Sharing

At Dwarves Foundation, we believe that sharing is an important part of our culture. We share almost everything: every week, a lot of events are open to the public, and some of them are recorded so that anyone can watch the videos to learn. It may seem strange to share so much, but there are good reasons for it.

The goal of what is shared at Dwarves is not just to make more people learn new technology or knowledge, but to improve the ability of the presenter to communicate their understanding, which will in turn improve their ability to create new things.

It’s not hard to notice that there are quite a few professional programmers who are terrible teachers. There are often two reasons for this: they either don’t know how to teach, or they have never learned how to learn from others. When you share knowledge with others, you need to understand your own shortcomings as well as your strengths so that you can explain them effectively. There will sometimes be a “criticism session” where others point out any mistakes or room for improvement in your presentation. It will help you recognize and strengthen those weaknesses in yourself by letting you see where your explanations fall short with respect to other people’s questions or ideas.

For this reason, we encourage everyone at Dwarves to share their ideas and learn from each other. This is how we grow as a company.

Sharing guideline

When you share, follow the guidelines.

• Do not tackle a subject that is too broad or complex. Instead, choose a narrow one that will keep your audience interested.
• Sharing time is less than 60 mins is the best.
• English languages for slides is preferable.
• Before sharing your findings with others, it’s important to discuss them with your manager or other senior people who can provide insights you might not otherwise see.
• A good presentation should outline:
  • What’s the problem?
  • How to solve the problem?
  • The best solution or practice
  • The mechanism, key techniques, and source code
  • Pros and cons
  • References
• Slideshows should use the template.