Valentin Despa

About

I teach people what I wish I'd known earlier.

Before any of the teaching, I was the one shipping the software. More than twenty years of it: e-commerce, logistics, and plenty in between, in Agile teams at fast-paced start-ups, mid-size companies, and large global corporations. Everything I teach came out of that work first.

For over a decade, I've taken that real-world experience and quietly built one of the largest learning communities around API tooling, test automation, and DevOps practices. What started as a side YouTube channel turned into hundreds of thousands of learners, conference talks, and team workshops at companies you've heard of.

The thread through all of it is the same: take something that looks intimidating and break it down so anyone can understand it in plain language.

Lately, I've been spending more time on practical AI in the workplace. I look at how teams can leverage AI for both everyday knowledge work and hands-on engineering, like coding and testing. I focus on cutting through the hype to figure out how AI actually helps people get work done, build, and ship faster. New formats, same approach.

900k+

Students taught

100k+

5-star reviews

71k

YouTube subscribers

10+

Years teaching

What I focus on

  • Practical AI for everyday work

    Prompt engineering, Microsoft 365 Copilot, and AI workflows for every team, in every department.

  • API design & testing

    Postman, Newman, REST Assured, CI pipelines.

  • DevOps & DevSecOps

    CI/CD pipelines, automation, and shifting security left.

  • Speaking & panels

    Conferences, podcasts, internal events.

Most of it ends up in a room with a team. If any of this sounds like something yours needs, have a look at how I run trainings.

Recognitions

Programs I've been part of

Over the years I've been recognized by some of the communities I care most about — for teaching, contributing, and showing up.

  • Postman Supernova

    Recognized by Postman for outstanding contributions to the API testing community through courses and content.

  • GitLab Hero

    Honored by GitLab for advocacy, education, and helping engineers adopt modern DevOps practices.

  • GitLab Contributor

    Active contributor to GitLab's open-source ecosystem — issues, content, and community support.

  • AWS Community Builder

    Multi-year member of the AWS Community Builders program, sharing knowledge on cloud and DevOps.

Work with me