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What even is a Developer Advocate? I get asked that a lot, and I have some thoughts. First of all, we're developers. Most of us had long careers in development before we ever decided to pick up this particular hybrid torch and run with it.
We're also public speakers, marketers, community managers, salespeople and event planners. Seem like a lot for one job? It is.
More than any of that though we represent you, developers out there writing code and using our products. We represent your interests inside and outside of our companies, because we're trying to make your lives better.
There are a lot of assumptions that people make about advocates and I've heard most of them. We're occasionally treated as though we're here to improve the bottom line above all else, when the reality couldn't be further from the truth.
Sure I want you to use my company's product, because I think it's awesome, otherwise I wouldn't have joined, but my top priority is making sure you have a good experience, that we make your lives easier instead of harder.
We spend a lot of time in meetings with product and marketing, trying to get them to do right by you. We often prevent features from landing on the wrong side of enterprise plans, or review copy for our marketing teams and keep them from peppering you with emails.
Many of us maintain the public APIs and documentation you know and love. We're out there speaking to you at conferences, talking about our products (ideally only in sponsored slots) and sharing our passion for programming, trying to inspire you.
What we're not doing is trying to trick you, or represent ourselves as the pinnacle of software development. Very few of us are doing this for the glory, those ones burn out quick, and they're not very well regarded within the field.
Most of us consider ourselves to be servant leaders, here to lift you up, so we collectively can improve this industry. Helping you write better code, or diversify your communities, or simply to live happier, more fulfilling lives.
It's true that we may sacrifice some technical ability along the way, it's hard to keep up with the bleeding edge in any particular community when you're focused on the bigger picture. I like to think that I've traded some of my technical depth for breadth.
As I was considering my recent departure I mentioned to a friend that I may want to go back to coding full-time, that I wanted to have that deep technical ability that I know my peers respect. I know it because they tell me, often.
I've tried to encourage friends to try out advocacy, only to be told that they would be more willing to consider it if they didn't have to immediately sacrifice half of their technical credibility.
My good friend, being the genius that she is, asked me if I wanted to help one person or I wanted to help a lot of people.
That's an easy answer for me, and it convinced me that I should stay out here on the conference circuit educating people, even if it means I have to make some tough trade-offs.
I'm here for you, I want to help you. If you have questions about my company's product I'll happily answer them. If not great, let's just hang out. Tell me about yourself and what you're doing out there in the world. Your perspective is invaluable to me and my friends back home.
Please don't ever assume I want anything but the best for you though. I fight for the users, as does most every advocate I know. It's right there in the job title.
While I'm making requests I have one last ask, stop walking up to the women amongst us and asking to speak with someone technical. That sucks, and you know better. She's probably a better programmer than you are, because she had to be to make it this far. Show her some respect.
I love you, good luck out there. Let me know if there's ever anything I can do to help. 
