Rails - May 2009 - BizConf at Ritz-Carlton Amelia Island Resort, August 20-21

[Apologies for the slightly-off-topic posting.]

BizConf is a one-of-a-kind event that I am hosting about 3 months from
now here in northern Florida. It''s a 2-day conference specifically
crafted for independent consultants and owners/managers of small to
mid-sized web consultancies. Because of who I am and the audience I
can reach, I expect the majority of the attendees to be involved with
Ruby on Rails, although it isn''t a technology-specific conference.

Information and registration now available at http://www.bizconf.org/

-- Additional Information --

BizConf is on Thursday and Friday and the Ritz-Carlton is offering
steep discounts on their room rates for up to 3 days before and after
the conference, making it s a perfect opportunity to turn your trip
into a vacation getaway with friends and family. I selected the venue
particularly because of the luxurious rooms, restaurants and spa, not
to mention its location on some of Florida''s finest white-powder
beachfront and warm, sparkling blue ocean. Amelia Island is
conveniently about 30 minutes drive east of Jacksonville airport (JAX)
and local transportation can be arranged through the conference.

Registration is limited to 75 people in order to keep the event
intimate and maximize interaction between our presenters and
attendees. We have over 20 compelling presenters confirmed so far,
with additional announcements happening soon. The following list of
featured presenters only skims the surface of who you can expect to
meet and learn from at BizConf:

My friend and mentor, Roy Singham, will be keynoting and spending
one-on-one time with attendees. Roy famously grew his tiny
Chicago-based consultancy into world-class software consulting
powerhouse ThoughtWorks, admirably working to make positive change in
the world every step of the way.

Jerry Weinberg is one of my heroes. He has over 30 years of consulting
experience and has written many notable books including "The Secrets
of Consulting" and "The Psychology of Computer Programming". He
will
be presenting small group experiential sessions including "Learning to
Say No" and "Great Client Expectations". You can get a taste of
his
writing on his blog at http://secretsofconsulting.blogspot.com/

Esther Derby and Johanna Rothman are esteemed trainers and authors of
the Pragmatic''s "Behind Closed Doors: Secrets of Great
Management"
among other titles. They will be very busy at BizConf with sessions
topics including:

- Recruiting and Keeping Talent Happy
- Leveraging Personal Sources of Power
- Levers for Change
- Interviewing Customers

Don Gray coaches software development organizations to higher levels
of productivity. His background in machine and process automation
provides the foundation for working with organizational systems and
change. His workshops at BizConf will focus on personality types and
teamwork, team productivity, and retrospectives.

Ian McFarland, Principal at the esteemed San Francisco-based
consultancy Pivotal Labs will present a new model for selling a potent
mix of Agile, Ruby on Rails and cloud-computing to CIOs and CTOs in
the enterprise world

Corey Haines is one of the warmest, most genuine voices of the
Software Craftmanship movement. He is rapidly gaining friends and
notoriety from his travel around the world as the wandering journeyman
software craftman, sharing programming language with technology
professionals in exchange for room and board.

James Duncan Davidson will provide attendees that bring their own
DSLRs with a unique opportunity to learn photography from a master of
the craft. Learn how to maximize your marketing with candid shots of
your people in action.

Jessie Shternshus is founder and owner of The Improv Effect and has
worked with companies such as CBS, Paramount Pictures, MTV and Sesame
Workshop. Jessie merges her lifelong passion and expertise of
improvisational acting with the fast paced demands of the corporate
world. In her classes and workshops she helps people become better
listeners, team players, leaders and communicators. Her physically
engaging and playful workshops are relevant to all facets of life and
are sure to be a fun highlight for BizConf participants.

Like I said above, that was only a partial list of the speakers and
topics we have lined up for you. This conference is very personal to
me -- I am handcrafting the program to maximize the interest to other
people like myself: entrepreneurs in the web development space,
particularly my peers running successful Rails consultancy shops.

If you register before July 17th you can take advantage of the
early-bird pricing of $1995. I know that cost is out of reach of some
of you reading this message, and for that I apologize. The reality is
that running a conference like BizConf is quite expensive and entails
a great deal of financial risk for the organizers. I want to take a
moment to thank my partners at Hashrocket, as well as our other
sponsors: nGen Works and Engine Yard for helping to make this dream a
reality.

See you in August!

Obie Fernandez
CEO & Founder | Hashrocket
904.435.1673 office
404.934.9201 mobile