When drafting blog posts, I try not to single out particular tweets or comments unless they’re helpful or resourceful.

There are times, though, thoughts are shared either via tweets, emails, and/or blog comments that may be intended to be critical, but end up being really useful and end up proving exactly what we’ve been discussing all along.

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Yesterday, I shared some thoughts on what I consider to be some qualifications to be a WordPress developer. The list and the post itself were by no means exhaustive, though I appreciated a lot of the comments and emails I received – there were some really good thoughts that came from the readership.

I think it’s an important to talk about.

But one thing I did want to make clear is that I don’t necessarily think that what I’ve written are the definitive things that one should consider in order to be a WordPress expert. We’ve all got different barometers and what not for what we consider to be experts – sometimes we say that they are just people who know more than we do; other times, we have more strict criteria.

To that end, although I’ve shared some of the things that I believe a WordPress developer should know, I wouldn’t consider myself an expert WordPress developer.

I know where I am, I know where I’ve been, I know where I want to be. And that’s what I use to gauge my personal level of experience.

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Over the past few years, the number one thing that I hear from many clients goes something like this:

Our previous developer has gone AWOL on us and our project isn’t complete.

What a total bummer, right?

I mean, as far as the client is concerned, they’ve [likely] paid out money to someone in order to build them a site or an application and the person has left. Then, on the flip side, those of us who try to good honest business with integrity get associated with people who do things like that.

So even if a person comes to us wanting to hire us to complete the task at hand, they’re likely a little unsure as to if they can actually trust us to finish what they thought was going to be done the first time.

And though I know the conversation about what qualifies a person as a WordPress developer and doesn’t has been mentioned several times, I want to be clear that this is not meant to re-ignite that conversation or really contribute to it (though it may, in some ways).

Instead, I’m trying to clarify what a developer actually is, the realities that go into building something custom for someone, and what to expect when you get into that field.

I guess the target audience isn’t the typical WordPress developer. Instead, it’s targeting those who are looking to hire people to employ for their WordPress project, but aren’t sure they’re hiring the right talent.

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