Interviews 
Interview With Marcel Hauri, an Experienced Certified Magento Developer
- Syed Muneeb Ul Hasan
- April 6, 2017
Joining us today for another inspiring interview is Marcel Hauri. He is currently working as a Magento-Developer and Deputy Team Leader Internet at Stämpfli AG, and is also an experienced Certified Magento developer.
Without wasting much time, here’s my talk with Marcel!
Muneeb: Marcel Hauri, thank you for your joining us today. As the Magento-Developer and Deputy Team Leader Internet at Stämpfli AG, please share some highlights of your career with our readers.
Marcel: My developer career started out by working for the national Swiss radio when they started to build their new website. Just a few years later I joined a web development company where I was able to gain a lot of knowledge by working on different frameworks and CMS systems together with talented developers. It was also during my time there that I got in contact with Magento.
I was asked if I would like to support the existing Magento team. I agreed, and after I had overcome the steep learning curve and worked on the project, no other Magento project followed. That was the point when I decided I wanted to focus on Magento and I started looking for a full-time Magento Job.
That’s how I got to my current position. I started by changing the setup process for all the Magento projects to a simple composer setup. I also presented that on my first Meet-Magento in Switzerland. Since then, I have been responsible for the interface between our in-house PIM solution and Magento as well as the training of our junior developers, improve our development processes, and ensure software quality.
Muneeb: As you are certified Magento Developer, do you think that Magento certification gives you special Magento knowledge that others don’t have? Why is there a need for such certifications?
Marcel: For me the certifications are rather a confirmation of the experience and knowledge of your development principles of Magento. They also help to see if there are areas where you have to improve and work on.
The main advantage of being a Magento Certified Developer is of course that you’re recognized as a professional. It also helps to build trust and to assure clients that their work is in capable hands.
Muneeb: What do you like the most about your work and what makes your office so special to you? Can you share a picture of your workplace?
Marcel: I guess the main reason why I love to work at Stämpfli AG is the office culture here. For us, the focus is always on an individual person. We meet at the same level, regardless of hierarchy, position, education, age, origin, gender or faith. This along with an environment where you can have fun while you still have an incredibly focused workforce is invaluable.
Here’s a picture of my workplace:
Muneeb: Magento is a powerful and complex ecommerce platform. What would be your advice to newbies to get the most out of the Magento platform?
Marcel: Get your hands dirty and dive deep into the core. Try to figure out how Magento works and why they do the things the way they do. Also, watch videos from different events like Mage Titans etc., read the blog posts from Alan Storm, and participate in Hackdays whenever possible to get in contact with others from the community and benefit from their knowledge.
Muneeb: Please tell our readers about your typical day at work? How do you manage your work-life balance?
Marcel: Well, first of all I think the term “work-life balance” is misleading because it suggests that work and life has nothing in common and life begins only when work is done. But that’s not true: we take the joy and pain in private life to our workplace and vice versa.
So my typical work day consists of having breakfast with my family whenever possible and then heading to work. In the office, I respond to emails, participate in the scheduled meetings, and determining my work for the day. I load up PHPStorm and get focused into the work for the day.
In my team we typically eat lunch together in the office or outside whenever the weather allows. We also have a group of people with whom you can go jogging or attend an organized Bootcamp. I mostly attend the bootcamp to get some exercise done and to clear my head to feel fresh in the afternoon.
In the afternoon I mostly leave the office around 4:30 pm to spend time with my son and my wife. If there is still some work left from the day, I continue my work as soon as my son is fallen asleep.
Muneeb: Do you attend Magento Community Events? Who are the people in the community that have inspired you the most?
Marcel: I have participated in several Magento-centric events since 2014 as a speaker mostly. This year, I was at the MageUnConference in Cologne and I will also do a talk at the Meet-Magento Germany in Leipzig. In addition, I plan to go to the Mage Titans in Italy and try to attend at least one Magento Live event.
There are a lot of people from the community who have inspired me but to list all of them would be a bit too much. It is difficult to say who has inspired me the most,though. But if I had to choose one then it would be Andreas von Studnitz. We’ve worked together several times and it was Andreas who supported me to go in the direction of an active participation in the Community.
Muneeb: What is your opinion of Magento 2? What features or changes do you want to see in Magento in the coming years.
Marcel: We focused quite early on Magento 2 since we didn’t want to sell Magento 1 Projects anymore to our clients given that the support for M1 will end in November 2018. We also had the luck of finding a client who was willing to support since he wanted to have his new shop on Magento 2. So we were able to gain a lot of Knowledge over that time.
We were also able to build tools that simplify our daily work like the Code generator for Magento 2 and the Magento 2 Deployment Tool.
I would like to see a more frequently Bugfix release cycle in Magento 2 as there are still a lot of bugs that have been fixed in the development branch but haven’t made it yet into a release.
Magento has shown a huge commitment to fixing bugs and improving Magento 2 with several activities like the Magento Contribution Days, their voting process for issues and the Community Gatekeepers for Pull Requests.
A feature I’m looking forward is the Bluefoot CMS being added to the core. Having an easy-to-use page builder will improve the usability and functionality.
Muneeb: How do you spend your free time? Do you like playing games, watching movies, and hanging out with friends?
Marcel: I try to spend time with my family and friends as much as I can. When I am not with my family, I am either in the volunteer fire brigade or spend my time learning and improving as a person and as a professional.
Muneeb: Who would you like to be interviewed next on Magenticians? You can recommend your friends or people who have notable contributions in the Magento Community.
Marcel: It would be great to see an interview of Anna Völkl, Andra Elena Lungu, Rebecca L. Troth or Sherrie Rohde. As much as I enjoyed giving this interview and like to read the other ones, I miss the female perspective in this interview series.
