John Ford
We’re very lucky to have another international speaker on our fabulous lineup for WordCamp Gold Coast 2011! John Ford can’t get enough of Australia so he’s back again from North Carolina, USA (via Budapest). John works for Automattic on VaultPress which is an invaluable WordPress plugin that provides real-time backups and security scanning of your WordPress site.
Automattic are a distributed company with employees all around the world. Running a distributed company is a rather unusual concept for anyone who isn’t running a business that revolves around technology and the internet. Automattic explain the way they work briefly on their website:
Everyone works from their own home or office, and we’re spread out all over the world — California, Texas, New York, Canada, Ireland, Japan, Bulgaria, Australia, and more. We track about 70% of our projects on P2-themed WordPress.com blogs, 25% on private IRC channels, and the rest on Skype or AIM. Because of the geographic variance, we’re active pretty much 24/7. You’ll set your own hours — what’s important is what gets done, not when or where it got done.
John will be giving us an insiders look into ‘How Things Work At Automattic’ and he’s summed up his talk as follows:
There are a number of benefits and challenges in a distributed work environment. At Automattic, the company behind WordPress.com, nearly 100 employees interact on a daily basis while living all around the world. The heart of the operation is fueled by constant communication and open source tools that help build awesome products. We’ll look at how the Automatticians work on a day-to-day basis, the tools they use, and ways to collaborate on projects when you’re not in the same location as your colleagues.
I know this is a session that I can’t wait to participate in as I’m a director in a WordPress based web design firm and I’ve always wondered how challenging it would be to manage a team of developers in remote locations.
You can follow John on Twitter. You should also follow WordCamp Gold Coast on Twitter.
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