Hello New York!

We’re super excited to announce that LeadDev is returning to New York on 15-16 October 2025. This year again, we're taking over the Javits Center, bringing the community together, and taking control in a time that feels more uncertain than ever!

About LeadDev

LeadDev is an event aimed specifically at the challenges faced by engineering leaders. If you're a Tech Lead, Engineering Manager, Staff Engineer, or a touch more senior than that - then this is the place for you. Every 

LeadDev event explores all of the ways that you can boost the effectiveness of your software delivery ecosystem: your team, working methods, and technology.

And now, more than ever, it feels important to be talking about that! Engineering is changing fast, and Engineering leaders have never been under more pressure to deliver results with fewer resources and to tighter timelines. 

So how can we support each other through this change? And what's story do you have that could help other engineering leaders?

What topics are we interested in?

All of our LeadDev events are focused around three big themes: team, tech, and tools. We’ve detailed a bit about them below and remember, you can submit more than one idea!

• Team - Our team talks cover anything related to leadership, personal development, and anything that happens within the unit of your teams. Think about: the skills that you need to be an effective leader; skills for growing people; creating inclusive and diverse environments; hiring and retention; adapting to new roles.
• Tech - Our tech talks cover anything you need to run an effective technical team in 2025. We love hearing case studies for our tech talks - real stories about what went right and what went wrong (which is always more interesting!). Think about: new languages, frameworks, technologies, scaling, architecture. 
• Tools - Our tools talks cover anything related to the way your teams get work done. Think about: agile and other delivery methods; frameworks for meetings like code reviews and 1:1s; on call; observability; continuous integration; velocity and debugging productivity; maintaining a high performing team.

The speaker experience

Working with speakers is one of our favourite things about running LeadDev. We love to giving you the opportunity to share your stories and knowledge with our audience - and we put a tonne of work in to help your content shine. Throughout the process, you’ll have the opportunity to work with our editor on your talk descriptions, our professional coach who’ll help you hone your presentation delivery, and our content team who’ll review your talk and help you sharpen it for our audience.

As a speaker for the event, we'd also offer you:

• A free ticket to the conference
• A complimentary ticket to a LeadDev conference in 20226
• 2 nights accommodation at the conference hotel
• Economy travel expenses
• Professional speaker coaching if requested
• Dedicated support from our team at all stages of your participation in the conference

Good luck

We hope that's given you all the information you need to submit a great proposal. We can't wait to read them!  

Hello New York!

We’re super excited to announce that StaffPlus is returning to New York on 15-16 October 2025. We're back at the Javits Center with two days of incredible content, the best community in engineering, and soon - your talk proposal! 

About StaffPlus

StaffPlus is an event aimed specifically at the challenges faced by Staff Engineers, Principal Engineers, and other folks on the technical track in their organisations. Senior ICs are leaders at their companies and their roles require as many new skills as stepping into management - but more often than not, companies don't provide support for that transition. 

That's why we're bringing together the most incredible community of leaders on the technical track to think about what it means to be a senior individual contributor in today's engineering landscape; how to navigating your role as a leader; how to frame your strategic thinking; how to bring your organisation up a level technically; and more!

What topics are we interested in?

All of our StaffPlus events are focused around four themes: big picture thinking, making the right technical decisions, influence at scale, and crunchy tech talks. We’ve detailed a bit about them below and remember, you can submit more than one idea!

• Big Picture Thinking - As you scale the technical track, the impact of your decisions increases. Strategic planning; consistently prioritizing the “big picture”; thinking about systems and architecture, and how choices impact the engineering org and the business in the long term all become core to your role. 
• Making the Right Technical Decisions - Very senior ICs are ‘force multipliers’. You’re expected to lead, execute and complete deeply technical projects across teams. In other words, you are continuously pushing on a project to ensure forward progress, filling in the gaps when needed, while understanding at what altitude you should be working.
• Influence at Scale - As a high-impacting engineer, you don’t just focus on solving technical problems, you have to influence other people to make things happen. But getting a large group of folks to walk in the same direction to bring the whole organisation to an upper level is easier said than done, especially when you won’t directly manage team members. So how can you be a good influence? 
• Crunchy Tech Talks - Senior ICs solve technical problems of the highest scope, complexity, and ambiguity.  Making high-value, high-impact technical decisions and recommendations and motivating teams to deliver is core to your role. We particularly value case studies in this category - check out Maude's talk from last year to see exactly what we mean.

The speaker experience

Working with speakers is one of our favourite things about running StaffPlus. We love to giving you the opportunity to share your stories and knowledge with our audience - and we put a tonne of work in to help your content shine. Throughout the process, you’ll have the opportunity to work with our editor on your talk descriptions, our professional coach who’ll help you hone your presentation delivery, and our content team who’ll review your talk and help you sharpen it for our audience.

As a speaker for the event, we'd also offer you:

• A free ticket to the conference
• A complimentary ticket to a LeadDev conference in 2026
• 2 nights accommodation at the conference hotel
• Economy travel expenses
• Professional speaker coaching if requested
• Dedicated support from our team at all stages of your participation in the conference

Good luck

We hope that's given you all the information you need to submit a great proposal. We can't wait to read them!  

Hello New York!

We’re super excited to announce that LeadingEng is returning to New York on 17 October 2025. We're back at the Javits Center for a day of incredible content and connections, and soon - your talk proposal! 

About LeadingEng

LeadingEng is a one day event aimed specifically at the challenges that Heads, Directors, and VPs of engineers are facing. We understand the issues on your desk are different from more junior engineering leaders - which means that you need not only different content but also different ways to learn. 

That’s why at LeadingEng events, we group you together with folks at similar organisations who are going through similar challenges so that you can build a peer network - because it can be lonely at the top and other engineering leaders are a valuable tool in your development. 

What topics are we interested in?

Each LeadingEng event in 2025 will focus on four key themes: Strategy; Team Design & Health; Risk & Resilience; Executional Excellence. 

We’ve detailed a bit about them below - but if you have an idea that doesn’t quite fit, let us know anyway! We may just find space for a special wildcard talks! 

• Strategy - Think about delivering commercial value; designing and delivering engineering strategy; securing buy-in from the business, prioritization and roadmapping; understand what tech/tools to invest in. 
• Team Design & Health - Anything related to managing managers; team topologies & reorgs; driving team autonomy; performance, calibration and compensation; measuring organizational health
• Risk & Resilience - Sample topics include: operationalizing risk & resilience at scale; incident management; security, safe AI deployment; controlling infrastructure costs
• Executional Excellence - Think about measuring productivity, quality, and efficiency; strategies for staying aware of everything going on in multiple teams; effective rross-collaboration with product and other business functions

The speaker experience

Working with speakers is one of our favourite things about running LeadingEng. We love to giving you the opportunity to share your stories and knowledge with our audience - and we put a tonne of work in to help your content shine. Throughout the process, you’ll have the opportunity to work with our editor on your talk descriptions, our professional coach who’ll help you hone your presentation delivery, and our content team who’ll review your talk and help you sharpen it for our audience.

As a speaker for the event, we'd also offer you:

• A free ticket to the conference
• A complimentary ticket to a LeadDev conference in 2026
• 2 nights accommodation at the conference hotel
• Economy travel expenses
• Professional speaker coaching if requested
• Dedicated support from our team at all stages of your participation in the conference

Good luck

We hope that's given you all the information you need to submit a great proposal. We can't wait to read them!
 

Supported tickets

We believe that knowledge is for everyone and that the industry gets better by being more diverse and inclusive.

We also know that not everyone has access to the same opportunities.

For this reason, we set aside a number of free, supported tickets to make our conferences more accessible. 

Links to applications

The scheme is open for all to apply to, and chosen applicants will receive the following: 

• A free ticket to their nearest conference and all activities included in the ticket price (e.g. networking activities)
• Conference meals and drinks as provided to all attendees
• Access to our community Slack group
• A conference guide (optional) to be a friendly face at the event, helping to make sure you get the most out of your LeadDev experience and there to introduce you to other members of our community.
• Unfortunately we cannot cover travel, accommodation or incidental expenses around the conference attendance.

Who can apply for a supported ticket?

The program is designed to support a individuals in a range of circumstances to access the conference where a company cannot cover the cost of their ticket, including:

•  individuals from marginalised and underrepresented groups in tech
• those facing economic or social hardship 
• individuals re-entering the workplace after a gap, for example due to redundancy, parental or caring leave

Tickets will be awarded to people who can show that the knowledge gained will be useful for their ongoing careers. The conferences are designed for engineering leaders and tickets are reserved for folks at that level. You don’t need to currently be in a role - in fact if you are out of work or returning to the workplace after a gap we welcome your application - but you do need to have achieved the level of seniority for the conference to be relevant to you. Eg tech leads, engineering managers and above. We do not grant supported tickets to those still studying who have not yet entered the workplace as the content of the events is not yet relevant to them.

Submissions will be assessed by the conference organising team and all applicants will be notified by email within four weeks of the closing date. Supported tickets can only be given in a limited number and the organizers’ decision is final and cannot be appealed.

When will I hear back about my submission?


 

Any questions?
If you have any questions contact us via hello@leaddev.com

Full conference details including speaker lineup, location information, and our code of conduct can be found at https://leaddev.com/leaddev-london.