A Decade with DCKAP

I started my journey in DCKAP 10 years ago as a Software engineer. It’s been a great experience working with DCKAP over the last 10 years. Yes, I Joined DCKAP the same day 10 years back on 21st February 2011. I really enjoyed each and every moment at DCKAP, though there are some ups and downs. Little did I know that was entering an organization that was going to change my life forever. My leadership took a chance, gave me lots of opportunities, and believed in me, and for that, I am forever grateful.

I would like to thank each and everyone who has supported me directly and indirectly for my career growth. I started my journey with DCKAP From developer to team lead and to Head of Extensions to Account Manager to Services Practice Leader and the whole journey was filled with lots of learnings and challenges.  

The Journey

I joined as a Software Engineer on 21st Feb 2011 and was one of the few Magento developers at DCKAP then. At that time, I didn’t know Magento would change my career path. I just thought Magento is one of the many open-source platforms in the world. 

We at DCKAP started Chennai Magento Meetup in 2014 and I was the organizer of the Meetup group and our team hosted the first Chennai Magento Meetup on 27th September 2014. Read more about Chennai Magento Meetup Journey here. 

First Travel Experience (Jan 2014) - I was given the opportunity to travel to the United States for a business trip to meet one of our clients in the LA area. 

 After several obstacles launched DCKAP Store on Jan 24, 2015, and started selling Magento extensions. We actually sell Extensions that solve business problems. 

Magento Imagine - My first-ever Imagine at Wynn, Las Vegas in April 2015 and consecutively attended the Imagine 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019. 

 I also got an opportunity to Head the Magento U training in India. We, DCKAP became Magento U Authorized Trainer. Thanks, Karthik Chidambaram for the opportunity, and Thanks a lot Jay Jay for the trust and your continued support on the training.

Fortunate, proud, and thankful to become one of the first persons to complete all four Magento 1 certifications back in 2016. https://www.dckap.com/blog/magento-cetification/

I didn’t know I would speak at Magento Imagine one day. I got the opportunity to speak at Magento Imagine 2017 at Wynn, Las Vegas about Translating B2C Success into B2B. Read more about my #RoadToImagine - Magento Imagine 2017 - A trip to Las Vegas.

Top Magento contributor in India - My name was listed under Top Magento Contributors in India and the same published in Magento blog and Magneto Live India 2017.

 Again listed under Magento Top contributors in India in Jan 2018 and also got an opportunity to speak at the Meet Magento India event.

I got an opportunity to attend my First Shopify UNITE conference in Toronto, Canada in May 2018.

I got an opportunity to attend Magento Live Europe in Amsterdam, the Netherlands in 2019

I also got an opportunity at DCKAP Summit 2019 in Los Angeles and I’m one of the speakers at the event. I gave talks about the Product Customization platform and How AR/VR can help to boost product sales. 

Learnings

1. I understand how important people are to run a successful business.
2. Trust is one of the key factors for successful growth. So, we need to earn trust from the people and retain the same. 
3. I learned more about team and project management skills. People management plays a major role in successful delivery. 
4. Experiments lead to innovation. So, try many experiments as much as possible. Don’t worry if you fail. Fail fast. Take risk. 
5. If someone doesn’t like you, don’t worry and take it easy. 
6. Don’t expect everyone to like you and praise you.
7. Help others to grow. 
8. Work with smart people. Nurture talent from the people. 
9. Take tough decisions. 
10. When I was organizing the meetup in Chennai, I learned more about how to engage people at the events and organized many successful events. 
11. I understand how important knowledge sharing is for the open-source community and encourage the team to actively participate in the meetups and other global community events. 
12. I learned about public speaking while attending the events. 
13. While attending the conferences, I learned about how to interact and network with the people at the event. 

What could have been better? Please comment.

Finally, This ride has been full of opportunities, challenges, and many tough and rewarding moments. I will continue to grow, learn and push my limits along the way and to work on my lifelong passion. 

Much gratitude to past and present team members, my family, friends, customers, and colleagues for helping me become the person that I am today. Each one of you has been a big part of this journey. I have been blessed to be part of such an amazing organization for my entire professional career. I've had a ton of amazing mentors which I will not mention here for the fear of leaving one out. All I can say is you all know who you are and for anyone that I've interacted with over the years at DCKAP, thank you. It’s great to be part of DCKAP’s success, but beyond that, by the end of the day, our daily happiness is measured by the people we work with on a daily basis. I appreciate my team and all of the talented & smart people I get to work with and learn from every day. 

Can’t wait to continue achieving extraordinary things with you for years to come! 

I truly want to thank all of the leadership for giving me the opportunity to pour everything I have into my work and trusting in me to lead our team. I’m feeling very blessed and excited for my future with this amazing family! Here's to the next 10!!