🇹🇳 Learn & Hack Tunisia 2025
I spent the whole last week in Tunisia. Yes, in Tunisia, Africa, and not as a tourist, but on a working trip. At the beginning of the year, I suggested to management that we organize technical training (like we used to have before; one that lasts several weeks where we only spend one or two days per week learning new stuff). But I got a counter-offer instead: What if we gather everyone for a week in 🇹🇳Tunisia (we have an office there) and, actually, create something?
So, I drafted a new concept, which I called "Learn & Hack Tunisia 2025." Gladly, it was supported, and we made it happen 📈. Here is what it was and what I learned.
Before you create a plan, you had better define what you want to achieve with it. Together with tech management, we defined three main goals:
🤝 build a community of tech leaders
💼 solve real business problems
🤖 leverage AI
To achieve that, we did the following. There were two main parts:💡 learn and 🛠 hack.
💡 The first three days started with the "Learn" part: tech leadership, hard skills, and soft skills—everything an established tech leader should know. Of course, it was backed up with exercises. This way, people tried the stuff they learned right away and absorbed the information much better.
🛠 The rest of the time was dedicated to the "Hack" part. We split the participants (about 20 people) into two end-to-end teams. Teams capable of delivering a feature from idea to real product. To do that, we combined different roles and mixed people from different teams and offices. During the hack part, teams worked on the same assignment, which we clearly defined before the training. During this week, the teams were supposed to develop an MVP and demo it to the audience on Friday.
🕺 And, of course, it wasn't only about learning and hacking. It was also about having fun. We had several activities and explored Tunis (the capital of Tunisia) together.
The results. The products which I saw exceeded my expectations. I was a little worried that teams had less than a full week to develop the product, but it turned out that in the current setup, that time is enough for a good MVP. Teams presented demos, and the feedback from both the jury and our tech department was super positive.
To me, the trip was a new experience as well:
1️⃣ Doing my Tech Leadership course in English in front of a live audience. It was a challenge, but also an opportunity.
2️⃣ Organizing such a big offline event. This was also a new thing for me. Even with the good support of management, HR, and the local office, and with positive feedback from participants, I still see things that could be improved in the next iteration.
3️⃣ The energy levels. The event itself was more exhausting than I expected :) It was, of course, fun and entertaining, but after years of remote work, socializing 16/7 feels different now.
In the next post, I’ll share more specific learnings from the training. Stay tuned.
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