Scape-what?

On the mornings of Thursday 9th April 2026 and Friday 10th April 2026, in bright and sunny Liverpool, the Harker and Jamescape teams descended onto CENTRAL TECH for the fifth instalment of our annual company conference, Scapegoat!

Scapegoat is our two day conference, jam-packed full of technical discussions and workshops on everything from web accessibility to task management methodology, to pitch practice and LinkedIn post writing. Working in a fast-paced start-up can sometimes mean that we focus so much on building and growing quickly that we forget to zoom out and take stock together and participate in valuable discussions, skill-building workshops, and team-building exercises.

Whilst we are a Liverpool-based team, we are a hybrid company and some of our staff work remotely, so it’s incredible to get all staff from both companies together, collectively travelling a total of over 1000 miles to reach Liverpool!

Two day structure

This year, we dedicated the first day of the conference to our software development team who hosted a range of technical workshops, alongside welcoming our next Year in Industry software developer, Thomas Manship onto the team with a fast-paced introduction to Harker, the team, and the codebase. The second day of the conference brought all staff across both companies together for a non-technical day.

With so much going on during Scapegoat it can quickly get overwhelming, but James Barber (CEO & Co-Founder) created the Scapegoat 2026 mobile app, which featured the session schedule, general conference information, and the Vincent Vanguard: the daily conference newspaper re-capping highlights from each day.

Lightning Rounds

Lighting Rounds have quickly became a Scapegoat staple after being introduced at Scapegoat 2024. These are three-minute talks given by every staff member on something that interests them (and, in some way, must link back to their job role). This year, we heard talks on topics ranging from the limitations of AI, to social media branding, to cold calling Instagram reels, to Beyoncé. Lightning Rounds are a great way to hear from the entire team, especially those who normally wouldn’t be leading a session or talk, and finding out what interests them personally beyond day-to-day work. Congratulations to Ollie Cockell (Software Developer at Harker) for winning the staff vote for Best Lightning Round for his talk on the impact of the discontinuation of Flash on the South African government.

Harker testing

Some of the more genuinely impactful sessions of Scapegoat 2026 involved us carrying out user testing for the Harker platform. This was the first time we’ve internally tested the platform beyond the software development team, so it was invaluable to gather feedback on navigation and reporting functionality from our non-technical team members.

Additionally, we welcomed Hannah Morrison to Scapegoat. Hannah is the Founder of Clear Creator, an accessibility consultant who recently supported us with embedding web accessibility into Harker. Hannah hosted a web accessibility workshop where we blindfolded team members and tasked them with completing a set of tasks within the app, which exposed areas where Harker wasn’t fully compatible with keyboard navigation and screen reader software.

The Scapies

At the end of the conference, we swapped the hoodies for formal wear as we enjoyed a delicious evening meal catered by Root to Flower featuring lots of draught real ale, brought to us by the Jamescape Events team. It was great to be joined by some of our previous staff members and friends of the company to celebrate the past year of Harker and Jamescape. This was followed by The Scapies 2026, our infamous staff awards show where we celebrate serious and unserious achievements alike, including Slack Message of the Year, Most PRs Merged, Most Work Hours Spent Watching Reels, and Most Likely to Strip in an Interview!

Scapegoat 2027

This time last year, we welcomed a team of fifteen to Scapegoat 2025, which was double the team size of Scapegoat 2024. This was a huge logistical challenge for us and we were unsure as to how we’d pull it off again, but Scapegoat 2026 was even more jam-packed and valuable! Thanks to all of our staff, partners, and suppliers who made Scapegoat 2026 a huge success. Things really have changed since our humble first conference in 2022 and now Scapegoat is the most hectic, enjoyable, and productive time in the company calendar. Both teams are now more aligned, stronger, and bigger than ever, ready to achieve their respective missions through fit-for-purpose software.

Until the next one.