Nishi - Speaker Acquisition Secretary

[KneeShe-2004]

Name: Nishi Shishir

Speaker Acquisition Secretary

Manifesto

Many of you know me already, but for those who don't, Hi!! My name's Nishi and I'm a second year doing the CS with AI course :).

Why Speaker Acquisition?

My main reason for nominating myself for the role of Speaker Acquisition Secretary (acquisition is a very hard word to spell) is because I've been to many HackSoc talks in the past and have absolutely loved them - enough that I think they are a brilliant way for people to learn more about their interests in more detail!

New Ideas

I have many ideas on how to improve on Isaac's great work from this last year, with a quick summary being:

Reaching out to other societies/courses who do something tech related to see if they want to explain about their specific interest/course/group - one stellar example is OPAD!

When speaking to one of the members, I learnt that they are a group that creates assistive and rehabilitation devices for the community and healthcare services - a group I didn't know existed until this particular conversation, and one that was also very, very interesting.

I think it is a great example of a group that is not as well known but doing brilliant work in the tech field, especially one that many other HackSoc members like myself would be interested in. Having talks/workshops or even just introductions from similar groups like this would be a great way for HackSoc to make connections with these said other groups, as well as helping out the visiting groups in a win-win situations (plus new friends!!)

Holding polls/gathering interest before booking talks

I think one of the best ways to streamline what content to hold talks on would be through getting feedback from the members of our society. Not only would it make content personalised towards our members (hopefully leading to ameliorated turn out to the talks?), it would make it easier for us as a committee to find speakers if we know which general direction to search in.

My current plan on how to do this is to think up a few topics every fortnight-ish and put them up to a poll, with a slot for any extra topics/field people might want a talk on. After gathering the results from this poll, I would then set out to find people in the field!

I believe with the connections I already have (no, not just the Linkedin ones haha), sourcing experts in the specific fields will be a piece of cake (I could also potentially bribe them with cake).

Better marketing for the talks!

The marketing for the talks was already great but I think more work needs to be done during and post-talk as well. Whether this be something as simple as stories just before a talk starts, some choice clips of the clip during, and a post afterwards of what the talk was like with acknowledgement to the speaker would be a considerable in bringing more eyes towards HackSoc - I also believe it would be a great way to present HackSoc to sponsors for HackNotts that's coming up very very soon :) (More about this later)

I'm more than happy to work with the new Marketing Secretary about this too :))

Why choose me?

Apart from my passion for the role, I believe I have the skills (and I'm hoping those of you who know me can attest to these) that are key for this position. I firmly believe if yapping was a competition I would win everytime, but in this context it works out in my favour! I am not afraid to start conversations with people, no matter what their age or background is like. I've learnt these skills from volunteering with various different age groups in the past and believe the skills are transferrable.

I also have the ability to write professionally but friendly - those of you who saw my foray's during DMS last year would hopefully believe that even more now. I also think this is a key skill that could come in to help when having conversations with sponsors for HackNotts.

Apart from this though, I also have the ability to take a leadership position if needed (and have done many times in the past), as well as having the adjacent skills that come with it - organisation and the ability to listen.

I hope this explanation of my ideas to improve HackSoc and some of the reasons behind why I think I would be a good fit for the role are useful! Please DM me on discord @kneeshe or email me if any of you have any questions :D

(and thank you for reading this long ass manifesto)

[KneeShe-2004]

gifs dont work :(

[markjfannon]

My gifs worked

[KneeShe-2004]

awh man

[sanamorii]

simply a skill issue