About TechVoices
TechVoices is a tech conference diversity initiative.
We work with:
- Aspiring Speakers - providing information about conferences, public speaking and free one on one mentoring
- Mentors - creating a mentor community to meet other experienced speakers and connecting mentors with aspiring speakers in need of mentoring
- Conferences - announcing conferences seeking first time and underindexed speakers, providing mentors for selected first time speakers
Over its existence, TechVoices has been a significant contributor of new voices and high-quality content to international tech conferences, particularly in testing, quality and teamwork topics.
Programs #
TechVoices runs two programs at no cost to the aspiring speaker.
- TechVoices Speaker. Mentoring on journey to 1st International Conference as Speaker
- TechVoices Keynote. Mentoring on journey from established speaker to 1st International Conference as Keynote Speaker
We encourage our aspiring speakers to level through to their International Conference by doing local meetups, local conferences and online webinars and we are happy to channel these opportunities to our aspiring speakers through our newsletter.
With limited mentor availability, we prioritize under-indexed people in-demand for international conferences
- black people: men, women and non-binary from geographies of minority representation
- women and non-binary people of all ethnicities and geographical locations
TechVoices is a volunteer organization and finding a mentor may take a while. Get matched early to submit to our partner conferences to ensure mentor's help.
Conference Partnership #
TechVoices partners with conferences seeking underindexed and new speakers.
What Does It Mean?
- Cross-promotion: You mention us in your channels, we mention you in ours
- Access to new speakers who come with a mentor helping them improve their delivery
- Letting TechVoices know the numbers of submissions and selections on the TechVoices candidates
- You still decide which speakers you select!
- In most cases, TechVoices Speakers submit like the rest of your speakers, just mentioning TechVoices.
- We sometimes partner with conferences for building keynotes and tracks where we help with the selection process. If that is something you are interested in, get in touch.
How To Get Your Conference Included
- Get in touch. We need your conference name, dates, submission link and list of benefits (are you e.g. paying for travel & hotel).
- We list your conference on our pages under partner conferences
- We tweet on the partnership, one month, one week and one day reminder for submitting
- We mention you in the TechVoices newsletter encouraging submissions
- You can mention TechVoices in your own calls for underrepresented and new speakers
- After submissions close, check with us that those who say they submit with TechVoices do so. If you select one that isn't registered with us, we would try to fast-track them to a mentor.
Sponsoring and Voluntary Fees #
TechVoices raises money through voluntary fees for finding underindexed and new speakers, to be used for running the operation and offering travel scholarships.
Sponsoring TechVoices to be visible in our channels is also available.
For questions, contact TechVoices.