as a colossal extrovert, I am actually very introverted. Going up to strangers and talking to them is incredibly difficult for me. Standing in front of them and talking at them is somehow easier. And, once it’s all over, they come and speak to me. A ready made gaggle of people to talk to and interact with while at a conference.

## Conference gains

Ultimately, for me, that’s what conferences are about. Yes, the learning to be gained from the talks is interesting, but you can watch most of those on the internet. **It’s the corridor conference which is the best part**. So despite everything, I will submit talks to conferences I want to go to, because if I don’t I will just passively attend the conference, rather than taking part in it. So this year, listen to the stories being told at [NorDevCon](https://nordevcon.com), and have a think about what story you might tell next year. You never know, you might even enjoy telling it.

Facing the fear

[Keynote speaker](https://www.nordevcon.com/#speakers) and specialist in work-place innovation and optimisation, [Rokker](https://www.rokker.co.uk/) People’s Jim Marshall, spent some time talking to us about the future of work – providing us with real-world solutions rather than just abstractions.

## The nuts & bolts

Having worked with the tech sector for many years, [Jim](https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimnmarshall) explains:

> We work across a range of industries and geographies and with companies of all sizes, from start-ups through to fortune 250 businesses; the common themes are: we tend to deal with c-suite stakeholders who want to dramatically scale or improve their people strategy. These companies are predominantly in the tech-sector…although it could be argued that every business on the planet these days is a tech company in one way or another!

## What is success?

Jim explains, “success is about identifying the goals or desired direction of travel for a client company, and then designing a contextual, optimal journey to meet that state”. This is where Rokker’s ‘Design Thinking’ approach comes in, treating each corporate and people brief as a design challenge which requires research, ideation, planning, execution and measurement – supported by a range of in-house tools such as the PRISM methodology seen on the Rokker website.

Jim says “this process is very agile, and specifically designed to align to language within tech companies, instead of MVPs we have MVIs (Minimum Viable Initiatives) for example. The agile framework is also very good at handling corporate change, similar to a development project, it allows us to prioritise and reprioritise based on customer, stakeholder or market influences. I am sure many in nor(DEV) will recognise this language”:

## The people lens

Most organisations are subject to persistent change. Jim is surprised that through these major transformations how comparatively little time and attention is spent addressing the very pertinent question - “how are these changes going to affect our people?” Jim feels that one of the biggest business failings is “inadequate comms.” Organisations that start with a collective ‘how are we going to work through this together?’ and ‘what are our roles going to look like in the new world?’, fair so much better than those that have impressive people slogans and collateral, but put little effort into understanding the motivations of their wider team(s).

## The autonomy to think

Allowing staff the freedom to think is a good start. Jim talked about the importance of giving colleagues the time and space to think and then the “autonomy to act.” Don’t follow siloed options, but “in a knowledge based economy, it’s so inefficient to run a business with a top down hierarchy - sadly this is all too common, akin to Victorian mill owners.” 

## Exploring the future

Jim highlights that there is room for hope. The pandemic unraveled a whole range of working options. His mantra at that time was, “I hope we don’t forget all of this.” …
”However, I know we have short memories and the crowd mentality rarely follows logic.” 

“There is a massive difference between companies that have been designed digital first and remote first and the approach here is often energising.” However, a lot of organisations that were built ‘premises first’ are struggling with the hybrid era. The problem is not the office working or the remote working, the difficulty is an ideology momentum that is based around control and hierarchy not empowerment and outcome.

Explore more about the future of work by attending [Jim’s keynote at 09.30 on 17th June.](https://www.nordevcon.com/schedule?share=20)

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