The Philosophy Behind a Great Community

0:00This episode of the WP Minute is brought to you by Pressable. You know what the best hosting feels like? Nothing. No panic alerts. No mystery downtime. No, hey, is the site down? Slack messages. That's the Pressable Experience WordPress hosting so reliable, you forget it's even there. We keep your site fast, secure, and up 100% of the time. So you can get back to building, selling, blogging, or binging CAD videos. No judgment, whatever you want to do. Go to pressable.com slash WP Minute and try hosting that disappears in all the right ways. Pressable.com slash WP Minute, pressable.com slash WP Minute. Thanks Pressable for supporting the show. Hi everyone and welcome to the WP Minute. I'm Eric Carcabach. This episode features a segment from my interview with Mary Job. Mary stopped by to discuss community leadership and building sustainable practices.

1:04Now you can catch the entire interview over on our WP Minute Plus channel. Visit the WP Minute.com for all the details. I have to admit, I went back and read your Hero Press essay from, I think it was 2017. Yes, it was way back. I loved your story because a lot of us in the WordPress space, we don't start out in technology necessarily. And I see that you studied philosophy in school, which is awesome. So how did you come to WordPress and how do you think your studies may be helped you along the way? Okay, so this is interesting because usually, there's this come on saying back home that when you find people studying philosophy, history, some hard related subjects, it's usually because they were giving them that subject. So like in our part, when you're going to the university, you have to pick like your first and your second chance, right? And growing up, I always wanted this administration, you know, and then I had to ask myself at

2:08the point like, what exactly is business administration? I suck at math. So why am I even trying to do business administration? So I was like, no, so I took the book and I was like, let me see where I fit in, right? And I read all of the subjects there that you could study in an university because it's like an universal book here for Nigeria. And I found philosophy and I was like, oh, wow, this sounds exactly like who I am. This is me. And I remember telling my dad, like, I'm not in this admin again. I'm doing philosophy. And my dad was like, are you sure? He asked me like multiple times. Like, are you sure? I'm like, yeah, I'm very, very sure. I want to study philosophy. So that's how I got into philosophy. Well, that's great. I can relate to that as a father. Are you sure you want to do that one? But I mean, it's something you're obviously you have a passion for it. How has that helped you in community building it? Do you feel like it's giving you a different perspective on it, maybe, than somebody else

3:11might have? Yes. Like I said, just knowing what the cost is for, I could totally connect. I could like, yes, this is so me. So it, for me, it wasn't like I was given across. I chose the cross. And I chose it because it reflects who I am as a person and who I am today. Like, it's literally like the foundation of my life, you know, and everything that I've been doing. So it sort of followed me all the way, even today, and I mean, philosophy is a foundation of all disciplines. So yes, it's, it's followed me all the way and up till today into what I do is, you know, the principles, the, you know, everything about it just flows into being in man, being a part of the community, you know, and stuff like that. Well, I think that's nice because in technology, we tend not to, we tend to dehumanize each

4:14other. Sometimes in technology, I think philosophy might actually be, we probably need more philosophers in tech. I don't know what you think about that. Yeah, yeah. No, no, I agree. Because when you look at the ethical, the ethical, that's actually like we need, and that's what I'm exploring these days. Like we seem to have forgotten that at the bottom of who is service, people, whether you are a business owner or you're a community person or whatever you do, people are the center of it. And we seem to be forgetting that, right? So I think we need a reminder and coming from that past, from that field, it helps me to remind myself, like people are at the bottom of everything you're doing, you're here for people. I mean, what's life without making an impact on people? I don't know what kind of life that would be if you haven't impacted anybody in any small way. It doesn't have to be big. Exactly. Exactly. Even, you know, I mean, there's a lot of pursuit of money and things like that, but really,

5:17if you're not impacting people, then what good is it if you can't make someone's life better? Yeah. There's nothing I want to post you to money, but who's going to pay that money? People. Right? That's a great point. People, not systems, I mean, people, you must have to go and pay that money. Thanks for listening to The WP Minute, part of the Matt Report Media Network. This episode wouldn't be possible without our amazing pillar sponsors, Pressible, Kinsta, GoDaddy, 20i, and Elementor. These brands are supporting WordPress media and helping us invest in your future as a WordPress professional. Our foundation plus sponsors like Hostinger, Big Scoots, Stellar WP, Personalized WP, We Glot, and PatchStack help us keep the lights on. Thanks to all of our members in the WP Minute Slack channel, which you can join to, head on over to TheWPMinute.com slash support to get access. Thanks for listening, and don't forget to hit the share button or tell a friend about this podcast. See you in the next one.