{"id":4651,"date":"2017-01-23T14:16:09","date_gmt":"2017-01-23T12:16:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/themeisle.com\/blog\/?p=4651"},"modified":"2022-03-30T22:45:29","modified_gmt":"2022-03-30T19:45:29","slug":"jean-galea-interview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/themeisle.com\/blog\/jean-galea-interview\/","title":{"rendered":"Jean Galea Interview – the Founder of WP Mayor"},"content":{"rendered":"

Let me just assure you that the Pirate Interviews<\/a> series is going to continue into 2017 with many more\u00a0great WordPress people on board. I’m not going to spoil the surprise, but if you’d like us to invite someone in particular, please mention\u00a0him\/her in the comments.<\/em><\/p>\n

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\"Jean<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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Okay, about today’s interview … the next person to step up is certainly a man with many ideas and many projects under his belt. Jean Galea<\/a>\u00a0is what you would call an influencer<\/em> in the WordPress space. Over the years, he has earned his spot in the limelight by being the man behind a number of interesting projects. <\/p>\n

With WP Mayor<\/a> being around since 2010, WP RSS Aggregator<\/a> used by 40,000+ people now, and his latest MastermindFM<\/a> podcast being nearly two years old there’s surely a lot to talk about. <\/p>\n

Plus, apart from what you’d call work, Jean is also living many people’s digital nomadic\u00a0dream, being a WordPress\u00a0entrepreneur and traveling the world at the same time.<\/p>\n

Here’s our Jean Galea interview:<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Jean Galea interview<\/h2>\n

In short, what is your history with WordPress?<\/h4>\n
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Jean Galea:<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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I stumbled on WordPress during my studies at university. I worked as a freelance web developer on the side to help finance my education. After a brief stint with Joomla I switched to WordPress, attracted by its promise of an easy installation and straightforward theme customizations. Soon after graduating, I teamed up with a friend of mine to form a WordPress agency in Malta. I ran that successfully for a few years before moving on to blogging and product development.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

What are the benefits and challenges of remote work?<\/h4>\n
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Jean Galea:<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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Working remotely was my dream even when I was younger and didn’t have my own business yet. I dreamt of a future where we could work from a location of our choosing where we can be most productive. <\/p>\n

Honestly, I had a few short stints working in offices while on summer break when I was a student, and I hated the office politics and time wasted due to constant interruptions. I am also very much into tech and love being able to make my own choices with regards to my desk, chair and other hardware and software. This is usually not possible in an office environment. Another big downside was the lost time in commuting and being stuck in traffic jams.<\/p>\n

With that in mind, you will understand that I’m all for remote work and find myself very comfortable in such a setup. It is a bit tougher to recruit people who are able to work remotely, as you need to have a high sense of autonomy and be able to organize your day and motivate yourself. So that’s one of the challenges for sure, although nowadays it is getting easier to find people who already have experience with remote work as it is becoming more and more popular around the world.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the one thing that office-bound teams have that I miss is the camaraderie and cohesion that is built by a united team pursuing a particular goal. It can still be present in a remote team but it’s not as tangible. That’s why yearly retreats can be a great tool for remote teams.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

You and your wife are living and working as digital nomads. What were the biggest drawbacks, if any, of this lifestyle?<\/h4>\n
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Jean Galea:<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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Let’s get the drawbacks out of the way. The biggest challenge is the fact that being constantly on the move makes it exponentially harder to form routines and have a comfortable work space where everything works and you can just walk in and start getting things done.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, a digital nomad lifestyle will reward you with incredible experiences (and challenges) that will remain with you for the rest of your life. The experience of immersing oneself in totally different cultures will give you the chance to appreciate things on a deeper level so that they can become part of your personality.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

What are your favorite development tools and why?<\/h4>\n
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Jean Galea:<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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I use Sublime Text<\/a> for code editing and Mamp Pro<\/a> for setting up a local server environment. These days my development time is very limited but when I do jump into code those are the main tools I use. As a team we also rely a lot on Slack and Atlassian’s JIRA and Confluence to manage our projects and internal communication. You can also read about all the software I use<\/a> over on my blog.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

So far, you’ve had several successful WordPress projects. Do you have certain criteria to determine whether a project might be successful?<\/h4>\n
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Jean Galea:<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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I try to look beyond my own ideas and dreams and ask people in the community whether they would have a need for whatever project I dreamt up. If there is an overwhelming positive response, I’ll go ahead and develop a first prototype. There’s a lot to be said on this topic, though, and there are many ways to make a successful entry with WordPress products. We have a few episodes tackling this very topic on Mastermind.fm, including an interview with Pippin Williamson who is a real master at achieving success over and over again with several products.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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