DevRel Scribbles
  • What are Scribbles?
  • Index
  • Developer Advocacy
  • Developer Advocates
  • Life as a developer advocate
  • Modernising Red Hat’s enterprise developer program
  • Engaging 9-year-old software developers
  • Making 22-year-olds love 26-year-old software
  • Dogfooding developer products: gathering insights from internal hackathons
  • How far does your ethical responsibility stretch for the tech your devs create?
  • Outside the lecture theatre
  • How do you design programs for diversity?
  • Build the Platform Your Developers Actually Want
  • Measuring dev rel programs far beyond marketing activities
  • Developer Evangelism
    • Developer Evangelists
    • How to rock a technical keynote
    • The Art of Slide Design
    • The Art of Talk Design
    • The Art of Story Design
    • Dev events beyond 2021
  • Developer Experience
    • The Power of Content
    • Building a Developer Community in an Enterprise World
    • How to lose a dev in three ways
    • Developer relations, why is it needed?
    • The hierarchy of developer needs
    • GitHub is your documentation landing page
    • Docs as engineering
    • Commit messages vs. release notes
    • A11y pal(ly)- crafting universally good docs
    • Inspiring and empowering users to become great writers, and why that’s important
    • Solving internal technical documentation at Spotify
  • Community Management
    • Building community flywheels
    • DevRel = Community Management?
    • Creating high-quality communities
    • How to grow a healthy Open-Source community?
    • Managing communities at scale
    • Using community to drive growth
    • Useful community success metrics
    • Communities aren't funnels
    • How to mobilise your community during a pandemic
  • Managing a DevRel Team
    • Developer Relations + Product
    • Distributed developer relations
    • Understanding company goals
    • DevRel Qualified Leads (DQL)
    • Path to success for DevRel
    • How to move up in your organization
    • Four pillars of DevRel
    • Building your DevRel dream team
    • Managing the burnout burn-down
    • I messed up and I’m going to get fired
    • How to report on community relationships without being creepy about it
    • How to scale a developer relations team
  • Misc
    • Is developer relations right for you?
    • Tooling your way to a great DevRel Team
    • Planning your DevRel career
    • Success metrics as narratives
    • Get executive buy-in or else
    • Introduction to the AAARRRP devrel strategy framework
    • Strategy for developer outreach
    • Connecting dev rel and product
    • Performance DevRel
    • Ultimate cheat codes for healthier travel
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  • Summary
  • Scribbles
  • Main goal of DevRel
  • Metrics
  • Finding the right goals
  • Big Question
  • LIBBY Boxes
  • Should you care?

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  1. Managing a DevRel Team

Understanding company goals

Whenever it has come asking as to "what is the main role of DevRel team"? The answer-- "It totally depends", which definitely raises more doubt in the mind of the person asking it.

PreviousDistributed developer relationsNextDevRel Qualified Leads (DQL)

Last updated 3 years ago

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Summary

  • Importance of understanding the main role of DevRel.

  • Empowerment of developer community should be a priority, always.

  • It is important to understand the difference between metrics and vanity metrics.

  • Work output might not measure impact but does give short-term numbers to assess the situation.

  • To successfully prove the value of our work, we need to attach the main goals of the Developer Relations department to the goals that are shared by the company as a whole.

  • , a predictive framework popularized by Cornell Accounting Professor Robert Libby, allow us to draw directly from the company objectives all the way down to the specific work output we’re working toward during a specific sprint (monthly, quarterly, yearly, etc.)

  • Libby boxes for DevRel team ensure they’re working toward common company goals while still serving the community.

Scribbles

Main goal of DevRel

  • No matter what company you're at -- is to support the company's empowerment of the developer community

  • A stable Developer Relations team that can easily point to the value they're bringing to the community as well as the company.

Metrics

  • Metrics should prove the value and impact of the work

  • Understanding the difference between metrics and vanity metrics is a must

Vanity Metrics

  • Items that are easy to track but don’t often speak to the larger business value of the work you’re doing.

  • Examples:

    • Social Media Statistics

    • Number of Downloads

    • Number of Talks Given or Tutorials Written

    • What Gaps You’ve Filled (e.g. Technical Support Staff for the Community Forum, Events Management, Social Media Management, Project Manager for Product or Engineering Teams, etc.)

Work Output

  • Second category of metrics that are tracked

  • Example would be like tracking the output of the tasks you have done over a span of time which can give you short term numbers.

  • These might not be able to measure the impact of the work on your community or company.

Filling gaps

  • One of the most debated questions -- "Which team or space does DevRel fit in"?

  • There is no such space or team that can truly define the unique qualities that DevRel brings to the table.

‌

Finding the right goals

  • In order to successfully prove the value of our work in a way that the company understands and sees as beneficial, we need to attach the main goals of the Developer Relations department to the goals that are shared by the company as a whole.

    • This work has to be done in a way the company understands

    • This work needs to be seen as beneficial

    • The work that we’re doing needs to be attached to the team goals -> pointing to broader company goals

‌

Big Question

How can we help our colleagues, using our own unique talents to support their goals, while still providing value to the community?

‌

  • Gather community opinions and translate them into actionable feedback.

  • Connect with community members one-on-one and start a relationship

  • Make introductions between community members and our coworkers

‌

LIBBY Boxes

‌

  • Helps the DevRel team ensure they’re working toward common company goals while still serving the community.

  • Gives senior leadership a way to see the direct impact the DevRel team

  • The top row of boxes is for the concepts or ideas that you’re working toward

  • Lower boxes can be utilized once general ideas are identified for various initiatives one wants to follow.

  • Gives way to easily trace your day-to-day work back to the company goals as a whole

‌

Should you care?

  • Yes! Even if you aren't working on DevRel strategies or work for an organization that doesn't reply on proving your values derived from communities. You should!

  • Attaching our day-to-day work to the broader company goals is how we ensure the longevity of our role.

In order to successfully prove the value of our work in a way that the company understands and sees as beneficial, we need to attach the main goals of the Developer Relations department to the goals that are shared by the company as a whole.

‌

  • Developer Relations goals are attached to the broader company goals.

Libby Boxes
First, Understand the Company Goals — Mary Thengvall - Community BuilderMary Thengvall - Community Builder
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