We were lucky to catch up with Joshua Walker recently and have shared our conversation below.

Joshua, appreciate you joining us today. Do you have any thoughts about how to create a more inclusive workplace?

Creating a more inclusive workplace is built into every fiber of my being. Diversity Equity and Inclusion has never been a nice to have. As I stated in my book “Venti Fried Chicken”, we are stopping Billions of dollars from entering the ecnomoy due to lack of diversity in the workforce.

Joshua, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

My name is Joshua “TechDev” Walker and I am a Army Vet turned self-taught Cloud Solutions Architecht, Diversity Pioneer and Author of “Venti Fried Chicken”.

I have been featured on Deloitte’s “Uncensored” series, Deloitte’s “On Cloud Podcast” and have been frequently covered by the Orlando Buiness Journal for my work in Diversity, Equity and Inclusion as one the Black Orlando Tech founders.

I continue to serve my clients and community in order to make the maximum impact through cloud delivery, online tech education and in-person tech talks. I am also the unofficial and super official leader of the TikTok #cloudGang.

I got into tech through serendipty and curiosity. I bumped into Orret Davis who was the Orlando Tech Association leader at the time 6+ years ago and he invited me to a free tech Meetup. After that I event I was hooked. Four months later I had my first developer job. Fast forward to now and I am Cloud Solutions Architecht at one of the big four firms. I share free knowledge on my TikTok account and YouTube channel in hopes someone else can receive the same life transformation that technology granted me.

However, I am most proud of being one of the Black Orlando Tech founders. I can produly say we are well on our way to hit our goal of getting 10,000 net-new minorities into tech by 2025. Especially with all of the major backing we have gotten from the City of Orlando and private entities.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

All of my education including my Masters was in entertainment. I moved my family to Atlanta for a audio job that end up falling through due to contract pursuits.

From there we applied for tons of jobs and did a lot of interviews but never found our footing which resulted in us losing it all.

Coming back from being homeless is something most folks dont get an oppurtunity to do so im grateful to be alive and in the position im in.

Have you ever had to pivot?

Yes, after losing everything in entertainment I had to pivot to a new industry. If I wasnt open to starting over in a new industry then who knows where I would be today. I can almost gurantee I wouldnt be as successful as I am right now.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://ventifriedchicken.com/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jwtechdev/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/jwtechdev
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUEUZ5UDx3PyfgwEMG-jHyw
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/discover/venti-fried-chicken?lang=en

Image Credits
Photographer: https://www.instagram.com/fotojanet/?hl=en