My Journey 5 Years in with Codeable

5 years ago on a Monday, I woke up in my studio apartment in Mission Beach, San Diego and while still laying in bed I checked my email on my phone only to find something I was not expecting…

It was an email that immediately got my attention as an adventurous person, I was ready for this journey to come. The email had come in on a Saturday so when I saw it on Monday I shot up out of bed and scurried over to my laptop researching everything I could about Codeable. I guess about a month earlier, I had applied to be one of their WordPress experts, not really thinking much of it or knowing where it would lead me.

Fast forward a little more than a year and I had moved from San Diego where I stayed after college for a 3 years back “home” to the Pacific Northwest to be in the mountains once again for winter. At this point, I had completed 108 projects on Codeable with no issues, no refunds, and all glowing 5-star ratings, as such was the case for all of my fellow Codeable experts.

I had become a part of the incredible Codeable expert community and I finally felt as though I was surrounded by peers who I knew all worked hard to deliver projects for clients at the same quality as me or better – and the all-around support was amazing in every sense.

At this time I was living in downtown Bellingham in Washington State, and I remember being humbled for the second time when an Intercom live chat popped up, with an offer from Codeable’s head of support David asking if I would be interested in joining him in-house to work on the customer support team. I was the third expert to be hired in-house on the support team proceeded by fellow experts Liam Bailey, and Christopher Churchill, two of which I respected back then very much, and still do of course.

The timing could not have been better as I was reaching the end of a long stint of providing high-quality client services and I was honestly ready to hang up my freelancer belt. I always enjoyed my freelance work, but something in me knew I needed to dedicate myself to helping others like me to be successful and I knew I could do that by helping Codeable in-house.

I worked on Codeable’s support team for about a year and a half, closing over 7,000 tickets from both clients and experts. I personally helped with vetting probably over 100 experts, was involved with revamping the expert vetting process, created the “blackbook” and took on numerous other side projects to develop different aspects of Codeable as a business apart from slaying tickets. Codeable also flew me to Paris, France for WordCamp Europe 2017, which was my first but not last time to Europe.

My problem with working customer support was similar to my problem with being a freelancer, I could only ever help a few people at a time so I was limited in my capacity to really make a larger impact on bringing Codeable to the people. When an opportunity arose to lead Codeable’s Marketing, I pounced on it and ran with that for about 6 months. I was fortunate again to be flown to Ljubljana, Slovenia, somewhere beautiful I’d never thought I’d visit, and participated in a management planning meeting. While in Slovenia, Codeable’s Co-Founder Tomaž took me to the Postojna Caves, we ate horse meat burgers, and we stayed and worked at the amazing Intercontinental Hotel in the middle of the city, which was unbelievably awesome.

My limited time in marketing was more of a marathon than a sprint, and as an easily distracted person, I saw Codeable partners as a very shiny object that I knew could be a huge opportunity to grow Codeable. After all, Codeable was built on partnerships with our very first partner being WooThemes back before WooCommerce & Automattic came along – and they remain valuable Codeable partners to this day. Partnerships created a one-to-many opportunity, where I could help establish one partnership that could result in helping thousands of people be more successful with WordPress & our partner’s services or products together.

Growing Codeable through partnerships has been more rewarding for me than I could have even guessed. With a we give, you give, we grow together mindset I saw immediate success in establishing new relationships with quality partners who have been looking for a quality solution like Codeable to send their out-of-scope request to a trusted provider for a long time. I remember shortly after seeing some success with partnerships, at a WordCamp our co-founder Tomaž told me, “Go get 10 new partnerships.” as we walked in the conference door, I told him no problem and you can bet your ass I knocked that goal out of the park, and haven’t stopped since. The most rewarding part, isn’t money or anything like that at all, but rather the sincere recognition and appreciation I receive almost daily from the entire community of experts like me on Codeable, and the internal staff cheering me on with constant predatory animal nicknames. It feels really good to get recognition for helping your peers, and that’s where I get my drive, is hearing about putting better meals on the table, enable better vacation for families… through a place where you can truly whistle while you work. Helping people like me.

After working Partnerships at Codeable for a couple years the start of 2020 began with a new hire, some real help to allow me to mature and scale the Partnership Department, which was very needed as I’d about maxed out my operational capacity with hundreds of partners at Codeable spanning across all the top names in the WordPress space… The only reason I was able to manage up till this point, is because we have true partnerships where everyone wins, and there just are not really any issues for me to deal with, everything is going well. Adding to the team and getting more support from the greater Codeable Organization will propel my success looking ahead into 2020 and beyond.

Personally

That brings us up to the current day more or less but I want to dig into a few more personal things that have happened along the way I think are important. And that’s how Codeable has supported my lifestyle through thick and thin. Over 5 years, anyone will go through struggles whether that’s physical, mental or just hard times in the World. I could not be more thankful to have Codeable as such a solid rock in my life, and all the people it touches to support me when I need it.

Codeable has supported me while living out of a station wagon almost full-time for 2 years. Codeable has helped me buy, design, and build a brand new sprinter style van I’ve lived in for over 2 years almost full-time as well. They even bought me the Pendleton blanket on the van bed keeping me warm in the winter as a gift, and the headlamp I bring on all my adventures. Codeable has supported me through 3 broken arms, a broken rib, and a herniated disc in my lower back, all separate incidents I’ve recovered well from. Codeable gifted me my first smart watch which helps me keep track of my health and has been a huge help. Codeable has given me moral support during tough times where I’ve struggled mentally with personal growth. Codeable is there for me if I ever needed anything, there is so much trust it’s hard to believe. As I write this, I’m told to treat myself to some new fishing gear by our amazing CEO as a thank you for 5 years, but little does he know, he’s already outfitted me with the nicest fishing gear I already have :) let’s not get into my snowboard collection… I’ve learned so much from working with Codeable, about myself, and about life, but not so much about WordPress, for that, I already knew haha ;p

This ushers in the next phase of growth for me and Codeable. No, I don’t have a kid on the way, and I’ll probably remain single as long as I drive a windowless van and remain homeless otherwise haha… rather much the opposite. And I am saving for a property to make that move at the right time. I’ve matured a lot in 5 years and developed the frontal lobe of my brain to where I can hear the voices in my head call me out when I do something dangerous now… those voices remained silent most my life :) Behold… I’ve now got a monkey in the van!

A proud owner of a 2020 Honda Monkey z125 motorcycle, as my new run around. I’ll be taking a motorcycle safety course and getting my endorsement this summer, not to mention some quality protective gear – Thanks to Codeable.

All that said, I hope you can see I’m happy. More than happy, I’m fortunate, and I’m as driven as ever to keep progressing in my life and bringing Codeable to the people. I owe huge thanks to way too many people that I can’t even begin to name you all. So if you’ve ever played any role in helping Codeable or being helped by Codeable – I owe, and just know how sincerely grateful I am for sharing this vision of bringing quality back to an industry previously riddled by a bad reputation.

If you need to reach me, feel free, I’ll be working from my computer from anywhere – Realizing a professional dream I had at around age 12. Now might be time to set some new goals? Any ideas for me? :)