The importance of job titles

Laurence Moroney: I don't think, ultimately, there is a difference, unless you really think about semantics. I'll give two reasons why I prefer using "advocate" over "evangelist." Firstly, evangelism gives the impression that it's a one-way street. You're saying, "I'm here to tell you the good news." That's literally the definition.

To be the best evangelist or the best advocate, there needs to be a two-way street. I advocate our tech to developers and I advocate developers' needs to our engineering people and to our product managers. As a result, I think "advocate" is a much better description.

The second reason is that Microsoft, when I worked there, used to call the role "evangelist." Nowadays, the role is called "advocate" at Microsoft. One of the things that I did at Microsoft was I trained and equipped what we called "field evangelists." I was based in the headquarters in Seattle, but we had different people in different parts of the world who were evangelists for Microsoft.

There was one young man in Southern Asia who I was helping to train as an evangelist and he traveled to a Muslim country.

When asked at the border what his job was, he said he was an evangelist and he got detained! I got a call from the border security at this country asking to verify that he really meant he talked about tech and not religion. I think that was one of the signals to maybe change the title!

Geertjan Wielenga: How do you train evangelists?

Laurence Moroney: I can talk about what I did in the past and what I do now. In a big company like Microsoft, people work in the field in regional offices, such as Singapore, Tokyo, or London. The evangelism had to be multidisciplinary for those people; they had to be able to evangelize multiple types of tech, whereas the people in corporate were able to specialize.

I worked as the main evangelist for a tech called Silverlight. I wrote a bunch of books on Silverlight and I drove what the messaging around it should be. When it came to people in the field who were evangelists, they would have to know Silverlight, Windows, Office, and many other topics. My job was to equip them with what they needed to be able to evangelize Silverlight to partners and customers.

At Google, it's similar. Part of my job with TensorFlow and with AI is to equip our people in the field. I make sure that they have the most up-to-date messaging, decks, and demos. If they want to run an event or visit a partner and be able to brief them on a particular tech, then I help them with that.

Geertjan Wielenga: TensorFlow and AI are what you're really known for nowadays. What enthuses you most about those areas?

Laurence Moroney: Firstly, I'm excited by the positive changes that AI is bringing to the industry. Secondly, I work with some of the smartest people on the planet and going shoulder to shoulder with them to build a product and communicate a product is really exciting. Finally, I enjoy being a spokesperson for AI.

Geertjan Wielenga: Could you not say the same things about any tech that you find interesting? What is unique about AI and TensorFlow?

Laurence Moroney: I think the level of enthusiasm in the outside world that I'm responding to is unique. I've worked with tech that people absolutely adored but not to the same level as this and not to the same level among non-technical people. A lot of business people understand that they need to know about AI and they're excited about the opportunities. Many politicians want to hear about the opportunities too. AI goes beyond just developers and that's one thing that's super unique about it.

Geertjan Wielenga: What are some of the upcoming developments in AI that you see happening?