my ramblings:
hey fam! we are finally back in the seat after a fantastic but crazy 6 week paternity break. that was the longest time in my 15 year career taking off work and it was eye opening in so many ways. first off, big shout out to stay at home parents. people say it time and time again, but the hardest most rewarding job is taking care of your kids and constantly being present and engaging with them daily. also 3 kids is no joke. it’s so funny when i say this but 2 kids was easy!! going to zone defense is a whole new muscle to develop, and i am thankful i got to be at home with the wife during the last 6 weeks.
that being said, what i saw unfold on the internet around AI was absolutely insane. i literally feel like AI took off while i was on paternity break. heck even in the 6 weeks i saw a company (openclaw) take off on x then get acquired by openai during that time. that is absolutely insane! to be honest it’s the first time in my career that i actually got stressed out that i was ‘falling behind’ with what was happening with ai. however i want to remind you (and myself) that what we see on x is bleeding bleeding edge of tech. it’s good to stay aware of what’s happening but let’s be honest buying 4 mac minis and setting up openclaw isn’t going to land you a job. however, you need to know that we are barreling towards a future where most code will be written in plain english. if you are not tinkering with ai right now you need to. i even vibe coded a mobile app while on paternity break to just keep up with our medical bills and it’s helped a ton! you can take pictures of medical bills, see if you have already been sent the bill, and keep track of how long you have had the bill for. i really need to drop it in the app store, so i will get to that eventually. that being said, let’s dive into some other topics…
torc community updates:
i have been in a wall of meetings over the course of this week wrapping my mind around all that’s happened over the last six weeks, and then starting to plan for the rest of the year. i’ve said this before, but 2025 was about testing for the torc/randstad community. we traveled to a lot of conferences, threw a ton of events, hosted a lot of online workshops/hackathons, and experimented with merch. 2026 is going to be about refining and deepening what we established in 2025.
i first want to give a shout-out to our ambassadors! everytime i opened up my phone on break i always saw an ambassador being an advocate for us online. we’ve been keeping close track of all ambassador social media posts and we have 90% of our ambassadors posting multiple times a week. to me that is a massive number which shows our ambassadors have really bought into what we are building.
i haven’t shared this publicly yet, but these bad boys are in production right now and our ambassadors will be repping these very soon:) again, the only way to get swag like this is to become an ambassador. we will give some of these out at in-person events, but will be limited. i want the randstad digital/torc community swag to be the best in the game, and to be honest i have not seen any corporate swag look like this:)
the torc community team is finally making it’s apperance in south america this year! LATAM has been such a huge part of growing the torc business, and we are PUMPED to finally get down to south america and love on our community. shout out to our community engagement manager, ximena, for introducing us to the founder/organizer of nerdearla which is the largest free technology and open-source conference for the spanish-speaking community. we will be at their chilie event in april and their argentina event in september. not to mention we will be back for talent land which is mexico’s largest talent and innovation event in mexico city in april.
we also are very active in the US again this year with the randstad/torc community team showing up at:
data tune - nashville - march 6-7 (use the code torc26 for 15% off your ticket)
all things open ai - raleigh - march 23-24
renderatl in august
all things open in october
if you plan on being at ANY of these events join our discord and keep an eye on discount codes/possible free tickets! we always try to partner with event organizers to offer as much assistance to our community as we can!
marketing thoughts:
i really did some thinking over paternity break and my hot take is ai is going to commoditize almost every industry that involves a computer (blue collar workers your work is DEFINITELY safe lol). if you log into x for any sort of time people are giving away prompts for ai to do anything from create your seo strategy, to run a deloitte level audit on your business, to a variety of other things.
i’ve also seen multiple posts that are calling the fact that marketing jobs are about to be the highest-paying jobs in tech. why? because it’s going to come down to taste, curation, and brand building. the question at the top of every marketers mind is ‘why should anyone choose our company to do business with in our industry.’ the answer? brand. this continues to strengthen my prediction that i had at the end of 2024 about community roles starting to become one of the hotter opportunities in the industry, and i absolutely saw that this year between actual community-based roles and the resurgence of developer relations roles across the tech industry.
i don’t know ori but he and i are on the same wavelength. the focus of community and how it elevates your compani’s brand in the market is going to continue to be THE THING companies need to invest in.
content recs:
i just dropped the 2025 randstad digital/torc community recap video. 2025 was a monumental year from us. basically taking community from 0. would mean a lot if you gave it a watch/like/comment over on youtube.
inspiration:
i have had the wonderful opportunity to get to know carl over the last few years. he shot my announcement video when i arrived at torc and he’s been on my pod talking about community. he is doing something pretty cool. he isn’t really posting to social but on wednesdays and he has started a vlog to document his life. i’m a big fan of him and how he approaches community.
im going to be honest these guys have a heck of a marketing podcast. most of what i’ve learned has been from these two dudes. they break down how companies should show up online and talk about brand building. if you are in marketing or have any interest in marketing would highly recommend giving these guys a follow.
sponsors/not sponsors of this newsletter lol:
whoop - gotta go with my favorite health wearable. its made me realize a lot of things a) gluten is bad for me b) any alcohol is a killer on my sleep c) networking at night makes me not sleep good:)
nokt - i’ve tried many ways to fall asleep over the years and most of those ways have killed my overall health (thanks whoop) but FINALLY found the best way to fall asleep. you get a few bucks off if you use my code:)
seek coffee - you know how much of a freak i am about coffee. this stuff is legit and what’s even cooler is the founder lives in nashville and we had lunch the other day and he told me his story! most coffee has traces of mold in it (not ideal) so he has found a way to make mold free coffee! use the code ‘tdesseyn’ at checkout.
brick - this thing has taken the internet by storm (or at least my side of the internet) if you have problems scrolling on your phone like i do you should check this out. it’s helped me a ton.
fabric - i save a lot of links and ive tried a lot of link saving apps. so far my favorite is this one. easy to use. you can create folders. really like it.
copilot - favorite budget app
savvycal - my favorite ‘here is my availability link’ scheduler
appwrite - if you want to make web apps easier
bits & bytes:
if you want to get involved in the torc community and what we are building jump into the conversation in our discord
if you are a dad and you are in tech i have a group of dads that meet once a month
i started a new x account for guidance counselor 2.0! would love if you follow it and give it some love!
if you want to be kept up to date about all the events (virtual and in person) go check out our meetup page
if you want to follow me and more of my family stuff follow me on instagram
if you want to be kept in the loop if quick updates and when we are in your city or have any job search questions text me! 615-235-5650 and if you want to be alerted when i go live with amazing guests on my stream text ‘journal’ to that number!
