New chapter for chapters: Why in-person community events still matter - Ep 122

In this episode of This Week in Quality, Simon welcomes a returning legend to the virtual stage as Deanna comes back from maternity leave and dives straight into everything that’s evolved across the MoTaverse. Together they turn the chat into a rapid-fire “what changed while Deanna was away?” tour, calling out highlights like Into the MoTaverse, My Reports, company pages, thank-you stars and badges, membership updates, SQU(e)C, and the growing momentum behind chapters as the next evolution of local meetups.The conversation then zooms in on why chapters matter and what becomes possible when in-person events connect directly to MoT profiles, memories, recordings, and the star system. Chris Pratt, a new organiser for MoT London, shares behind-the-scenes insights on stepping into a fresh organising team, raising the bar after a strong year, and what to expect at the next London event. He previews talks that reframe everyday testing work, including one on authentication that treats login as an adversarial system and another on how quality assurance is evolving into quality engineering, plus a call for potential event sponsors to support food and drinks.Deanna also invites Mat on stage to reflect on community moments he’s enjoyed, including the MoT Christmas quiz, and to share the real-world grind of job hunting in 2026. Mat talks candidly about being asked for “commercial experience” with specific tools, using that pressure as fuel to keep learning, and leaning on the community for momentum. Building on that, Simon encourages professional members to book recorded one-to-one insight conversations that can be published back into the MoTaverse, and hints at future ambassador-led conversations as the programme grows.Later, Ady Stokes shares an energising update from the Leads chapter, describing an “I Am Remarkable” workshop focused on self-promotion without the cringe. The session helps people push past imposter syndrome, recognise their achievements, and practise saying them out loud. Sean Ye joins from Ottawa with a practical quality win of his own, containerising APIs for on-demand sandbox environments to enable automated integration and regression testing, and using AI tools to navigate dense AWS documentation more effectively.The episode wraps with a wave of excitement about how fast the platform is evolving, how following and activity feeds help you stay connected, and why showing up, online and in-person, keeps the MoTaverse moving.#ThisWeekInQuality#MoTaverse#Chapters#Community#CareerGrowth#QualityEngineering