The jet lag is still having an effect on my cognitive abilities. It’s five am on Wednesday morning, two and a half days after my Sunday return from London. I traveled there a week prior for the third annual TRU London unconference where I presented on topics of Twitter Sourcing and Location-Based Recruiting.
TRU London is always a special experience for me. Hosted in one of my favorite cities, and by one of my favorite people, Bill Boorman, I get to take in the sites and culture as well as network with the best and brightest of Europe’s recruiting and HR Technology community (and many of my North American friends too!).
This year the conference was held in the East End of London in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. Osborn Street and Brick Lane, where the hotel is located, are lined with curry houses, student hangouts, and eclectic shops. The nearby tube station, Aldgate Easte, is around the corner in Whitechapel, home to the famous hunting grounds of Jack the Ripper.
The area is near Norton Folgate, where Bill spent much of his youth (hence the name of his blog). Bill is systematically showing us more interesting parts of London with each conference. It was so cool.
The week was filled with so many wonderful experiences. I learned a great deal and will not attempt to sum it all up here. So far I think the mindshare of the event has been best documented by Jobsite’s Marketing Director, Felix Wetzel, in his Future Series article, Born of TRU.
You can see more of the amazing ideas and articles stemming from TRU London by scanning the twitter hashtag #trulondon. And Martin Cousins has an aggregated blog list going here.
Here are my top 10 scary good moments, in no particular order:
10) Seeing old friends and meeting so many new friends from Europe and North America (including meeting Kevin Wheeler for the first time IRL).
9) Celebrating James Mayes birthday TRULondon style
8) Plotting world domination with Glenn Cathey, Michael Long, and Jacco Valkenburg
7) Wondering through London with Sarah White China Gorman Laurie Ruettimann Michael Long Maren Hogan Shane McCusker and Meghan Biro.
6) Debating the viability of Location-Based mobile recruiting (and just about everything else) with John Sumser.
5) River Thames dinner on the wrong boat with Arie Ball. We literally missed the right boat.
4) Charity event location mix-up at the Houses of Parliament resulting in Geoff Webb being detained by Metropolitan Police.
3) Bill Boorman – enough said.
2) Exploring Brick Lake and Whitechapel in the footsteps of Jack the Ripper.
1) Traveling to "Pompey" with Etienne Besson, Bill Boorman, Glen Cathey, Arie Ball, and Rhiannon Hughes to support Portsmouth FC from the partners box hosted by Jobsite. Special thanks to Felix Wetzel and Keith Potts.
Check out some of the great TRULondon photos from Heather Bussing. Or join me on Facebook to see the pics I have posted there.
I’ll be glad to reconnect with some of my friends from TRULondon on March 11th at SouthBySW, where I am hosting the first ever TalentetNet Live Austin conference. Register now for the only recruiting and HR related content in Austin during SX Interactive.
