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# Hiring Technical Leaders: Promote from Within or Go External?


- **Date:** Thursday, Jul 9, 2026
- **Time:** 16:50–17:20 (30 min)
- **Room:** Airstream 2
- **Event:** World Congress 2026 Europe

## Recording

[Watch recording](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/100167-hiring-technical-leaders-promote-from-within-or-go-external)

## Description

Alternative title - Hiring Technical Leaders: Build or Buy?
When it comes to (technical) people leaders, should we nurture and promote from within the organization or hire from the outside? 
What is the not-so-hidden cost of both of those approaches (fresh ideas, different approaches to people and technical leadership, leadership maturity vs organization maturity); technical leadership - building credibility within a team; leading at different sizes and different maturity of organization - the role of a leader in a start-up vs scale-up vs large organization. 

## Speaker

### [Barbara Wilk](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/@barbara-wilk)

Global Head of TA and People Analytics at Appfire 


## Related talks at this congress

- [Five Ways to Break Silos in Your Engineering Organization](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-europe/sessions/1153-five-ways-to-break) — Daniel Schniepp
- [Fireside Chat - Why the future is built on “AND”](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-europe/sessions/1040-fireside-chat-why) — Jürgen Hartwig, Rudi Bauer
- [Engineering/Manager Pendulum: Generating compound interest on your career](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-europe/sessions/1396-engineering-manager) — Marcin Olichwirowicz
- [Decode Your People: Using PCM to Build High-Performance Teams](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-europe/sessions/1206-decode-your-people) — Chris Redmond