From Fear to Stage: My Journey to My First Tech Talk
What I Learned Giving My First Tech Talk (and How You Can Too)
The Way To Get Started Is To Quit Talking And Begin Doing — Walt Disney
I have more than 12 years of experience in the IT world. Yet I hadn’t been on stage addressing tech that I love. Developers much younger than me have been doing it for years now. That’s the trend nowadays. Should I complain? Complain to whom? Can I go in the past? — NO.
Remember, Only You are responsible for Your fate.
In retrospect, there was no difference between how I spent 2021 and 2022. I created YouTube videos, redesigned my website, tried new blogging sites, wrote articles, thought of many new ideas, and implemented some of them.
Out of the blue, I decided to submit the proposal for a talk at Flutter Conference India 2022. This was the best decision I have taken.
What changed in 2022?
Being a YouTuber since 2018, I had no fear of explaining things and speaking for hours. But there were other fears like fumbling, pronunciation, etc. I was nervous and anxious about them.
Let me mention little history here — I switched two companies in 2022 due to some circumstances and ended up in Tide. Tide encourages employees to speak, share knowledge and be active in communities. And that is what attracted me most.
The obstacle of not submitting a talk and not even thinking about topics for the event was slowly diminishing. Soon, I grabbed the first opportunity to speak.
It’s that simple — You only have to commit to speaking. The rest will fall in place. I have been procrastinating this for years.
Topic selection
Once I made my mind up to speak, it was time to select a topic. It’s always better to submit 2–3 topics because that increases the probability of selection. I jotted down summaries of some.
I discussed the topics with my wife. I wanted a second and an honest opinion. She has been extremely supportive about whole of this stuff.
The first impression has to be crucial, so I wanted to speak on a topic that excites the audience, and people remember me for that. Of course, I should be very comfortable with the topic.
I set the priorities for 3–4 topics and asked for opinion from 2 of my colleagues — Anna (Domashych) Leushchenko 👩💻💙📱🇺🇦 and Oleksandr Leushchenko. They are pro speakers who have spoken at many events on various topics. They helped me with the process of selecting the topic. And also some insights into how a talk should be.
Rejection
I submitted only one topic to the organizers and got rejected because there were many better topics at their desks. I lost the 30 minutes slot. They asked me to submit another topic for a lightning talk for 15 minutes.
At first, it looked like a demotion where I was planning to be on stage for a longer time, but it turned out to be better. As this was my first talk, I had less time to fumble, less to speak, and less to prepare.
It wasn’t possible to shorten previously shortlisted topics to 15 minutes, so I had a sleepless night thinking of another one that’s short enough and memorable. Luckily I remembered a UI full of dots, and those dots would animate to form a recognizable shape.
Animations are always fun and exciting, and this one stuck in my memory for a longer time. I wrote down this idea in Notion, and what can I create using that animation. And then I slept with a smile on my face 🙂.
The next morning, the first thing I did was create an Indian Flag with dots. The next day, I created India Map using Dots. By now, I was very confident about the topic and figured out how my talk would be. Submitted it to the organizers.
The topic got selected this time. Honestly, duration didn’t matter. It was important to get on stage, and overcome the fear that I had for many years.
Bold step
I developed animations using Flutter SDK. As I had only 15 minutes and many animations to show, it would have been tricky and risky if I switched between IDE and presentation software frequently.
So, instead of using Google slides or Powerpoint, I created a Flutter application for MacOS that would almost look like slides. Of course, it was tough but worth it. First, it was rare, and secondly it was memorable. For this, I had to remember the script, as building a notes functionality on my own would have taken much longer.
I prepared a rough script. Speaking on my channel helped me here.
Rehearsed & Rehearsed
Practice makes Perfect. It was crucial to deliver my best on stage. I had to be confident and sure about what and how much I speak.
To be honest, I talked very less from the script. Script helped me to stick to the content.
I rehearsed the complete talk in front of my wife Preeti Modi. I am very thankful to her. She gave genuine feedbacks and helped me fine tune the talk. We recorded 11 minutes. It was perfect as there was some buffer for uncontrolled circumstances.
As I stated earlier, Tide has an awesome environment for speakers and community contributors. I also showcased my talk to Lazo, Anna and Alex and received fruitful feedback and suggestions.
On the eve
We(My wife and I) landed in Bengaluru 2 days before the conference. While roaming around the streets, I reframed some of the sentences in my talk to sound better.
It doesn’t matter how much you prepare when it’s your first, you will feel nervy until the last second. Luckily, I got a chance to interact with many people at the dinner before D-Day.
I talked to Vivek Yadav about his experiences and his first time as a speaker.
I still remember one of the tips from Majid Hajian — Imagine people sitting in front of you from now on until tomorrow.
Talking casually to other speakers and volunteers made me feel relaxed and confident.
D-Day
Finally, the day arrived. Nerves started to play their role. My talk was after lunch. I couldn’t eat breakfast and lunch. But, I drank a lot of water sip by sip. I attended all the talks from fellow speakers so that I can imagine myself on stage.
Before my talk, I interacted with many attendees and speakers to get more comfortable.
When I was on stage, I started slow for initial one minute. The starting minute is when you are most anxious, and the mouth is dry. Because I consumed lots of water, this was a pretty easy phase. I later thought that I was unnecessarily scared.
Aftermath
That was my first talk. Many thank to Abhishek and Akansha for giving me the opportunity.
I decided to submit my talk to GDG DevFest events. My talk fit well with the agenda of GDG Vadodara, and I got chance to talk again on the same topic but for 30–40 minutes now.
I extended my slides for the event by adding a detailed explanation of one of the animations via code. I also made sure to keep the talk more engaging and interactive.
That is it from my journey to my 1st talk. I shared this with you so that you can learn from my experience and get ready for your first talk.