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Helen Hou-Sandí

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On Thursday, June 3 at 3:30pm EDT, I’ll be presenting “Editorial Experience: An Important Part of the Full Stack” at Click/Deploy, an event presented by Jamstack Toronto. If you’re intrigued by talk about Jamstack versus WordPress, this is for you. Then, on June 8 at 3:15 EDT I’m joining GitHub’s Global Maintainer Summit to present “You Can’t Have a Solution Without a Problem”. I’ll be talking about why I like to ask, “What’s the problem being solved for here?” and how that type of thought process can lead to better solutions. Both events are virtual and free to attend.

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This Thursday I’m participating in the CoRise Summit — a free global startup summit to CoLearn, Collaborate, and CoRise with the community. As a panelist in a session on Building Remote Teams and Company Culture (August 27 at 12:30 PM ET), I’m looking forward to sharing some of our insights on building and managing a distributed team.

I’m also happy to be a contributor to Remote Teams Work. It’s a new book out this month that provides strategic and practical guidance on establishing and running a successful remote team, including tools and methodologies, hiring and salaries, and creating a remote culture.

As more and more companies adjust to remote work and the value of distributed teams, hopefully they can benefit from the best practices we’ve seen and experienced.

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Recently, Director of Client Delivery for 10up Europe, Lily Bonney, and I co-hosted a webinar on recruiting, onboarding, and maintaining company culture at a distance with Onezeero, a UK-based tech recruitment partner. As organizations increasingly recognize the benefits of working from home, many are asking, “How do we still maintain our ‘essence’ at a distance?” From transparency during hiring to clear systems, processes, and company values, we’ve learned how to attract, onboard, and grow remote talent. Lily and I shared how 10up fosters meaningful connections and cultivates a vibrant team culture.

Helen Hou-Sandí

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!!Con 2020 (pronounced “bang bang con”) features two days of ten-minute talks celebrating the joyous, exciting, and surprising moments in computing. This pay-what-you-want conference is happening online May 9-10, 2020 and I am excited to share that I will be speaking at 1:00 pm EST on Sunday, May 10.

My talk, Sparking Musical Joy at Home With Magnetic Stripe Swipe Cards and Tiny Code, shares how I, a programmer and not a human jukebox, used a Raspberry Pi, magnetic stripe swipe cards, stickers, and a tiny Bash script to help my children enjoy curated music on their own terms.

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In response to COVID-19, many people are working from home for the first time. Recently, I shared insights from my experience working at home and leading a remote agency with one of our clients, T-Mobile. My tips are featured alongside some other perspectives in their story, Pants or No Pants? That Is the Question! For the record, I am team “yes, pants.”

Jeffrey Paul.

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WordPress 5.4 was released this week, featuring new and better blocks, a cleaner block editor UI, improved user data privacy features, and a handful of under the hood performance and developer improvements. Seven 10uppers helped make this release possible, including myself, who was recognized as a Noteworthy Contributor.

Thank you for helping make WordPress: Ben Greeley, Fabian Kaegy, Felipe Elia, John Watkins, Ryan Welcher, and Tung Du!

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Today WordPress powers 35% of the web, yet there are still many myths and misconceptions about using the WordPress as an enterprise-level content management system.

10up is one of four enterprise agency partners featured in the new ebook, Faster, Smarter, Safer WordPress for Enterprise, by Pantheon, a WebOps platform for open-source Drupal and WordPress websites. The ebook shares valuable insights on how enterprises can best leverage WordPress and work with an agency partner. It also addresses common myths and misconceptions about the capability, security, and scalability of WordPress as a platform.

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From New York City, to rural South Africa, to a dozen countries across Europe, our distributed workforce model empowers us to bring in the best strategists, designers, and engineers, wherever they may live—because the best talent isn’t found in a single zip code.

Recently, I had the opportunity to discuss our forward-looking remote work culture with Toggl.

My interview is featured in their new ebook How Remote-Friendly Organizations Can Embrace a Client Roster That’s Not Limited by Office Location, along with insights from other remote work cultures, including Buffer, Gitlab, and Doist. The ebook provides a blueprint for building a successful business while working remotely, including establishing customer expectations, choosing the right tools, and navigating cultural differences.

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WordPress 5.3 was released yesterday, featuring block editor refinements that deliver more intuitive interactions and improved accessibility, new editor features that give designers more control over visual design, and the block-based Twenty Twenty WordPress theme. Several 10uppers contributed to this release during its development cycle, including Jeffrey Paul and Adam Silverstein, who are recognized as Noteworthy Contributors.

Thank you for helping make WordPress:
Ashar Irfan, Christian Chung, Helen Hou-Sandi, Mario Aguiar (emeritus), and Ryan Welcher.