Taylor Desseyn is speaking at Epic Web Conf 2025

Hey, what's up, everybody? I'm so excited to be joined by my buddy, Taylor Desseyn. Oh, Desseyn, is that how you say your last name? Yeah, you nailed it. Yes. I need to review that before I start, like, hit the record button. Yeah, what's up, everybody? So Taylor and I go back a couple of years. I think we definitely met at a conference. I'm trying to remember which one.

I think at that conference, you had somebody following you around with a camera because you were doing this vlogging thing for a while. So yeah, it was great, dude. And that vlogging thing will be at Epic Web Dev, too. So yeah, let's go. I love it. Yeah, I definitely love that. So yeah, I'm really excited to have you as an emcee at Epic Web Conf.

And I want people to get to know you a little bit ahead of the conference. So can you tell us who is Taylor? Yeah, absolutely. So again, Taylor Desseyn, I've been in the talent tech engineering space now for 13 years.

I'm VP of global development at Torque.dev, our community-first jobs platform, helping people get connected to their dream jobs across the globe. A little about me, I am a father, a husband. I have two kids. I have a four-year-old going on 19, a four-year-old daughter going on 19.

And then I have almost a six-month-old baby boy who's already wearing one-year-old clothes, basically. So he's going to be a monster. And I play ice hockey. And I manage a team here sponsored by a barbecue joint here in Nashville. I am starting back on my CrossFit journey literally today.

So whenever you see this, that won't mean anything necessarily to you. But I'm excited to get started back on my CrossFit journey. I love producing content. I love connecting people and telling stories. That is a little bit about me at a high level. Love it, Taylor. Yeah, that's a lot of stuff going on in your life, man. How do you get it all done? How do you fit it all in? I'm going to be honest with you. Very supportive wife.

I could not do any of this without her. But also, too, I'm OCD when it comes to my calendar to the point where I schedule lunches, I schedule breaks. I even schedule date nights. My wife hates when I send a calendar invite for a date night. But I'm like, listen, if it's not on my calendar, I won't prepare for it. I won't know it's there. So yes, calendar. Shout out Notion Calendar. Sorry to use that. Really, really good. Oh, yeah.

I also use Notion Calendar. Used to be, what was it? I forgot what it was called before. Really good. It's great. It's fabulous. Way into that. Dude, that is high-level productivity. And it actually sounds really nice. I schedule date nights also. Also, date nights with the kids.

Your four-year-old is probably almost to the age where those date nights with her would be really, really beneficial. Especially if she's going on 19. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. For sure. That's great, dude. So yeah, we're going to have you emceeing on stage at the conference. You actually submitted a couple of really great talks.

And I was like, dang it. We just have so many awesome talks. How do I get Taylor on that stage? So we're going to throw him up as an emcee with Bri. And what are some of the things you're really excited about emceeing? Have you emceed before? Yeah, yeah. I mean, I'm super blessed to obviously be a part of it. And thank you so much for having me.

I'm always grateful to even be a part of some sort of conference. I do know that I'm not an engineer. So I can't give the nerdiest talks. And I know soft skill talks are becoming vogue over the last two or three years. So I know it's competitive. I know you saw a lot of talks. So it's a hard decision on your part. So again, thank you for having me involved.

But basically, for me, I'm actually one of the official hosts for RenderATL out of Atlanta. So I've hosted that conference now for, I believe, three years. Or this will be my third year. It's a great time. And I'm excited to bring my hosting, you know, a little LeBron James here.

I'm bringing my talents to Salt Lake. And no, I mean, listen, I think my passion is connecting people. And my passion is connecting people over just very self-deprecating humor. I think Nate Bargatze. Oh, I love it. Yeah. And so basically, for me, I'm pumped to be here. I know a lot of the speakers.

Obviously, speaking of Epic Web Dev, it's gonna be a great time. I know them enough to riff on them, which is gonna be great. And so again, just excited about being up on stage, about just making people feel good. I do think, like, I was actually tweeting with somebody not in the tech industry. And he was talking about, like, conference setups, which would have been good for our conversation. I should have brought that in.

But he was talking about the importance of a host and MC. And he even said it could literally change the entire tone of the conference. And so for me, like, I don't take it for granted. And I don't take it lightly. We are gonna have fun. It is going to be a blast. Nonstop energy and very terrible jokes. I love it.

Yeah, I am very excited and very grateful to you for bringing your talents to Salt Lake. And it's gonna be awesome. So while we're there, Taylor, we've got extended breaks because the purpose of the conference is to get people together. And so our breaks that we're not doing, like, it's all single track.

So it's not like we need time for people to get to different tracks or anything. The break is literally just there so that you can go and talk with people. They're a half hour long. And so, like, plenty of time for people to talk and stuff. So when you're standing around talking and people say, you know what, I want to go talk to Taylor. What's the sort of thing that you would really love people to come and talk with you about?

Yeah, I mean, for me, I just want to help you in any part of my career and or any part of your career and any part of your job search journey. I've become very, very passionate about really about developer marketing.

And so I know you and I just got off my podcast talking about that. But developer marketing, job search, career advice, how to navigate the market, how to write a resume, thoughts on how to use LinkedIn, how do you network via social media? That's kind of like my sweet spot. I love that. You've got this Guidance Counselor 2.0 thing.

Can you tell us a little bit about that? Yeah, so Guidance Counselor 2.0, it's a live show. Believe it or not, you and I literally just chatted. And so I've been doing it now for almost five years. Five years this year in March. And it really started out as a way for me to give back to developers at scale. When COVID hit in March 2020, my entire business was in person.

So I would literally like coffees, lunches, dinners, breakfast every single day. And so when we were forced at home, I was like, well, I have all of this information. How do I give that back at scale? And so I started yapping it up on LinkedIn, just me, myself and I. I think my mom was like my biggest supporter there at the time.

And I just spent six months just talking into the abyss of the internet. And then really six months into it, I had some people like, hey, I like what you're doing. I'd love to come tell my story. I would love to talk about my job search journey. And then, man, five years later, I've interviewed bootcamp grads who found a job successfully at a bootcamp, all the way to engineering leaders and thought leaders like yourself.

I caught up with Jim Young from Netflix last week on it. So it's just kind of blossomed into this space. And I've built a community off of it, which has essentially led me to kind of being in this position with Torque. So it's been a really, really, really cool journey. Yeah, yeah. That actually kind of leads into my next thought of,

like, why for you has in-person mattered so much? Like, we had the COVID lockdown and so everybody's at home. Why was that not enough? Like, why do we have to come out of our caves again? Yeah, we got to come out of our caves because one, sunlight's good for your skin and your mental mood. Two, you also need to bathe from time to time. That'll help.

But I think too, I think the big thing is, so I'm an introvert, which is the craziest thing. Like, I understand people watch this, like, there's no way. I am. I'm a social sprinter. Elise Myers, the content creator, coined that. And I thought that was, like, the best term ever. So I'm a social sprinter. And so, like, for me, I actually thrive like this. I thrive at my computer.

I thrive not, like, being out in public all the time. However, it has become very special to meet people in person that I've never met in person, but I've met on the internet. So many of my relationships, so much of my career, I mean, you have to understand something.

And my wife kind of said the other day, she's like, it's crazy that, like, you've pivoted your career without ever really taking a step back. She was like, you went from, like, heads down recruiter to essentially, like, community developer marketing, kind of overnight, in a way. You didn't have to go back and restart as a marketing associate or whatever.

She's like, you just kind of jumped into it. And so for me, like, that would never have been possible if I didn't meet individuals like yourself and all of these developers who've supported me along the way. You know, I mean, Kelly Vaughn's been a big supporter of me and so thankful for her and our friendship. And so it's the people you meet along the way. And really, Jason said it best.

Jason Torres said it best on our live stream just now. You do the work, you do the outreach online, but then you, like, tie the knot in person. Like, you really make it meaningful in person. And so there's a lot of people that are speaking at your conference that I've not met before in person that I'm super pumped to meet in person because we've developed this relationship online.

So again, not only just for your hygiene purposes, it's good to get out, but also because of building relationships. And again, like what we talked about on live stream, we're not meant to go through this life alone, let alone your career. And so it's incredibly important to have those relationships. 100%, love it, Taylor. Hey, thank you so much for giving us some of your time today.

Do you have any, like, words of wisdom for anybody who is going to be coming to the event? Maybe they don't, they haven't gone to many events before or they just want to make the most out of it. Yeah, so I have like some quick, dirty list in terms of like, not dirty, quick list. It's a clean list.

It's like, basically, like, do your research beforehand, research the people who are speaking, research, you know, the people, research the people that are speaking so that you can go in and know who they are and actually have a really good conversation. Also, second thing is, know what talks you want to attend. This is a little easier because it's single track,

but like, just really, like, have a really good idea of what talks that you really don't want to miss, right? And then also, too, like, again, this conference for, you know, what I've talked with Kent about and like learned about everything is that, is that this conference is like networking first with a heavy dosage of learning. And so, in my opinion, if you do not come

with your QR code on your phone to your LinkedIn, connecting with every single person and following up with every single person after you are missing out, I think people do not realize when you attend a conference, the people that are there actually want to network with you. But then when you leave the conference, you have to follow up, say, hey, get a coffee, get a virtual coffee.

If you're, if you podcast like me, I'll try to get everybody on my podcast after the show or after the conference just to network with them because people really miss out on the opportunity. Yeah, I love that. Yeah, the LinkedIn QR code, that's like your yearbook for the event. Heck, have a great summer, yeah. Never change. Never change, yeah, exactly.

All right, hey, thanks so much, Taylor. Really appreciate your time. Thanks, everybody. We're looking forward to seeing you at Epic Web Conf in March. Let's go.

Taylor Desseyn

vp of global community @ torc.dev

Talk

Bio

Share

Interview