Initially from Brazil, Alex beforehand lived in Chile and now lives in Spain.
Throughout his time dwelling in Latin America in early 2016, Alex noticed what he describes as a “data hole”—seeing the way in which expertise, content material and experience are shared in an open, pleasant approach at conferences within the US, Alex wished to copy that in Latin America.
To handle this hole, Alex began planning meetups. “Our first meetup began in a Starbucks espresso store, with only a few individuals round a desk. Shortly, they remodeled into gatherings with as much as 70 individuals in a delegated room. My objective was to create an area for information fanatics in Latin America to share data with others.” Alex estimates he ran over 50 meetups with over 1,000 attendees in whole, permitting individuals to attach over expertise and meet quite a lot of distributors and other people working within the area.
“It was a stunning expertise to share my data, get in contact with individuals, and practice others! I noticed the way in which the open supply group works and the way individuals engaged to share skilled experiences, and that motivated me to do the identical factor in Latin America.”
Utilizing his contacts at a couple of universities and expertise faculties in Chile, he started to advertise an area the place information fanatics might join, whereas additionally providing coaching alternatives for professionals and college students to realize employment and subsequently diminish the technical hole, beginning with hands-on workshops showcasing the expertise. However Alex likes a problem, and wished to do one thing greater—a convention. His good friend Max mentioned, “Are you certain about that?” And Alex definitively answered “Sure!”
Solely utilizing their contacts and networks, Alex and Max started to arrange their first occasion. “That first occasion, we had 400 attendees at a one-day convention, combining hands-on labs with delivered content material. The thought was to convey native individuals from native companies and universities collectively to study from that content material. It was superb! It was actually exhausting work as a result of we had no price range, however we achieved our objective—to convey data and other people collectively.”
With the income generated from that first convention, Alex and staff donated to an area nonprofit supporting expertise training for girls and ladies, and set to work planning their second occasion.
In partnership with Telefónica, the 2019 convention introduced in 600 attendees, along with distributors similar to Google and AWS. Alex and Max teamed up with Federico to launch a giant information convention chapter in Buenos Aires, Argentina, with over 400 attendees. Even because the attain and enter grew, the core mission of the occasions remained the identical: to share data and convey information fanatics collectively. “The folks that attended these conferences began out with zero data about information, and now they haven’t solely information literacy however a community of friends. These attendees would by no means in any other case have the possibility to listen to from individuals within the trade about achievements, failures, and classes realized,” he says.
“Their suggestions was the gasoline to encourage us to proceed giving again increasingly. These occasions are the most important skilled achievements in my profession.”
Sadly, the pandemic put future conferences on pause (though they’ve since began once more!), and through this time Alex moved to Spain. He began delivering extra content material on information to native universities. This culminated in an invite from the Faculty of Administration in Madrid asking Alex to ship information and open-source content material and share skilled experiences with a world viewers of scholars.
“For some individuals, this helped them to understand that information is their ardour, one thing they need to dedicate extra time to as knowledgeable specialty.”
Reflecting again, Alex notes that friendship was a key part to this work. “We discovered actually good individuals to work with alongside the way in which. As a result of we had no monetary assets, we needed to be open, collaborative, and resourceful all through the planning course of.” On the occasions, friendship and networking was additionally a main part. “These gatherings have been a possibility for attendees to fulfill reachable professionals, who’re open to communication and prepared to assist.” In the end, enhancing entry to employment and training within the information area, selling friendship and connection and supporting numerous entry into the information trade is what Alex is obsessed with.
Alex is now volunteering with Médicos del Mundo in Spain, because of an initiative to attach college alumni with NGOs to share their skilled and specialist data. “In our enterprise, particularly through the gross sales cycle, we’re focussed on closing offers. However on this case, the affect is completely different—there’s no financial return, however we join with individuals with completely different expertise, and I’m studying extra in regards to the affect that these NGOs have. I’m at present a part of a bunch of volunteers working with Médicos del Mundo, to prioritize their digital transformation over the subsequent three years, ensuring they will implement options which are impactful for them and the individuals they assist, with the assets they’ve.”
