Bekah graduated from the Flatiron School Software Engineering program in May of 2019 and since then has spent time as a frontend developer, started the Virtual Coffee developer community, and has continued to mom her four kids. She currently co-hosts the Virtual Coffee podcast, tries to work on her postpartum wellness OSS project, and lifts heavy things in her free time. She works as the Developer Experience Lead at OpenSauced.
Our mental well-being has a huge impact on our jobs (and vice-versa), yet talking about mental health care at work is tricky. Most of us can agree that it's past time to break the taboo around therapy and medication, yet we're nervous about it becoming a distraction, fodder for gossip, or crossing the line into “TMI”. This talk will describe 4 simple steps you can take to help you and your coworkers start to feel comfortable talking about it.
This talk mixes a healthy dose of neuroscience, psychology and personal experience as Alida (they/she) discusses the challenges and strategies involved in day-to-day life with treatment-resistant Major Depressive Disorder, Autism Spectrum Disorder, and ADHD, but with a healthy dose of lighthearted introspection and approachability. Attendees will come away from this talk with insight into the complexities of managing mental health, personal growth, and stress, as well as actionable coping skills for bending, not breaking under the pressures of life.
Open source software development thrives on collaboration and community contributions. This talk shifts the focus from technical skills to core interpersonal skills, which are often overlooked but equally critical in OSS. By highlighting the importance of these skills, we aim to nurture a more holistic approach to OSS contributions, leading to stronger, more diverse, and resilient projects.
Meet our speakers
Bekah Hawrot Weigel (she/her)
Alida Weatherbee (they/she)
Alida Weatherbee is a full-stack software engineer at GitHub on Customer Success Engineering, with a blended background of customer service, technical support, people leadership, and developer advocacy. She's passionate about empowering developers everywhere and making tech more human and accessible for Neurodivergent folks and under-represented minorities.
Leon Barnard (he/him)
Leon leads the Design Education team at Balsamiq. After 10 years of UX practice in a variety of industries, he joined Balsamiq to help teach wireframing and design, both inside and outside the company. He is the author of Wireframing for Everyone and also writes and talks about remote work, web development, and UX career paths.