Breaking the Myths of the Rockstar Developer

What makes a rockstar developer?

• Is it the number of community contributions?
• Is it the number of side projects? Blog posts? Hours of coding in his free time?
• Is it the talks she has given at Drupal events?
• Is it the expertise on the newest development frameworks?
• Is it the ability to solve the problems that no other devs at work can solve?

Becoming a rockstar developer is a goal for many of us, a successful status to achieve beyond being a senior developer. But all those traits we suppose we should have in order to look like a rockstar, are so overwhelming that we might feel we are not smart enough, we have not enough time, we are not perfect enough...

Is this realistic? Are we trying to be something we are not and we will never really be? Does that mean that only smarter, more talented people with lots of time and dedication can be great developers?

If we think so, we’re doing ourselves, our colleagues and our customers a big disservice. Why don’t we redefine the concept of “rockstar developer” to make it more inclusive, realistic, and focused on actionable points that we can work on?

• Are we good team players? And what does it entail?
• Can we commit to get work done, or are we constantly falling back to the “I’ll try…”?
• Are we looking only after ourselves, or are we caring about mentoring others too?
• Are we good at communicating with clients, managers and team members? 
• Are we giving value to our clients, or are we “selling” them the last framework we want to play with?
• Are we accepting our teammates mistakes, or do we condemn them?
• Are we accepting OUR mistakes, or do we hide them and show us as invulnerable?
• Are we keeping our feet on earth?

Let us join you to share our experiences, and explore the areas and attitudes that can help us become better professionals by embracing who we are, giving the most out of us, and empowering people around us to do the same. 

We believe this session will be inspiring for anyone who wants to grow professionally and provide more value at work by overcoming myths and impossible standards and focusing on our real life, our human relationships and personal development, and being ourselves. Developers, designers, managers… everybody is welcome.