Big project small team
When I first had the idea to develop a WordPress theme for the international community, it was a vague idea. What I knew is that I had used many premium themes which I was not satisfied with, I decided a new theme should be born.
I am a web developer and a websites builder for a long time. Our team developed many well-functioning WordPress sites from scratch. It is time for us to move on to the next phase and develop a new WordPress theme for the WordPress community. A theme that people will love using.
First I thought of my concept, and why it is different from the other themes out there. Also, I had to think what would make it an amazing theme. A theme that I would like to use anytime (or almost anytime). So after I understood what I want to do, I understood that it is not just a theme, it is a whole package, a theme, and some bundled plugins.
My decision was to develop a complete package. A theme for the layout and style. Some plugins for the functionality and user experience. We also need to wrap the theme and plugins together, so they work together the best way. But I also want the plugins to work great with any other good theme so one can change the theme whenever he needs.
We listed what we need to make it happen, and this is the list:
- Someone that will do functional design
- Someone that will do graphic design
- Someone that will do technical design
- Someone that will code server side
- Someone that will code client side
- Someone that will do testing and Q&A
- Someone that will fix the bugs found
- Someone that will write documentation
- Someone that will translate the product and documentation to other languages
- Someone that will create how-to videos
- Someone that will plan the marketing
- Someone that will do the marketing
- Someone that will be in charge of support
- Someone that will support 24/7
- Someone that will manage all this
I have the feeling that I forgot some of these someones…
So how can a team of three people do the job of 15 people or more?
Any team member must do more than one of these jobs. All team members should do their best at any given time and in any given job they hold. But also, we must understand that not everything will be perfect in phase one.
So I had to decide what will be our compromising, where we will not compromise in any case and what will be postponed. When 70% is good enough and when less than 95% is not acceptable.
It is intensive to work only three people on a project like this, but it is rewarding. Once our package of theme and plugins will be out there, and many people will enjoy and love using it, we will be satisfied and happy.
