If there was one thing I could say about Ross Johnson it’s that he’s not afraid of clowns. Not even a little bit. Is there more to know about him? Let’s find out.

What drives you to speak at WordCamps?

I love learning. It gives me an opportunity to improve my understanding of a topic (if you want to know something deeply, teach it) and share what I’ve learned with others.

What is your session about?

Differentiating yourself in a crowded market using design.

Where can people find more about you?

You can find my design agency here and my project management plugin here.

What would you like to see change about the WordPress platform in the next 5-10 years?

I’d like to see an improved admin experience. For a long time WordPress was considered the easiest CMS to learn and understand but I no longer think that’s the case. The admin interface hasn’t changed in a long time and could benefit from rethinking.

Who do you think is under represented in the WordPress community?

I’m going to say children because they rarely come up in these conversations yet the younger generations will start building websites at a much earlier age than we all did.

What was the most challenging WordPress project you’ve worked on?

I only work on easy projects. I did build a bid management system that allowed a general contractor to post jobs to a network of sub-contractors who would submit their credentials and proposals. I also worked on a custom BuddyPress implementation for a niche Instagram like social network hosted on WordPress VIP.

What’s a problem you recently solved creatively using WordPress?

We built a custom proposal plugin that allows us to create proposals for clients within WordPress and track views to the proposal, which sections were viewed the most / longest and a form to approve the proposal at the end. It was a simple mash-up of custom post types, advanced custom fields and gravity forms.