Kingpin: Interview With Tom Willmot
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Q1: What's your background, & what was the first time you became involved with WordPress?
Like a lot of folks within our field I started my journey into designing websites as a pastime at quite a young age. Building websites in Microsoft FrontPage and then Macromedia Dreamweaver as well as ColdFusion. I was educated in sports and outdoor education in college, and then entered the field right from the beginning. Web design was something I was able to do in the evenings and during weekends just for fun. It was part of my job my web design, I created websites for my friends and family and then at around 18 landed my first job that was paid cutting some PSDs into static HTML site. The website was not table-based! I loved the feeling and decided to give it a go. attempt at freelance. At this point, I was playing around with WordPress (early the year 2005) I was using it to create my personal blog, etc. I made the decision to register myself as a WordPress developer, which proved to be a smart choice. I was quickly hired and was able to work on some of the early large-scale WordPress installations, such as http://geek.com. I continued to directly contract with clients until I got too busy to set up an agency was the only next step. In 2010, I formed the company Human Made with Joe and soon after Noel joined the company as a third partner.
Q2: What do readers need to be aware of regarding Human Made, & what kind of clients make a good fit?
In the present, HM is a 40 person WordPress business. We're primarily focused on enterprise-level agency work, where we've earned a reputation for being one of the top companies in the world. We're well-suited for clients creating large-scale or other complex WordPress targeted projects. Most often, they require a team of project managers and developers who work for months at period of. Our typical clients spend an average of 6-7 figures a year with us.
Human Made really sees Human Made as being focused on two things. The first, being great at WordPress. And the second being an amazing place to work. Our culture of remote-first and our diverse and positive team members are an integral factor in our thinking about the success of the business. We're looking to expand there too, initially by sharing our experience and by building products that help those who work from home. Nomadbase, a product currently in active development, is created to assist those who work from home and digital nomads connect with their way to connect with one another as they travel around, after all, being with Humans in real life is extremely important!
Q3: What were the biggest challenges you have to overcome in establishing the agency?
There's been many difficulties along the way, with undoubtedly many more to follow. There are a few that stand out, and are, I think, the key to the successes we've seen thus far. First, people. At its core, a company like ours is composed of the employees who we are able to recruit and keep. Therefore, the question becomes what do we do to hire the best candidates we're capable of as well as how to keep them over the long-term.
The process of creating a company where great employees want to be part of is a challenge and continues to be an ongoing challenge. Identifying this challenge early on was the reason we've had a laser focus on the health of our team, from hiring to the culture of our team. Just recently we've been working with a PHD student undertaking research into the causes of stress that are unique to remote work environments, research we're learning an enormous amount from and hope to share with the wider community in the near future.
Growing in and of itself is an issue in any business which is self-sustaining. The key to your health is balancing growth vs cash flow. Don't save money in a conservative way and you'll be stagnant, possibly missing the opportunity or being defeated by a than risk-averse rival. If you grow too fast, your business will be spending money prior to you've even got it (there's can be a large time lag before employees are ramped up working on project bills that are making cash flow). We intend for Human Made to be around for the long-term, so we're certainly not aiming for an explosion in growth. Instead, we think about growth strategically, always asking whether growing faster makes us more powerful.
Q4: Was there anything that surprised you during the process of growing it?
I'm still amazed at the amount of change that has occurred even though it's an extremely short period of time. In fact, it was just five years ago that there was just Joe, Matt and I working in a tiny room, excited to be a winner of an idea that we'd probably think was too small to be us, writing code we'd surely all find ourselves embarrassed at now.
Most of the time, however, surprise events can be a negative factor when you are growing your business. The kick in the guts whenever an employee informs you that they want to leave or when a customer goes into bankruptcy out of the blue (both have occurred for me). The good things are rarely an unexpected event, as they are constantly in your view, whilst you do the hard work necessary to make contact with them.
Q5: What will the future look like to the agency?
We find our clients are often separated between hosting themselves or hosting with an affordable managed hosting service for enterprises. We're now at a point that the managed hosting market performs pretty well technical. Hosting a high-traffic WordPress site whilst making sure it's secure and efficient is usually a problem solved. With enterprise, a solid technical ability is just one aspect of the equation however, it is not always the main component. Typically a much greater level of significance is given to account management and support, hosts who have achieved that and can deal confidently with enterprise customers using their own (unique) native language will be able to perform exceptionally well.
Q7: What activities do you enjoy doing when you're away from your computer?
I'm an avid climber and strive to climb the bouldering wall in my area as much as I can. Yoga classes are great for contemplation and relaxing. Additionally, I love to cook, and I am a big enthusiast of various companies that offer recipe boxes (we make use of abelandcole.co.uk).
Question 8: Who do we interview next and why?
I've always admired Ilona Filipi who was the founder of UK WordPress Agency Moove we started our respective agencies around the same date and have followed various paths since.
Brian Jackson
Brian has a great love for WordPress is a frequent user of the platform for more than 10 years and has developed a few premium WordPress plugins. Brian is a fan of movies, blogging, and hiking. Join Brian via Twitter.