There are three ways to propose a topic:

• Conference Talk: an in-depth and detailed 30-minute talk during the conference in the main auditorium
• Ignite Talk: a quick, impactful 5-minute talk with 20 auto-advancing slides taking place in the main auditorium. If you are unfamiliar with ignites, look here. (Note: These have a 75% acceptance rate; if you want a challenge and a high probability of speaking, this is your spot!)
• Workshop: an in-depth and detailed 60-90 minute workshop where attendees can get in-depth and hands-on training or experience with a product or technology (Note: it is currently unknown as to whether DevOpsDays Nashville will have a workshop space in 2024)

Rules

• Be specific… we aren’t mind readers (a description of about 20 lines is about right)
• Detail is good… but not as important as explaining why your proposal would be interesting
• Propose your own talk; don’t have someone else do it for you.
• Nominations welcome … if you know someone who has content/experience relevant to the DevOps conversation, please point us in their direction! Email the organizers to recommend someone! This goes double for under-represented voices in the DevOps community!
• Multiple proposals welcome… just follow the other rules
• Submissions with multiple speakers welcome!
• No vendor pitches

Topic Suggestions

Top topics that the Nashville DevOps Community finds interesting in 2024:

• Culture (DevOps enablement, Process Engineering, etc)
• Development & Architecture (including Microservices, Low-Code-Apps, use of LLMs for Dev, Service Mesh)
• Reliability Engineering (including Observability, Monitoring, Tracing, Alerting, etc)
• Infrastructure (including Cloud vs. OnPrem, Virtual vs. Physical, Serverless, Infrastructure-as-Code)
• Security (including DevSecOps, Vulnerability Management)
• Containers (including Docker, Kubernetes, Containerization)

Choosing a talk is part art, part science

Here are some factors we consider when trying to assemble the best possible program for our local audience:

• Broad appeal: How will your talk play out in a room of people with a variety of backgrounds? Technical deep dives need more levels to provide value for the whole room, some of whom might not use your specific tool.
• Local presenters: You are the only one who can tell your story. We are very interested in the challenges and successes being experienced in our local community. We are happy to provide guidance/coaching for new speakers upon request. First time speaker? We would love for you to contribute even if you are new to public speaking, our team can help you with coaching through the process if selected.
• Underrepresented voices: We want to hear all voices, including those who may speak less frequently at similar events. Whether you’re in a field not typically thought of as a technology field, you’re in a large, traditional organization, or you’re the only person in your organization with your background, we are interested in your unique experience.
• Original content: We will consider talks that have already been presented elsewhere, but we prefer talks that the local area isn’t likely to have already seen. No third-party submissions: This is a small community-driven event, and speakers need to be directly engaged with the organizers and attendees. If a PR firm or your marketing department is proposing the talk, you’ve already shown that as a speaker you’re too distant from the process.
• No vendor pitches: As much as we value vendors and sponsors, we are not going to accept a talk that appears to be a pitch for your product. This is what we would like to learn about, do you have any experiences and/or knowledge you can share? Focus on new topics: new methods, new technology, new techniques. Don’t recycle old talks or topics the audience has seen before.