State of the motivation
In this episode, Kathy and Michelle discuss some amazing things happening in the WordPress community, and the upcoming State of the Word event.
Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:02 Happy Friday, Kathy.
Speaker 1 00:00:05 Woo. We made it to another week.
Speaker 0 00:00:07 We did. Uh, some days I, you know, some days every day is, is fun, even if it’s got its challenges. And some weeks I hit the end and I’m like, thank God it’s Friday. And today is just, this week is one of those weeks and you know, a total T G I F moment. Maybe it’s because it was a shorter week last week with the holiday, so like the week back just feels like drudgery. Um, and you know, maybe it’s just the weather changing or maybe it’s just things I’m dealing with, um, you know, personally or whatever. But I am, I’ve never been so grateful for a Friday. I am today .
Speaker 1 00:00:44 I am super grateful for it to be Friday last week. Well, with Black Friday going on last week, it was mm-hmm. , it was just phatic, you know, cuz I’m running sales for two different brands so that there was a lot of activity, um, positive, but still a lot of activity. Um, and then Thanksgiving I was like, not so sure I wanted to Thanksgiving and my daughter, you know, I think I mentioned last week, she just kind of Christmas music to me into , into happiness. And then this week I was gonna take like Thursday and Friday off, but there’s just so much stuff going on. I was just like, you know, I’m just gonna work at, but I, I, you know, stopped work at like two yesterday and probably take it off a little easy today because it’s just, I need some decompression time because I’m having dreams about work and that’s kinda scary.
Speaker 0 00:01:34 Oh, that’s not good.
Speaker 1 00:01:35 Like, they’re hilarious dreams.
Speaker 0 00:01:38 I bet , like one
Speaker 1 00:01:40 Of our people is like seven feet tall and I’m just like, what
Speaker 0 00:01:45 ?
Speaker 1 00:01:46 Oh my gosh. And I’m like, how tall are you? Cause I’ve never met this guy in real life. And I’m like, how tall are you? He’s like, six foot. And I’m like, oh, okay. Well you, you’re my, my dreams. You’re seven
Speaker 0 00:01:54 . It’s just like,
Speaker 1 00:01:56 I’m like, I, I think I just need a little bit of a break when like my unconscious is like mapping out all of these things. So that
Speaker 0 00:02:02 Is so funny. I mean, not funny, but it’s funny. Oh my goodness. Well we are less than two weeks away from state of the word.
Speaker 1 00:02:14 We are. Are you going?
Speaker 0 00:02:16 I am. I did. I got an invitation a few weeks back. Um, super excited. I mean, I’m, I I’m very seldom like, feel like a celebrity, right? Like I’m just me. And even though people like play and up like, ooh, you’re more per celebrity. I don’t feel like that. But when you get invited to state of the word and you don’t have to like throw your name into the lottery for state of the word. Yeah. It’s at that plate that you feel like maybe a little celebrity
Speaker 1 00:02:50 Are the busiest. You are the busiest woman in WordPress. It would be, it would be awful for them to not have you there. So I think yeah, you are. But yeah, nobody even, I’ve met celebrities. I’ve, my husband used to work with celebrities. Like I’d be on, like walk into the room and hear voices and I’m like, is that, and he’d be like, yeah, whatever. And I’d meet these people and they were like way different than their public personas.
Speaker 0 00:03:17 Oh yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1 00:03:19 Like way different, like is crazy different. Um, but you are not only a WordPress celebrity, you are an authentic, like what you see is what you get kind of person. You just are very real. So that’s refreshing. Well, you
Speaker 0 00:03:34 Don’t, you so, so my upstairs neighbor is coming with me, right? Cause as I’m, I have a disability and planes give me anxiety cause I’m a a plus size person and if I don’t have a spare seat next to me or I’m sitting next to somebody that I can put the arm rest up and if my butt spills over a little bit, it doesn’t matter kind of thing. And, and I feel like I’m always infringing at other people’s space and so that it causes a huge anxiety. So I said to her, I’m like, Hey, I’m going to New York City. I’m flying in on the 14th, flying home the night of the 15th. Cause it’s actually in the afternoon this year instead of in the evening, which is nice. Do you wanna go with me? And she’s like, absolutely. So we’ve got plane seats next to each other and um, I got a room with two beds. I said, the , I go, the only thing is you have to room with me. And I fart and I snore on my sleeve . I go, I don’t really know if I, I know I snore cuz I’ve been, I assume the other, cuz I think most people do. But she’s like, no problem. So yeah, so Julia’s going with me. And so we signed her up, we threw her into the lottery and um, she actually got an invitation too. So she’s a brand new WordPress user. I’m teaching her WordPress, um, awesome. She wants to start her own business and so she gets to go to state of the word also. So I’m really excited about that.
Speaker 1 00:04:55 That’s great. That sounds like just a fun trip. That’s gonna
Speaker 0 00:04:58 Be good time. Yeah, we fly out first thing like literally a 6:00 AM flight out of Rochester into New York City and then we can’t even check into the hotel until like three, right. Um, so we’re gonna do a little sight sit sighting around the city and then, um, meet up with other word pressors for dinner that night. And then the next day kind of have a leisurely morning check out of the hotel and um, go to state of the word, have dinner somewhere. And then, um, we have a 10:00 PM flight out of New York. So I’m back into Rochester around midnight, so not too bad.
Speaker 1 00:05:33 Excellent. That sounds great.
Speaker 0 00:05:34 Yeah. We’re gonna pack a lot in for sure.
Speaker 1 00:05:36 Yeah. Cool. What kind of sight eating are you going to do?
Speaker 0 00:05:39 Um, we both wanna see the giant tree at Rockefeller Center, so that’s at least one thing we know that we’re gonna do. I don’t know what else we’re gonna do. We haven’t really planned that bar head. I actually texted her with figuring out what she’d like to do. Cause my biggest thing is I just wanna see people from WordPress. So if there’s things that she wants to do around that, there’s a restaurant she wants to, to go to or if there’s something she wants to see, um, to let me know and we will make sure that we get those things done. But super excited.
Speaker 1 00:06:03 That’s so often I’m, I’m so, so jealous I’m not going this year and not, you know.
Speaker 0 00:06:09 Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:06:09 Just this time of year especially is hard. Um, just if I catch something and bring it home, I just, I can’t risk it. Yeah. This, you know, springtime I’ll feel a little bit better because more of us I think will be a little healthier, but this time of year everybody I knows like getting sick, so I’m just like, yeah, I’m just gonna be a hermit for now.
Speaker 0 00:06:27 Exactly. Exactly. Um, we don’t, we’re not usually a news show, but we’re like a motivational show. But there are some things happening also and we’re, I think are kinda motivational. And even though it’s kinda noy, I still wanna kind of mention them if I can. The first is that if you aren’t listening to this and you haven’t taken the annual WordPress survey, do it. Like I actually did it today. I do it every year, but I always forget, like I see it a million places, but I’m like, oh, I haven’t done it myself yet. So I did it today. There’s some great questions in there and it’s all quantified information, so it really does help inform how people are using WordPress, what they’re using it for, and those kinds of things do help inform what should happen going forward with WordPress with the open source project. So if you haven’t done it, do that. I think it’s a great way to be involved. You, there’s so many ways you can be involved in WordPress, but at the very least, study five minutes to complete the survey is a great way to do that. Yeah, yeah, for sure. I
Speaker 1 00:07:20 Always, I always do it. I haven’t done it yet though, so I’m glad for this reminder. Very
Speaker 0 00:07:23 Cool. Yeah, there you go. And um, the other thing is, I’m involved in a new project in Word, you know, surprise, surprise, , but it’s called Certified wp. Mm-hmm. . And it’s a credentialing process. Uh, so looking certified WP came about because of WP Connects. WP Connects is a skill bridge program, um, that works with United States military and separating military and veterans to do WordPress training for people who have been in the military. Maybe they don’t know what their next career stuff is. They’ve been in the military and they don’t know what they wanna do and they think they wanna go into, into WordPress. And so, um, so, uh, WP Connects puts them through Skill Bridge program where they learn WordPress, but in order for them to be hired back by the Department of Defense, they have to have a credential. They have to have a level of certification.
Speaker 0 00:08:18 And so certified WP as a new, it will be a non-profit. It is a non-profit, it’s just not a registered non-profit yet. It’s in the process right now of, of having that all set up, um, to establish baseline credentials or baseline certify, you know, certifiable areas in WordPress, like WordPress use, design development, you know, plugin development support, those kinds of things. And so we have a board now. So you go to certified wp.com, we have a board in place with some pretty heavy hitters in the area. Robbie Ada from US training, um, Gabriel Cohen from pmc, um, pmc, I cannot remember. Pmc, um, who else is on the board? LIC started it. Uh, we also have, and I’m just like brain dead right now and who’s on the board right there. So forgive me if you’re listening and I don’t didn’t name you cause I’m just, um, um, just isn’t she? Yep. Courtney Robinson. Thank you. And Jess. Yep. So some, you know, some well known people who are very committed to, um, to the WordPress.
Speaker 1 00:09:22 Lot of women too. I noticed that, that it’s
Speaker 0 00:09:24 Like lots of women,
Speaker 1 00:09:25 Women doing good in
Speaker 0 00:09:27 The world. Not a single white man. I just have to say not a single white man on that board. Um, you wanna be our, if you wanna be our token white dude, let me know , but it’s all women and people of color on that board and I’m pretty excited about that too. That’s great. But um, but yeah, so the one thing that we’re asking for help with is in order for the Department of Defense to agree that this certification or or credential, um, fits their need. We need at least 50 letters from people within the WordPress community who are working for a company that does hiring to say this would be something that would benefit them in the workplace as well. So go to certified wp, check it out. It’s a pretty cool program. We’re not gonna be asking for, you know, a ton of donations. It isn’t that kind of thing. We just need the, the support of the community behind the idea of hiring people within WordPress. So I
Speaker 1 00:10:21 Love it. I love it so much. Me too. Because there’s so many different people, you know, through my time in WordPress, um, I’ve been involved in a lot of hiring decisions and, you know, you make connections with people and some people don’t make it. And I always just feel for them. Right. And I, I encourage them to keep learning, keep pushing or, you know, I, I’m very honest about like where the, you know, deficits were, I guess mm-hmm. of like why we chose someone else. And I encourage them. And the cool thing is, is that someone that I was encouraging to four years ago and completely forgot about, wrote me on LinkedIn and it’s like, I’m so glad I didn’t get that job. I am now doing this, but mm-hmm. , I probably wouldn’t be doing this if you didn’t encourage me to do that. And so this is something that I can encourage people to do. Like if they are in that hiring process and maybe didn’t I, I, because I wanna, I wanna lift everyone up, you know, not just the people that we’re selecting and saying, okay, this is the person for this job, but people who aren’t, you know, that might be ready for another job or might just need another, another boost somehow. Mm-hmm. . So to be able to offer this kind of thing to someone else is, I’m excited about it. So
Speaker 0 00:11:31 Yeah, me
Speaker 1 00:11:31 Too. You do so much great work for this community. I don’t know.
Speaker 0 00:11:34 Oh, thanks. It’s been fun. And, and, and side note, I built that website last, it took, actually it took, it took me about six hours to build that entire website using Cadence wp. So, um, so yeah, shout out to that and WS forum. I have to give Mark, um, s a shout out too cuz he donated a license. Actually he gave me a developer license, um, that doesn’t expire until work I do in community. He’s, so, he’s like, oh, I saw you use your, yes. Does
Speaker 1 00:12:11 He have like an automation notification of like, okay, Michelle’s doing another
Speaker 0 00:12:15 One. I, I dunno how he knows what he knows. He’s like all knowing when it comes to that stuff, but Yeah. But it’s exciting. Um, I love using things that I’m part of or that I’ve, you know, helped build, um, or, or been a part of the organization whenever. And I can honestly say this is not a commercial for Cadence, but gosh darn if it doesn’t make my life a whole lot easier to use the themes that are built in there. So, um, if there isn’t a theme specifically for what you need, find a theme that looks good and just change it out. Cause that’s what I did .
Speaker 1 00:12:49 It’s, it’s so easy. And you know, the cool thing is that there’s so many people who are like getting wise to what’s going on with Cadence Cloud. There’s all these new design libraries that people are offering. So if it’s not in like the Cadence templates, starter templates, or if it’s not in the cadence wire frames or design libraries, I’m gonna bet there’s someone out there who is building something that you can use. Um, there’s this guy Jake, um, Jake Full who has start blogging blocks and you know how you had that, um, idea for Cadence linked the Link tree replacement? Yes. Mm-hmm. . And I was like, Ooh, I’m writing about this. And I did a link tree for my dog,
Speaker 0 00:13:25 . Yes. I like, oh,
Speaker 1 00:13:29 Such a good idea. And I gonna just have fun with it because, you know, I’m here for the lulls. Uh, Jake saw that and was like, I’m gonna build a whole, he pulled a whole library of them so that if anybody wants, you know, to pick and choose and own, you know, it’s kind of like he’s built his own like little link tree on top of things. Yeah. So I But you inspired all of that. That would’ve never happened if you didn’t start it. So,
Speaker 0 00:13:53 So cool. Well, I was like, I had a link tree and I was like, first of all, I had to remember like, it’s l i n Ktr Doe slash Michelle Rap or whatever. It was like, I, I mean I had it in a, in an autocomplete right? In Atex. But I’m like, if I’m trying to tell somebody how to find it, like I, I’m literally not remembering where to put the.in in all of that. Yeah. And what if Link Tree goes outta business and I suddenly lose it all or they decide they’re gonna start charging me for it or whatever. So I was like, ugh, what could I, I spent an entire Saturday afternoon trying to come up with a URL that would work for that that people could spell. Cause like I have michelle frache.com but I challenge almost anybody in WordPress to spell Fresh .
Speaker 1 00:14:42 Where’s, where’s the asco? Right. I’m always like, no, it’s a C
Speaker 0 00:14:47 But people put an N in it like it’s friend and it’s not, there is no, no Michelle Marie Fresh, there’s no n anywhere. But, um, meet michelle.online was available and I was like that’s perfect cuz you’re meeting me through the online. So, uh, yeah so, and I actually gave it a facelift this week, so that’s why tweeted about it again. Yeah, I got head shots done. I had a whole um, you know, whole photo shoot with different things and so I swapped out photos and I changed the background colors and, and spruce enough took out a button. Added a button. So if you’re interested, take a look at Meet Michelle dotted line. It’s kinda cool.
Speaker 1 00:15:21 Definitely. Yeah. And your headshots are beautiful. I love those.
Speaker 0 00:15:24 Oh, thank you. Thank you. I needed some with purple hair. I was, I’m no longer a redhead. Um, and those ones were like 10 years old so it was time to update the make them look like I actually look, so Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. They were fun. And what most people don’t know is that it was a bou war photographer, so I actually got some B War photos too. Did you? But those are free your eyes only for only certain eyes I should say. So yeah, those ones are not on the website, so if you’re hoping to catch a little something, something on there. No, it’s not gonna be there. too funny. But you may seem my Wonder Woman time does make an appearance. So . Yeah,
Speaker 1 00:16:01 When I, when I used to work in an office, my uh, one guy that I worked with, his wife had them done and he had one frame down his desk and it was always kind like, I I need you
Speaker 0 00:16:10 To just look at this like
Speaker 1 00:16:12 What
Speaker 0 00:16:13 Here for It was like, so she was beautiful and everything. Yeah. It was just like at work really a little too risky. So the kinda thing where you get there before he does and you put some strategically um, placed post-it notes . Yeah,
Speaker 1 00:16:28 Exactly. Exactly. Luckily he was in an office with a closed door. You didn’t really have to go in there too much, but if like you had to, it was like, um,
Speaker 0 00:16:37 I, I’m not shaming anybody cause I have those pictures now too, but there’s a, there’s a place that those belong and there’s a place that probably probably don’t. So .
Speaker 1 00:16:46 Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 0 00:16:47 mine are in a locked file and if I ever do get married, he gets those . Yeah, that’s, I ever have a long term boyfriend again. He may see those. And I showed my mother . Did you? I did. I think her, her response was U la la. Ok mom. That’s my mom. Oh, that’s great. Oh, so every day, every week that we talk, I like while we’re talking because I don’t actually do anything with this podcast until like Sunday night. Um, I try to think of, well what am I gonna write about? Like to sum up, you know, like a two, two sentences to sum up this episode or what am I gonna title it and I’m gonna title this one State of the Motivation. I just thought of that. So
Speaker 1 00:17:32 There you go. I like it.
Speaker 0 00:17:34 Cause it’s a little bit about everything, so Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:17:37 Yeah. All over the place when it’s state of the words. What, on the 15th?
Speaker 0 00:17:41 On the 15th, the Thursday afternoon in New York City. Yep.
Speaker 1 00:17:45 Excellent. Yeah,
Speaker 0 00:17:45 At the Tumblr offices, so
Speaker 1 00:17:48 Oh wow. Oh cool. That’ll be fun.
Speaker 0 00:17:51 Yeah. Yeah, they’re really cool. There’s so much artwork on the walls in there. Beautiful. Nice.
Speaker 1 00:17:56 Did you move over to Tumblr after the whole, like what’s going on with Twitter?
Speaker 0 00:17:59 So I haven’t moved anywhere, but I’ve, I’ve added sites, I’ve added social media cuz I didn’t have enough, I . So not only do I have Twitter and Facebook and all the other things I now have mastered on and Tumblr as well because I thought, well I may as well at least claim my name in those places. So
Speaker 1 00:18:19 I have Tumblr from like 20 years ago, right? Yeah. There’s apic, there’s a, I logged in, I’m like, God, uh, password reset. I don’t even log in. And it’s like one post and then a picture of me with Max, my almost 22 year old as a baby. And I’m just like, oh my gosh, this is so old. Like, do I change it out and update it or do I just keep it as I’m just like, I’m gonna keep it, I’m gonna keep that picture. I look.
Speaker 0 00:18:48 So it’s a time capsule,
Speaker 1 00:18:50 A little kid. Oh my gosh,
Speaker 0 00:18:51 I love it. Yeah, well it turns out I had one too and I didn’t even remember, but my, I went to put my email and it was like, this already exists. So I was like, but I had never posted anything, but I had claimed the name Marketing Diva, which is what I used to have on my business cards when I had my freelancing. And so I was like, well I can’t use that anymore. So I changed the name to Michelle . So you , I’m Michelle Embler, but if you could spell it, you can find me .
Speaker 1 00:19:18 That’s great.
Speaker 0 00:19:20 Or haven’t,
Speaker 1 00:19:21 I haven’t figured out masked it on yet. Like you have to pick a I think I tried to set it up like years ago and I was just like, pick a server, like I wanna talk to everybody. Right. So yeah, I haven’t done that yet, but somebody actually requested like, we wanna talk about Cadence on Mastodon, so can you set up an account? And I’m like, I gotta figure this out now. So , I’ll be on Mastodon pretty soon. It’s just maybe this weekend I’ll poke around at servers and figure out where I and Cadence needs to live. I don’t know, have
Speaker 0 00:19:52 You got some ideas for Yeah, so, um, Nathan Wrigley has a server set up for WP Builds. So he invited me over there and I was like, sure, why not? I’ll join there. So if you’re interested you can go to WP Builds, do social and join his server if you, if you’re interested in that. So.
Speaker 1 00:20:09 Sounds good. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:20:10 Hello. I sent you anyway, so I’m just silly. And apparently I need a glass of wine or something. It’s only one 30. It’s not gonna happen for several hours, but I envision ending my day with a glass of wine
Speaker 1 00:20:26 Ending your week with a glass ending my
Speaker 0 00:20:28 That’s right.
Speaker 1 00:20:29 Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 0 00:20:30 Absolutely. Anyway,
Speaker 1 00:20:33 It has been a week.
Speaker 0 00:20:34 It has been a week. Well my, they used to say that’s all the news that’s fit to print. I’m gonna say that’s all the motivation that’s fit to podcast for today.
Speaker 1 00:20:44 And yeah, we have
Speaker 0 00:20:46 To do a holiday one. I’m gonna do Santa Hat and everything coming up one of these times I used to have a Santa Hat hat that had a, I had a Santa hat that had a little, um, tiara sew onto the front of it, but it got ruined and so it’s gone. But maybe tomorrow when I’m not shopping, I’ll, I’ll find a new Santa hat to wear for. Yeah. Holiday edition . Perfect. Awesome. Have a good week everybody. Stay motivated. Bye. Bye.