Last year, I joined WP Media as the CTO and Head of Engineering with this mission: Transform product development into an agile engineering organization built for quality, innovation, scale, excellence, and growth. Mission accomplished.
Why Should I Care About Writing Clean, Readable Code?
You are a developer. You read books, blog posts, and Tweets about the practice of how to construct clean code. Do you truly understand why? I never advocate blindly following. Rather, I encourage you to ask: Why should I care about writing clean,
My Secret to Retain as You Quickly Read a Book
I'm an avid reader. Last year, I challenged myself to read one book per week. That challenge was difficult for me to achieve, but I finally cracked it. I'll share my secret with you of how to quickly read a book and retain what you've
What is Engineering Excellence?
Excellence is something we all want. But what does it truly mean? Think about that. What is the definition of engineering excellence? How can we measure it to know that we've achieved it? I'm on a quest to answer these questions. I'm starting with
Profession of Complexity – Simplicity is Better
We make things harder than they need to be. We take a basic concept and then diverge into a sea of complexity. This human behavior burrows deep into our thinking, implementations, and explanations. This drive towards complexity makes us ineffective
Then I Met Beans Theme Framework.
If you know me, then you know I've been a huge Genesis framework advocate for quite some time. But then I met the Beans Theme Framework. Though I tried to resist the temptation and stay true to the Genesis Community, I fell hard for Beans. I fell so
Why “Best Practices” are a Complete Myth
There is no such thing as "best practices." None. That's a lie. It's confusing too, as we seek to find some solution or methodology that is superior to any other. But that doesn't exist. Let's talk about why "best practices" are a complete
Down the Rabbit Hole to Build Perfectly Designed Software
I am a software craftsman. I teach and advocate building high-quality solutions using the techniques of readability, reusability, and maintainability. But there is a point of no return. There is a ledge that we walk on where the act of building
My Best Career Advice…It’s a Game Changer
I'm often asked for advice, that one secret formula to unlock your potential and thrust your career forward. As the year winds down and we approach a brand new year, let me share my best career advice..my secret formula. It's a game changer. I'm
My 2016 Personal Year-End Review
It's time to reflect on this year from a personal point-of-view. This year has been a story of extremes of success, failures, grief, and joy. The pendulum has swung from side-to-side this year. Let's take a few moments to reflect. Then I'll share
My 2016 Business Year-End Review
December is the month of reflection and review. It's our time to stop and think about where we are now in comparison to the plan set forth back in January. I'm taking a few minutes of your time today to talk about my business year. What went to
A Woman in a Man’s Profession – My 30 Years in Engineering
I've been in engineering for three decades, a non-degreed woman. I've engineered and led incredible mega-million dollar projects. But every step of my career was a struggle, as I had to work twice as hard and long as my teams. I did the role of
Playing Games to Amplify Your Problem-Solving Skills
You spend countless hours learning new technologies and methodologies to level up and stay current. You read, take online courses, and go to conferences. You are actively bettering yourself. Hum, what steps are you taking to improve your
Being Adaptive When Ideas Fall Short
You have a tremendous idea, one that you think the market needs. You pitch the idea and map it into your business plans. But wait. First, you need to determine if the market wants what you are proposing. If the response is mediocre, then being
A Full Lego Box is the First Secret to Programming
Listen up as I'm going to unlock the first secret of programming for you. Everything in code is built from the same building blocks. Everything. It doesn't matter if you're building the space shuttle, banking system, a vision-guided robotic cell, or
Your Code Sucks. Time to Clean it Up
Your code sucks. I remember the first time a mentor told me that. I was crushed. I was so focused on getting it working and done that I hadn't taken the time to build quality into it. Shoot, I didn't even know what that was or where to start. Thirty
Is Your Course or Program an Infomercial or Your Proven Expertise?
My inbox is filled with newsletters, tweets, and social shares about how someone is going to teach or help me do something better. They have some course, program, workshop, or service they are selling. They're promising to teach or show me something
Be a Humble, Gracious Servant to Build A More Meaningful Company
I believe in humility and gratitude. So often in life, we forget to just stop and be grateful. In business, we are on this continuous quest to obtain more. It's a compelling merry-go-round that leads us round and round. But there is a better
Secrets of a Manager – Empower & Unleash Your Teams
You are a manager. Your job is to implement the company strategy and directives. You're given a group. It might be a team, departments, or divisions. How you do your job determines how well you achieve the goals given to you. Let's talk about your
Daring You to Migrate from Reactive to Proactive
I have a confession. I despise reactive, firefighting processes and cultures. I do. The costs of this approach are too high. It impacts every part of your business from your internal team, quality, processes, product, and clients. I'm daring you to
How to Better Serve the WordPress Community and You
Over the past couple of years, I focused on teaching and helping individual professional developers who want to master and continually level up. But it occurs to me that not everyone is or can be a professional developer. That revelation opened my
Why You’re Struggling to Make Money in WordPress
You're struggling to make a sustainable, full-time income in the WordPress market. Why? Why is it so difficult to advance and grow your business? Let's rethink how you are doing your business. I'm going to burst your bubble. Ready? It doesn't
How to Split WordPress Back-end for Owners/Users and Developers
We have two separate needs and experiences for the WordPress back-end. Site owners and users need a different suite of tools and interfaces from what we developers/implementers need. Let's talk about splitting the back-end interfaces to serve both
The Flawed Strategy of Assigning Site Owners as Editors
Many times developers will assign the site owner as an editor to hide away all of the extra screens and menus that they've added into the back-end. But we are doing the site owner a disservice when s/he is not given full access to her/his website.
Developers, We’ve Made the WordPress Back-end Complex and Disconnected
There's an alarming trend in the WordPress back-end: we developers are polluting the back-end and building disconnected, complex solutions for the site owners. I understand the path that lead us to this state. But now it's time to stop and think
My WordPress and PHP Coding Philosophies
So you've watched some of the tutorials in the Know the Code, watched my presentations, read some blog posts, and read my tweets. You may notice a trend of how I approach WordPress and PHP coding. Let's talk about it for a moment. First of all,
How to Cope. Don’t Feed the Monsters
When I was a child, I had child-like fears of monsters in the closet and under my bed. I thought if I laid in the middle of my bed, exactly the middle, wrapped my blankets tightly around the edges of me, and kept still, then these monsters couldn't
How to Live Your Life – Lesson from a Dying Man
In your darkest hour, when life is unbearable and the odds are against you, you have a choice to make. You can choose to be consumed by the gravitational force of your challenge, as it pulls you further into its negativity. Or you can choose to let