Life Rules of GDG Lviv: Part 1
Inspired by Esquire series of short ironic interviews, we’ve decided to publish our own edition, full of sincerity, unexpected insights and even some confessions.
Why did we decide we should share these interviews? Well…
- Each of us has been managing communities for ~2–5 years.
- We started writing our “How Not To Fuck Up” document in 2014. It has 150+ items inside 🙃
- We want to capture this mix of passion and personal experience in history.
- The next DevFest will be the last one organized by our team.
BTW, if you’re an event organizer, some of the stories mentioned below may actually save you a couple hours of precious sleep!
Interview participants: Oleh Zasadnyy, Vitaliy Zasadnyy, Ostap Andrusiv, Volodya Karpliuk, Alina Yurenko, Sophie Huts, Vasylyna Mytsak, Marta Maxymiak, Diana Pinchuk, Valerii Rotermel and Oleksandr Pidlisnyi.
First time I organized an event was…
Valerii: Introduction to IT — a conference for students to help them choose the right way: freelance, fulltime office or remote office.
Oleh: GTUG and Rock’n’Roll Lviv (the first and the last event under Google Technology User Group name) — it was also the first event of GDG Lviv. I was only 17 years old and this was the first year at the university. Joining GDG as an organizer was the best decision in my life so far.
Sophie: 3 years ago…14th of December, Women Techmakers event, remember that day as it was yesterday, I was nervous (as f*ck). Apart from organizing, I had also to give a talk on a theme around Google technologies. I thought few people will come, but we’ve got a full room of passionate students. Most of the attendees, of course, were women. BIG thank GDG Lviv’s organizers — Vitaliy, Oleh and Ostap for support and help and inviting us to the warm family — GDG Lviv.
Vasylyna: Also 3 years ago (14th December 2014). It was our first WTM event when we met other guys from GDG Lviv, or actually, it was the first time we talked to all of them. There was an interesting pre-story. We were very inspired after the GDG DevFest Ukraine 2014, the first DevFest held in Lviv. I still remember how Sofia, Marta and me were sitting at Kredens cafe, drinking coffee and sharing our emotions about future work on self-improvement and organizing such events like DevFest. At that moment we could have only dreamed that next year we would be co-organizing this conference. Oleh helped us with designing our first banner. This year I found it at home and it made me laugh because now I feel how we grow after this first event.
Marta: It was in 2014 when I with Sofia and Vasylyna joined GDG Lviv community and found GDG Women Lviv. We organized our first women meetup and each of us was a speaker. At that time I thought every time you organize the event you have to give a talk :) But very soon I realized that it’s not about being a speaker.
Vitaliy: The first event I’ve organized was a … student party in Picasso nightclub. It was the first year in university, I’ve just joined the Student Self Government, organization that “officially” has to create a space for intellectual and creative development for the students. Well, we tried to keep our parties as creative as possible:)
Ostap: The first event I organized was Software Freedom Day in September 2009, 1y after I joined the university. That was a tiny university meetup about open-source and Linux. Convincing teachers to participate and negotiating space felt so out of my comfort zone. Funny though, one of the biggest struggles for me was purely administrative one: to find an electric kettle so that everyone can make tea for themselves.
Volodya: It was GDG DevFest 2014. I accidentally met Vitaly and Ostap in Warsaw even though we were all living in Lviv at that time. It was MCE conference. After we got back to Lviv guys reached me and asked if I want to help them with DevFest 2014. “Sure! Let’s try!” — was my answer and it was the beginning of the great journey I didn’t even expect to participate in.
Diana: In 2011, when I worked at the youth NGO and tried to coordinate a documentary film festival called Docudays UA: needed to set up 5 locations, negotiate with hosting schools and universities, carry media support. I had a lot of help from the other organizers and did a lot of failures…
What inspires me is…
Diana: People around me, and that amazing feeling that you helped somebody to get something new, especially knowledge.
Valerii: Basically the process and the result are the most inspiring parts for me :)
Oleh: To see how small group of people doing amazing things in their free time even if they are new in some fields.
Sophie: People around and a feeling of the result. Why do people climb to the summit of a mountain? it’s hard to carry a backpack weighing > 10 kilograms, getting corns on the legs, backache. But the feeling when you’re at the top of the mountain is unbelievable and drives you to do it again, pushes yourself in the hardest moments.
Vasylyna: Of course people. I have been always comparing GDG DevFest Ukraine to startup. We had everything: ups and painful downs, but all the time I felt support from our team. They are very pushy. They inspire me to work harder, to jump higher, to change my attitude to some things. As Sophie wrote — making the event is like climbing the mountains: you are arguing while you are climbing but you have this unforgettable feeling of satisfaction on the summit. When you come down you say that it was the last time you did such a crazy decision to do it. But after some time you feel that you miss hiking and you remember only the beauty of the landscapes and forget about the difficulties. Organizing events is also painful while preparing for because it is very time consuming and needs your flexibility to changes in case of some force majors. But the result and positive feedback from attendees inspires us to make the next event again.
Ostap: I’d say 2 things: commitment and team. The moment people start buying tickets, you understand there’s no turning back. Now it’s either all or nothing. And you have to deploy all your energy to make their experience a top-notch memorable one. Fortunately, you’re a part of a great self-motivated team, which has the exact same goal and always has your back.
Volodya: Won’t be original: people. My team (I think it’s more than just a team) and our community which is one of the key factors why are we all doing this.
Marta: Creative and persistent people who implement crazy ideas without any hesitation that it could fail or someone will judge you.
Oleksandr: The feeling of creating something significant and self-development during it. Helping and motivating people to create own better way to stars (with blackjack and cookies).
The most memorable moment for me was…
Alina: At DFUA’17, I was running down the main staircase when the lunch break started, and when I saw all the people (more than 1000!) coming to the main hall at once, I was like “OMG what have we done” 😄
Valerii: We should to give back chairs and tables and the track-driver called me and said: “Hi! We are over here with truck for chairs and couple Hummers for your guys” :D
Oleh: One guy bought the most expensive ticket “I Love DevFest” when there was the option to purchase three times cheaper. Furthermore, the day before the conference he asked to help us in preparing everything and stayed with us until 3:30 AM with the only core team at the venue!
Sophie: One dream few weeks before DevFest (I slept worth and worth that time). The dream was about, how I stuck on the bridge that was going to fall down, and one DFUA’s speaker saved my life. Though, it was a good thriller that night.
Diana: At DFUA’15, when I was a volunteer and got a terrible antritis just 2 days before the conference start. I missed “Day 0” when all the preparation was done and somehow arrived on the Day 1 (I was late) and did some useless work as all the responsible tasks were split among the volunteers who arrived in time :D The conference just have started, I was standing alone in the wardrobe constantly sniffing, and one of the busiest organizers, Oleh, brought me a hot tea and asked if I’m ok. That unexpected attention to all the people and to the smallest details turned my mind upside down. That was one of the role models for me to follow in my further life — never forget to be a human ^_^
Vitaliy: When during the opening countdown at DFUA’16 the audience started shouting “five, four, three, …”. At that moment I had a feeling that audience was more excited than me.
Volodya: When one of our speakers decided to go to the airport alone and didn’t wait for me. He didn’t answer the calls and messages. I was worrying a lot and almost forced airport stuff to make an announcement to get to know that he’s checked-in and everything is OK. Hopefully, he answered in Messenger and when he heard the story he told me “Whenever you’ll be in my city — know that you have a place to stay”. We chat from time to time and he gave me a bunch of useful pieces of advice.
Marta: Speaker’s reaction in Mazoch cafe. He didn’t expect to be beaten at the after party :)
[That was the first part of the interview, the second one is coming soon…Subscribe to our blog in order not to miss it]
