We caught up with the brilliant and insightful George Woodard a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

George, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Let’s start with education – we’d love to hear your thoughts about how we can better prepare students for a more fulfilling life and career.

The educational system doesn’t teach children to become functional adults; they only teach them to become workers. What I would implement more in the educational system is more soft skills development. I think there is an assumption that having children in a specific environment will render soft skills, but that’s further from the truth. They should be taught or educated about things like emotional intelligence or effectively resolving conflict.

I also think that teaching them more life management skills such as credit and home buying should be mandatory. Many people in my generation (born in 1985; Millennials) had to learn much of these skills through trial and error. While I am a proponent of not giving a child everything because you spoil them, and then they become dependent on the help. But I think you should, at minimum, expose them to what to expect.

In postsecondary education, these types of skills should be mandatory. Yes, students are free to select their courses, but children in college are not far removed from the habits of high school. At this point, there should be courses that are mandatory for them to learn much of what will apply for the future: job/business negotiation, creditworthiness, in-depth financial planning, and a whole lot more. We prep them with the skills to accomplish what’s necessary for their job field. Why not also prepare them on what to expect in life.

George, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I’m a full-time WordPress developer. Since 2012, I have built solutions that help organizations be more efficient, scale, generate awareness, save time and money on their operations by automating workflows and streamlining digital communication. Levering WordPress, the problems I solved have resulted in:

-Slashing admin time and cost managing company information and news.
-Organizing extensive repositories of resources and valuable content.
-Creating event management and calendar systems to manage meetings, save time processing signups for events, and stay compliant with government regulations for open meeting transparency.
-Organize documents and relevant client information with Company Client Portals.
-Automate the process of communication from newsletters to social media.
-Built and manage eCommerce storefronts that reach B2B consumers.
-Representing a business with refreshed branding.
-Supporting Nonprofits with Social Impact, Government Agencies, and B2B organizations globally.
-Consult & educate businesses on effectively optimizing their website for their target audience, Accessibility, and quality SEO.

I have worked in several capacities in my career from development, designing, consulting to support. To date, I’ve been responsible for over 3000 websites in my career (whew that’s a lot). Many in this industry consider themselves a Developer but until you have had to create code from scratch, you can’t call yourself that.

What sets me apart from others is that I have an extensive & diverse background in what I do. One unique thing is that I’ve worked alongside the WordPress VIP team. They are the dedicated enterprise team at WordPress that builds/manages enterprise-scale websites like New York Post and the White House. During my time in that role, I was pushed to my limits in my skills to become a better developer.

The thing I am most proud of is my ability to be dependable, knowledgeable, and relatable. I make it a point to do business with humanness in mind. I try to grow relationships with everyone I work with because we all are trying to accomplish something. I’m a servant at heart so my goal is to be the change in the world that I would like to see. If you don’t learn anything from me or I’m not helping you become better by the services I provide, I’m not doing my job.

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

My entire business is bootstrapped. When I graduated from college, I started working in a call center. The skills and relationships I built on that job are priceless. I also started that job around the financial crisis of 2008-2009 so having a side hustle was mandatory. It was two years in that I realized my career in the company wasn’t going anywhere so I turned to my own skills (which is my love for technology and specifically web development). Once I realized that being a web developer could be a viable career for me, I started off doing sites for people I knew. The challenge was getting the right tools to do the job. Each year at my job we would get a performance bonus, which was very generous (sometimes $3-5k). I took that and invested in computers and software to help do the work I wanted to do. From there, I picked up steam, left my job, enrolled in grad school to study Computer Science, and went full steam ahead with business. I cashed out my 401k at the time which helped sustain me some and I made it work from there. It was a roller coaster but a decision I will never regret.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

My life from 2009 until 2017 included losing many people that are very near and dear to me. This consists of both parents, a grandparent, cousins, classmates, friends, family, and a mentor. Also, having to go through the investigation of my father’s murder case was emotionally draining, along with my mother eventually succumbing to cancer in 2016. Not to mention being in a dead-end job, figuring out your career, life’s normal nuances, starting a business, going dead broke on my mother’s couch, grad school, and learning to balance my sanity.

Let’s just say that time period was a pruning process for me. Trying not to sound cliche, but God has a hand on my life. I can’t say it enough. There were so many days I sat in darkness and cried myself to sleep. Many times I broke down sitting in my driveway. I often didn’t even know what I was doing or where I was going. But I never gave up. I’ve been tired MANY times. The feeling of quitting, even today, never leaves because we are not initially conditioned to be resilient. We are conditioned to obtain comfort. I was not consistent many days, but my spirit was consistent on what I should be doing. The last of that chapter was 2016 when my mother passed four days after Christmas. I stood by her side along with my sister and remembered her last days telling us, “Do Not Stop.” She knew when I made my career pivot in 2014, I was tired of trying to conform to Corporate America. It was not easy by a long shot, but she knew my spirit wasn’t for it. In her last days, she kept encouraging me to keep going. And that I did. In 2017, after finishing all my paperwork for my thesis, I packed two suitcases and four boxes, my savings, a dream in my heart, and I moved to Houston, TX, full of faith & fear. I didn’t have a job, and I didn’t have a steady business, but I knew I was going to make it. Oh, and did I mention I moved amid the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey? When I told people what I was doing, folks called me crazy. But if you know the type of person I am, you know I came on a mission with a purpose, and me walking into the storm is in my character.

Today, I can give glory and praise even more to the Almighty because business is booming and growing more than ever. My career has pivoted from a place of request to a position of demand. Meaning, I am being sought out after more now than ever. I’m a happily married man to a beautiful woman who is my biggest encourager and critic coach (creatives need someone to keep them accountable because we dream too big). We are also parents to two beautiful, charismatic, and happy twin girls (Daddy loves you).

My encouragement to any who chooses this route is to stay the course, stay focused and keep going!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.elsqrd.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eLsqrd/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/eLsqrd/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ghwoodard/
• Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/eLsqrd/