Hari is a Happiness Engineer at Automattic – where he works on support for WooCommerce Shipping Extensions. He is a passionate WordPress enthusiast, and has over ten years of experience as a WordPress developer, and as a consultant. An avid blogger and a writer, Hari is a former journalist with a national newspaper based in India, and has also worked in the banking industry, prior to joining Automattic.
Links: WordPress Profile | Website | Blog | Twitter | LinkedIn
Author: Hari Shanker R
I am an experienced Community and Project/Program Management Professional.
Until July 2025, I served as the Community Program Manager (formerly known as "Super Deputy") on the Make/WordPress Community Team, where my focus was on making the WordPress Community the best it can be, through events and other community-led efforts. I used to lead the Contributor Working Group of WordPress, where we built, and successfully ran three editions of the Contributor Mentorship Program, which resulted in a net total of 150 active contributors for WordPress. I also co-led the Five for the Future Program, and was also involved in other contributor initiatives such as the WordPress Contributor Health Dashboard project. I also used to be a fully-sponsored contributor to the WordPress open source project for over four years from 2020 through 2024.
Even though I don't work with WordPress on a day-to-day basis these days, the software has a close place in my heart. I strongly believe that open source tech and the open web have the potential to make the world a better place.
I have had a rather diverse career with significant experience in the domains of Retail Banking, Print & Web Journalism, Web Development, Entrepreneurship, Event Management, Professional Blogging, and Education.
Outside of work, I enjoy writing (blogging) as a hobby, and I'm a compulsive bibliophile. I'm also a happily married pet parent to three cats.
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