I’ve been attending conferences since 2003 and spoke at my first event in 2005. I would say with no hesitation that I owe my entire career to a decision I made more than 20 years ago to go to an event at a hotel across the street from one of Canada’s biggest shopping centers. There, I discovered that there were all sorts of other programming conferences out there and that you could get paid to go and speak. Almost 100 talks and workshops later, my decision to get involved with speaking at events allowed me to create an awesome professional life. by Chris Hartjes