Comments on: 10 WordPress Developer Skills You Should Invest In (2020 Edition)

By: Cameron Petar

Cameron Petar — Sun, 21 Feb 2021 16:09:33 +0000

Very nicely explained and all points are valid. I also like to have block related skills. It’s the next WP for sure.

By: Nick Schäferhoff

Nick Schäferhoff — Wed, 03 Jun 2020 10:16:32 +0000

Thanks for the kind words! I would start with the WordPress developer handbook: https://developer.wordpress.org/cli/commands/

By: Solution Suggest

Solution Suggest — Tue, 02 Jun 2020 19:46:03 +0000

A masterpiece article on WordPress development!
Nick, can you add or provide a list of popular WP-CLI commands?
Thank you.

By: Nick Schäferhoff

Nick Schäferhoff — Mon, 01 Jun 2020 14:32:06 +0000

In reply to Amit Biswas. Absolutely. If I were a programmer, I'd also get into blocks.

By: Meshach Owolabi

Meshach Owolabi — Sun, 31 May 2020 07:14:27 +0000

Thank you for this post, it has revealed to me some WordPress dev skills that there is to learn.
We never know it all.

Bravo!

By: Amit Biswas

Amit Biswas — Sat, 30 May 2020 05:05:35 +0000

Very nicely explained and all points are valid. I also like to have block related skills. It’s the next WP for sure.

By: john owen

john owen — Fri, 29 May 2020 01:37:54 +0000

Excellent point! I have for years been trying to instill the idea. ‘we don’t produce bad ideas’.

By: Brent Leavitt

Brent Leavitt — Thu, 28 May 2020 17:04:09 +0000

Walk on water? He, he, he. Of course, the cultivation of civility is a timeless attribute that could always be improved upon.

Nick, thank you for taking the time to articulate your perspective on some of these skills that are valid now in 2020. I particularly like the idea of version control for the content within WordPress itself. That’s a new one for me that I may be looking more into. That would give me the confidence of allowing others to get their hands dirty with my fine-tuned content and layouts.

Because this is new to me, how do these version control plugins compare with WP’s default version control tools? Do they sync content to a Git system? Do they create a true Git environment for content or am I misreading the purpose of this?

By: Nick Schäferhoff

Nick Schäferhoff — Wed, 27 May 2020 15:30:05 +0000

In reply to WPezDeveloper. Walking on water sure would be a nice thing to put on your resume. Of course, I am not suggesting that you need to get proficient in every single skill on this list in order to make it as a developer. Nor do I want to disparage the importance of the soft skills you mention. The focus of the post was simply on technical abilities that will become more important in the current environment. It is meant as inspiration for those who are looking to improve their skill set (as every professional should do) and are not sure what would be a good direction. My apologies if that wasn't clear and thank you very much for your detailed and helpful input!

By: WPezDeveloper

WPezDeveloper — Wed, 27 May 2020 13:42:12 +0000

Why not add “walk on water” to the list?

It’s certainly possible to have some experience with all – or at least most – of the above. But the idea that spreading yourself so thin is necessary for success is a myth that needs to be busted already. It’s silly and more importantly, it’s unhealthy.

Oddly enough, this list misses some of the most important skills:

– User Experience and empathy
– Analysis and critical thinking
– Creative problem-solving
– Communications: spoken and written.

There is no shortage of people with technical skills. For the most part, what can be imagined can be built. The void is in the ability to answer these two simple questions:

1. Should it be built?
2. Will the audience it’s being built for want to use it?

The ability to address these two questions will get you further than any technical skill(s).