A WordPress Journey

Year 1994

“What do you want to become?”, asked a teacher.

“A Software Engineer!”, replied a boy

Teacher: “Why?”

Boy: “My Mom wants me to become an engineer!”

Flash forward …

Year 2010

A postgraduate from NYU in Computer Science got placed in Time Inc. as a Front End Developer! He calls his mom and says “I am a Software Engineer!”

I wasn’t satisfied when I called my mom back on October 10, 2010 when I got my first job because I knew that I was born to do business, it runs in my genes! While growing up, I followed the herd like millions of other Indians, got good ranks in school, got enrolled into an Engineering school, completed my post graduation and started working as an Engineer. But, somewhere in my heart, I always knew that this is not what I want to do. I wanted to run a successful business just like my father and brother. The idea was illusive as I was still looking out to the domain I wanted to excel.

Nothing fancy!

I don’t have an emotional story, neither am I a hero. I was a kid next door with dreams who grew up like most of us does. I did all right; at least I used to think, as far as career options go. I was working with ABC News, living in New York for 6 years post my Master’s in Computer Science from NYU.

Ideas are loading…

It was in mid 2013, I started contemplating the facts of life and started thinking the direction my life is heading in. There was lot of things to consider:

  • Is my work life satiating?
  • Where do I want to stay? U.S.? Should I consider moving back to India?
  • What will I do in India, if I want to relocate for good?
  • A job in India? Or business??
  • What about my family?

“If you think of a thing and work hard enough at it, I guess it’s pretty nearly bound to happen, wind and weather permitting.” –Laura Ingalls Wilder

Coincidentally, it was at the same time I was introduced to WordPress when I decided to take the most important decision of my life: To relocate to India for good.

Work in WordPress

I always liked building websites! Starting my career as a Front End Developer, I felt proud when I used to see the analytics report of the websites I did. It felt very nice when millions of viewers were browsing through the websites you have built. When I started as a WordPress Engineer in May 2014, I was on the other side of the wall. My major duties involved working the customization of a CMS, which our team is later going to use. I had to put on “business hat” to understand what different teams in the company want:

  • Editorial team is looking for an easy & simple experience with the new CMS.
  • Marketing team is looking for different ventures with third parties. They want the CMS to be scalable to achieve this feat.
  • Business team wants to lower the cost and invest smartly.
  • Tech team has two fronts:
    • Platform team (including myself) wants to build robust and efficient CMS
    • Front End team wants to use the APIs easily accessible to them.

I was lucky to share the dressing room with the finest people in the business of WordPress. For the next 8-9 months before moving to India, we worked extensively building an experience satisfying all of the above needs. My findings were astonishing! WordPress is everything what a company wants:

  • It’s FREE!
  • Easy & Simple to understand
  • Robust and scalable
  • Wide support of community and many more

Dream come true!

So there it was… I had relocated to India! Now what? Do I look for a job? Or business? Earlier, I had fewer clues to answer this question. But, today, I had a reason to believe that I knew what it takes to run a successful business: My work in WordPress! I love what I do and now, I know one of the best ways to do it as well. After a healthy discussion with my family, I decided to start my own company, Hirazi Webtech! My mission was to keep it simple and be as transparent as I can be, with the goal to provide WordPress Development to my client.

The Journey – Part 1 (in India, early 2015)

Bitter truth: Embarking on the journey you have been striving for for years isn’t easy.

Yes, I had the experience as a developer. Yes, I had experience managing projects as well. But, this was a different ball game altogether. From the legal aspects of establishing an entity to setting up your first resource to getting your first client to your first deliverable to setting the architecture for payroll to successfully spread the word to many more. There was a lot to take!

“Start by doing what’s necessary; then do what’s possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.” – Francis of Assisi

I started with the basic asking myself “who am I?”, the answer helped me lay the foundation of the company: “A WordPress Developer!”, said a voice in my heart. It was time to unleash the power of the WordPress community. I had access to this wonderful Open Source Community running regular meetups, having discussions on various groups (Facebook, LinkedIn etc.) and of course, I was in touch with my team in the U.S. All this combined together helped me get my first client: Fusion.

The Journey – Part 2 (ongoing)

If it weren’t for WordPress, I would have been sitting in the ESPN office in Bangalore where I was selected as a Sr. UI Engineer back in September 2014. But, I decided to pursue what I always wanted to as a kid and dived in this wonderful community. There is no secret to success but one thing always helps:being honest.At the end of the day, we deal with people who think alike, act alike and work alike. As a fitness freak, a Zumba trainer once told me “If you dance to lose weight, you may not. But, if you dance for fun, you will end up losing weight”

Along with keeping things simple at Hirazi Webtech, we encourage our team to have fun and enjoy the coding experience, sharing the experiences at the same time. We have launched our Learning & Experience section for the same and invite developers from around the globe to share their coding experience with the community. It is my constant desire to take the overall “WordPress Experience” in India to next level after attending various meetups and WordCamps in the U.S., along with working with the team of experts when I started my career in WordPress.

Someone once told me “People are always eager to enter the temple. ‘When are we getting out of here?’, is the first thing they think after entering.” I still remember that thought and always follow to adhere to the principles of patience.

As we say at Hirazi Webtech, “We love doing WordPress development and have the good fortune of doing it for our living!”

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.