Last week, Lisa did ManageWP’s Ask Me Anything. There were some fantastic questions about WordPress (and some thorough razzing over football). While we were super excited about this before it happened, we had no idea we’d see such thoughtful questions!
In case you missed it, here’s a snippet:
RYAN: Given that you’ve worked in web design/development since 2003, what 3 things do you know now, that you wish you knew when you got started?
LISA: 3 things I wished I knew in 2003 when I first got started….
I was pretty green to web development back then, with only about 3 years of some serious tinkering with CSS and HTML markup prior to the release of WordPress. It took me a long time to really understand WordPress core, primarily because I didn’t have a good base knowledge of PHP. I think I could have achieved more things in my development work and emerging career back then if I had a better fundamental understanding of PHP and the logic behind it. CSS & HTML came pretty easy to me, and even the hierarchy of WP themes and the template tags were pretty easy to understand – but I was stymied for a good amount of time in any real custom features until I had a better understanding of how it all worked.
Second, I wish I had been more prepared for running my own business. These days, everywhere I look on the web there are resources, training and advice for new entrepreneurs in internet tech, particularly in the WP community. But back then, I either was not looking in the right places or it just didn’t exist – so I made it up as I went along and learned some of the hard lessons not through the benefit of someone else’s experience, but because I went through each challenging step of it myself. It was exciting and actually quite fun, looking back – but I think I could have progressed quicker with the help of some of the fantastic resources I’m seeing out there today.
Third, I wish someone would have told me how difficult it was to write a book about technology! I really do enjoy it, a lot – and over the years have learned so much – but it’s quite a challenge to write a book about software that is constantly changing and evolving. Most often, the software is changing as I am writing. If someone had sat me down back then and said “Lisa, this is going to be really challenging” – it wouldn’t have changed my mind about doing it, I just would have, maybe, felt better prepared for the road ahead of me, which might have softened some of the frustrations and stress I experienced about it early on.
If you want to read more excellent questions for Lisa, as well as her responses, you can check out the thread here. Cheers!