My First Week at Constant Contact

Wow, what a week it has been here at Constant Contact.  Monday was your pretty typical first day- who we are, what we do, expectations, and paperwork (lots of it).  But in full-blown trial by fire fashion, I found myself representing Constant Contact at Secure360 on Tuesday, and flying to Chicago for php[tek] Wednesday!

So here I am Friday, finally with a chance to take a breath and reflect!  First, I suppose I should introduce myself, my name’s Mike Stowe, and as of Monday, May 13, I am a Developer Advocate with Constant Contact.  What that means is that I am here for you, the developer.  My job description is pretty simple – make you happy.  If there are things we’re doing well, how can we do them better?  If there are things we’re doing poorly, I want your help to improve them.  And if you have questions, ideas, or are just stuck on some code – I want to help out.  My job is to be your voice in the company at the highest levels, and your direct resource for any challenges you may run into.

My job is also to give back to the community.  Before Constant Contact, I worked as a PHP software engineer, in the industry for over 10 years.  During that time, I have seen a lot of challenges and a lot of opportunities – not just within the PHP community, but within the software engineering industry as a whole.  For that reason, I’ve always tried to be involved, organizing the MidwestPHP Conference in Minnesota, the Twin Cities Software Engineers user group, and co-organizing the MNPHP user group.  I’ve also made it my mission to get out in the community and share what I’ve learned both at presentations and in a few articles.

Now with the power of Constant Contact, we can do even more!  I am excited to be able to get out more in the community, and work with all of you to support open source projects, sponsor user groups and conferences, and on occasion even bore audiences with presentations ranging from code security to implementing agile in the workplace.  And for those of you in the Bay area, this is just the start, as we will be hosting several events in our San Francisco office and in the community on a regular basis!

With the introduction out of the way, I look forward to meeting you all- whether it be via email, at a conference, a meetup, or just on the streets of Minneapolis or San Francisco.  And please, do not hesitate to contact me if you need anything or have any suggestions.  You can always email me at mstowe@constantcontact.com or tweet me at @ctct_api or @mikegstowe.

And definitely stay tuned, great things are heading your way (I’ve only been here a week and I’m already amazed by the work the Constant Contact team is doing!!!).