Burning Minds – Our Biggest Internal Conference
Knowledge sharing is really important in our culture, as one of our values says that we should grow ourselves and people around us. By organizing something more complex than an ordinary team retreat, we wanted to put emphasis on this part of our identity and bring value to everyone in Netguru. That’s why we decided to organize a team retreat along with internal conference for educational purposes.
Check out our post-event video here.
The Idea
The event, formerly named Netguru Tech Talks, took place in Hotel Warszawianka, Serock, from Thursday to Sunday. It featured a wide range of speakers, mentors, and creative activities designed specifically for this occasion. The event gave us a lot of opportunities to explore different forms of self-development, share our knowledge, and inspire each other. It was a perfect combination of educational value and community engagement.
The event kicked off with a Grand Opening Presentation given by Wiktor Schmidt, Marek Talarczyk, and their guests. This time, we also decided to invite people directly from our team to share their inspirational stories with the whole company.
“It was an amazing idea. It’s authentic and it’s inspirational. I believe these real-life examples show that everyone has some impact on our organization. It was an honor for me to be on the stage at that very moment,” said Joanna Falkowska, Learning & Development Team Leader.
Why?
We decided that participation was key to a successful community building event. Netguru encourages selfless sharing of one's unique talents, knowledge, and experience for the benefit and enjoyment of all.
The main goals behind hosting The Burning Minds, were:
- Adding educational value to annual company retreats by running an internal conference for all Netgurals split into by thematic Tracks.
- Promoting a culture of knowledge-sharing and giving all Netgurals a platform to share their experiences and ideas across different departments.
- Helping people improve their presentation skills through public speaking trainings and giving them an opportunity to deliver keynotes and workshops in front of a big audience.
- Bringing together all Netgurals and engaging them in well-being activities, creative workshops, and fun attractions.
Go Big or... Go Bigger
During the conference we had a chance to listen to over 50 speakers and participate in 44 workshops and presentations split into 5 main paths. 400 attendees could choose between 8 conference rooms. We talked about taking ownership and questioning the status quo. We also had a chance to discuss personal and professional growth that can allow us to exceed our clients’ and colleagues’ expectations. There was also a path where we talked about creating beautiful software, and another one showing how to do that in an agile way. Last but not least, as Netguru has been growing rapidly we had some speeches about how we roll and what has changed inside the company.
In the evening, we all got together one more time for the Closing Keynote and an #AMA session with the Core Team. The crowd then gave a massive round of applause for the Burning Minds Organizers: Iga Walczak, Joanna Antkowiak, Zuzanna Stolińska, Anita Migacz, and Justyna Fibich. You rock!
Saturday was filled with well-being and team-building activities such as yoga and dancing classes, home-made cosmetics and detergents workshops, a scavenger hunt, and kayaking. These activities allowed us to strengthen our relationships with teammates and relax a little before going home on Sunday.
We came back well-rested and filled with knowledge and inspiration. It was a great way to kick-start another half of 2019. We truly can’t wait for the Burning Minds 2020 edition, and we hope that you’d like to join us on this adventure. See our openings.
