#TheTechHustle 2024 Year-in-Review
Reflecting on how hard we hustled in 2024!
Just like that, family, we’re at the end of 2024!
Let me just say that this year gave us more than we ever expected. If I had to sum it up in two words, they’d be hustle and success.
Every move we made took us up and to the right!
From traveling the nation for our #TTH Tour to the growth of our YouTube channel and Skool community, the massive success we’ve had with Backstage with BobbyD, and the countless wins we experienced along the way—yeah, 2024 was really that year for #TheTechHustle.
And to say this is only the beginning!
I honestly don’t know of any other tech community that hustles the way we do! We kept our heads and hearts in the game this year, and it truly paid off.
But we could not have done any of it without the love, support, and engagement we received from our #TTH family. Y’all are the real champs!
It doesn’t matter if you’ve been rocking with us since the beginning or only recently joined the crew, we genuinely appreciate y’all for being on this journey with us.
Not going to hold you, though! Let’s get to what you came here for…
Here’s how 2024 shaped up for #TheTechHustle:
#TTH Growth Stats 📈🚀
This year, 2024, was a year of growth—and the numbers are proof. We definitely reached new levels on our three main digital platforms, and we have none other than our #TTH peeps to thank for that.
#TheTechHustle YouTube: 7,700 Subscribers
Y’all was really rocking with us this year!
We’re currently at 7.7k on YouTube, which is more than 15x the number of subscribers we had at the beginning of 2024!
Not to mention, we just released Episode 50! This milestone means a lot because many podcasts fail within the first 15 episodes (fun fact provided by Raymond).
As we’ve said before, it’s really an honor to know that y’all find value in what we’re doing and want to come along for the ride. Continue to tell everyone you know about #TheTechHustle, peeps.
#TheTechHustle Skool Community: 260 Members
We’re grinding toward 300 in the #TTH Skool community, and we couldn’t be more appreciative of those who have locked in with us.
The focus this year was quality over quantity. Everyone in our community—from newbies to tech pros—has the same mindset and hunger for making it in this field. That said, you better believe that in 2025, we’re going to put the grind in overdrive as we work together to revolutionize engineering through the power of community, empowerment, and AI education.
#TheTechHustle Newsletter: 200 Subscribers
Yet another milestone we’re proud of.
The #TTH newsletter is where we’ve been documenting a lot of our journey, especially this year. And we love being able to not only go back and see our growth but share these details and memories with a couple hundred like minds each month.
This number will continue to grow, for sure. The goal is to add another zero to it by this time next year.
#TTH Tour 2024 🗺️📍
Atlanta. NYC. Miami. San Francisco. Mountain View. Houston. Fort Lauderdale.
It’s been a heck of a year for traveling. Happy to say that #TheTechHustle Tour 2024 took us to a good amount of places in 2024—and we’re grateful for each experience!
March 20-24: NSBE 50th Annual Convention (Atlanta)
We pulled up to the Georgia World Congress Center in March 2024 for the #NSBE50 Convention—an event filled with black engineering talent from all over the country. In the building were many reputable brands and companies, including Google, Amazon, Facebook, Walmart, Dell, Delta, ExxonMobil, and HP.
March 23: ATL Cloud Conference 2024 (Atlanta)
Also in March, the team and I pulled up to the ATL Cloud Conference 2024. Yours truly graced the stage for a 60-minute speech titled “Behind the Cloud at Twitter 1.0”. I talked about my previous tenure at Twitter as a site reliability engineer and the responsibilities and significance of the the SRE role. I also discussed topics such as cloud infrastructure and containerization.
June: LinkedIn Headquarters with Codepath (San Francisco)
DHustle and I showed up to the LinkedIn Headquarters where I conducted two workshops for early educated students in their sophomore year (as part of my partnership with CodePath). We also visited Google in Mountain View and then spent some time working on the 36th, 37th, and 38th floors of the Salesforce Tower!
August 19-21: Black Is Tech Conference (Houston)
In August, I had the opportunity to be a part of two sessions at the Black Is Tech event. I gave a speech called Behind the Cloud at Twitter 1.0 and was a part of a panel that discussed the vital connection between computer science and the Black community.
October 1-3: Emerging Engineers Summit 2024 (Virtual)
Toward the end of the year, I had the pleasure of hosting the Emerging Engineers Summit 2024 for CodePath. This was a three-day virtual event for computer science students and junior software engineers working toward a career in tech.
October 10-13: Thrive Conference - Black Men in Tech (Fort Lauderdale)
#TheTechHustle showed up to the Black Men in Tech conference where the crew and I were able to rub shoulders with a lot of intelligent, melanated tech talent. It was great to see how people who look like me are making waves in this industry!
November 13-16: Afrotech (Houston)
This conference was definitely a 10/10 experience that checked all the boxes. The crowd, the panel discussions, the product demos, everything was A1! We also ran into my good friend—and one of our recent Backstage with BobbyD guests—Portia Kibble Smith.
BobbyD x #TTH Speeches 🎤💎
If you know me, you know that I don’t shy away from the mic!
I’m grateful to have had the pleasure of gracing a few stages and dropping some gems to several knowledge-hungry audiences in 2024.
ATL Cloud Conference 2024 (March)
Speech: “Behind the Cloud at Twitter 1.0”
Miami Tech Tuesdays (May)
Speech: “Twitter to Tech Leader”
Black Is Tech (August)
Speech: “Behind the Cloud at Twitter 1.0”
Black Is Tech (August)
Panelist Discussion: The vital connection between computer science and the Black Community
Emerging Engineers Summit 2024 (October)
Speech: “Manifesting Your Career in an Ever-Changing Landscape”
THRIVE 2024 Conference (October)
Panelist Discussion: BLK in Engineering
TechFest Live (November)
Panelist Discussion: Pathways to success
BobbyD Guest Appearances 🎙️🤝🏽
What’s a tech podcast without a guest appearance from one of the best in the game?!
Nah, I'm joking! (Or am I?!) Very grateful that I had the chance to make guest appearances on not one, not two, but SIX tech podcasts this year.
Can you say hustle?!!
Major respect and appreciation for each of the podcast hosts who so graciously opened their platform to BobbyD. I genuinely enjoyed being able to share parts of my journey and knowledge with their listening audiences.
Big Tech Energy - Episode 12
Navigating Non-Tech to Tech: Bobby D's Journey in Engineering and Diversity Advocacy
TinoTalk - Episode 83
Cafe Cultura (Tech and Entrepreneurship)
Bobby Dorlus: The Path from South Florida to Silicon Valley Engineer featuring Jaylah Sandoval
Sauce Labs
Is SRE the Antidote to Developers Behaving Badly? With BobbyD
Working in Tech - Episode 45
Rachel Mlota
#TTH Bigger & Better 💻
One of our biggest motivations for hustlin’ the way we do is knowing that there’s always room for improvement. There’s a lot that goes on behind the scenes that y’all don’t see but is helping set up #TheTechHustle to be bigger and better than it was the day before, the month before, the year before, etc…
Here are a few things we put into action in 2024, each of which added a few more points to the scoreboard:
Backstage with BobbyD 🎙️🎥
We recorded a total of 13 Backstage with BobbyD episodes this year! If you haven’t already seen them, be sure to tune in. If you have, go watch them again!
Catalina Peña - Career coach (ex-Tweep)
Ebun Aluko - Tech prodigy
Portia Kibble Smith - Tech trailblazer and OG
Asia Taylor - Engineer and compute team member at Twitter (ex-Tweep)
Babatunde Fashola - Engineer at Twitter (ex-Tweep)
Maisha Gray-Diggs - Engineer and HR & DEI leader in tech (ex-Tweep)
Tayo Olukola - Principal software engineer at SoFi (ex-Tweep)
Gerrard Williams - Hip-Hop Gamer
Chanel Power - Chemist and mathematician turned software engineer
Bobby Allen - Tech trailblazer from Google
Marlon Avery - Self-taught software engineer and AI innovator
Meryl Charleston - Former Twitter employee and mentee of mine (ex-Tweep)
Sebastian Nunez - Software engineer intern at Google
New #TTH Team Members 👥
Another way we’ve grown this year is by expanding the #TTH team! We recently hired five (5) Career Coaches to support our new holistic career development program designed for Google Tech Equity Collective (TEC)! 🎉
#TTH Projects & 2025 Plans ✅
The thing about this hustle is that it doesn’t stop!
Every day is a new opportunity to be your best and do something great—at least that’s how we see it. We keep the tech juices flowing in the #TTH Skool community; not to mention, there’s no shortage of collaboration or teamwork on the #TTH GitHub.
Feel free to join us at any time!
In terms of plans for 2025, just know that we have a lot of things in the works! Among the biggest plans are the efforts being made toward the AI Edge Datacenters and moving into Season 4 of #TheTechHustle podcast.
You’ll need to stay locked in with us to see what else we have in the pipeline. Of course, there’ll be more traveling, more Backstage with BobbyD, more projects, and just a lot more of the greatness that makes #TheTechHustle what it is.
#TTH Thank Yous 🙏🏾
We want to extend a sincere thank you to every single person who has shown their love to #TheTechHustle—whether it was by sharing a post, telling a friend about us, joining our community, watching/listening to our podcasts, or simply just reading the #TTH newsletters each month.
We do this for y’all! And we don’t take our work lightly.
THANK YOU to our #TTH community aka the backbone of our mission!
THANK YOU to our sponsor, Mar-velous Creations, for believing in the vision!
THANK YOU to our current partners and clients!
THANK YOU to our podcast guests who shared invaluable tech knowledge!
Words from #TheTechHustle Team
It’s been quite the year, family. We certainly hope you and everyone around you were able to achieve the goals you all set forth. Here a few words of encouragement and appreciation directly from The #TTH crew. Thank you for everything!
BobbyD 👨🏾💻:
Congratulations, we've made it! 2024 was a year of building, developing, and setting the bar high. It was a year of iteration, growth, and pushing the boundaries of what could be for our brand, our company, our community, and #TheTechHustle.
As we look ahead to 2025, I’m excited about elevating our presence, amplifying our impact, and ensuring that the stories we tell and the journeys we take will resonate long after we're gone. This is the year of elevation.
I’ll stand on global stages, inspiring audiences with my journey—touching the stars and showcasing the power of persistence. Our podcast will echo across the globe, and our newsletter will vibrantly connect communities throughout the internet. We’ll build AI Edge Data Center(s), engineer live solutions, foster communities, and create spaces for innovation through open-source and open-minded collaboration.
This year, I’ll celebrate unforgettable milestones: walking the red carpet with my family and witnessing the pyramids of Egypt. Above all, I’m laying the foundation for a legacy that will empower generations to come.
Let’s move boldly into 2025—together.
DHustle 💆🏽♂️:
Success is built by the dedication of a team that shows up, works hard, and strives for excellence. Thank you for an incredible year, and here’s to even greater achievements ahead!
Raymond 🤷🏾♂️:
Every day above ground is a good day! Looking forward to continuing this in 2025!
Jasmin 💃🏽:
Close this chapter with a smile.
...and just know that whatever you desire is already yours. My hope is that each of you remains as dedicated to your growth as you do to your grind. Stay present, and you'll always be in the right place at the right time.
Respect! You conquered this thing called 2024! The next milestone awaits you...
Not Goodbye, Just See You Later! 👋🏾
Thank you for a tremendous 2024. We’re steadily climbing the ladder, baby!
Until 2025! Peace…✌🏾
Special shoutout and thank you to our sponsor, Mar-velous Creations. Check her out for creative and custom handmade sweets and treats. Her service area spans from Palm Beach down to Miami-Dade.
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