Building Bridges: From Developer to Developer Advocate • David Edoh-Bedi & James Beswick • GOTO 2025

This interview was recorded for GOTO Unscripted. #GOTOcon #GOTOunscripted
https://gotopia.tech

Read the full transcription of this interview here:
https://gotopia.tech/articles/368

David Edoh-Bedi - Developer Relations at Stripe
James Beswick - Head of Developer Relations at Stripe ‪@JamesBeswickD‬

RESOURCES
David
https://x.com/edohbedi_d
  / edohbedi  
https://edoh-bedi.com

James
https://bsky.app/profile/jbesw.bsky.s...
  / jbesw  
  / jamesbeswick  

Links
https://stripe.dev
‪@StripeDev‬
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DESCRIPTION
James Beswick (Head of Developer Relations at Stripe) talks with David Edoh-Bedi (Developer Advocate) about his professional journey from growing up in Togo to working at Microsoft and eventually Stripe.

The conversation explores David's transition from software engineering to developer advocacy, highlighting the importance of empathy, communication skills, and technical knowledge in the role.
They discuss the challenges of working with large legacy systems, the complexities of payment processing, and how the software development landscape has evolved from library-focused development to API-centric approaches.

The interview provides valuable insights for developers considering a career path in developer relations and those integrating complex systems like payment processing into their applications.

TIMECODES
00:00 Intro
00:24 First programming experiences
03:57 Transitioning from college to industry
10:30 Dealing with legacy systems
14:14 Transition to developer advocacy
17:42 Challenges of transitioning roles & public speaking in tech
25:08 Beyond payments: The complexity of payment systems
38:37 Mastering APIs
44:00 Comparing AWS & Stripe
46:35 Outro

RECOMMENDED BOOKS
Simon Brown • Software Architecture for Developers Vol. 2 • https://leanpub.com/visualising-softw...
David Farley • Modern Software Engineering • https://amzn.to/3GI468M
Kim, Humble, Debois, Willis & Forsgren • The DevOps Handbook • https://amzn.to/47oAf3l
Simon Wardley • Wardley Maps • https://amzn.to/45U8Upr
Simon Wardley • Wardley Mapping, The Knowledge • https://amzn.to/3XQEeDu
David Anderson, Marck McCann & Michael O'Reilly • The Value Flywheel Effect • https://amzn.to/3VcHxC
Mike Amundsen • Restful Web API Patterns & Practices Cookbook • https://amzn.to/3C74fpH

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