Please briefly describe yourself and what you do:

I work as a web developer, consultant and trainer. In web development, I am a specialist for server side programming using the language PHP. Backends, databases and APIs are my strong suit. Read more about it on php-entwickler-berlin.de. In terms of technology I am a big fan of the Symfony 2 framwork. I’ve been using the framework as a developer for two years and attended several developer conferences, trainings and workshops. I frequently wrote about my favourite technology in my blog. Sharing my passion with the world was not only fun, but turned out to be a good idea from a business perspective as well: In 2012, three companies independently contacted me and asked whether I could train their employees in developing web applications using Symfony 2. Giving these trainings was the most enjoyable work I did the whole year. Now I offer Symfony trainings every other month.

What is your experience with coworking / betahaus?

I was always attracted to betahaus and coworking in general. In 2010 I helped to start the coworking space “Yorck 52” in Berlin. Later I moved my Company Market Valid GmbH & Co KG to betahaus in an emergency situation: After moving to a new appartment I found that my landlord would not allow me to put my companies’ name on the mailbox and urgently needed a place where I could receive my business mail. At the same time I needed a quiet place to work. betahaus came to the rescue in both aspects: Thanks to the mail service offered by betahaus the company could quickly receive its mail again. At the same time the silent room was the perfect enviroment for my development work.

I would like to share that sharing is the key to success. Three years ago I blogged about by favourite project, which was a tool to test websites in Internet Explorer on Mac OS X. Apparently this was an urgent need for many developers, because they picked up the article and discussed it in many other blogs and forums. Within a week, 12.000 visitors checked out the site and about 1000 signed up for a private beta. In 2011 and 2012 I shared my thoughts and passion about my favourite technology in blogging about the Symfony 2 framework for web applications. As described in the beginning of the interview, this led to this years most enjoyable business opportunities. Don’t keep your ideas secret. Let the word know. Talk to people and blog about them.

What are your future goals?
Having found out how much I like to give developer trainings I want to give a lot of trainings in the future. My first step in this direction is to offer open Symfony trainings in Berlin and Munich every other month. The next thing I have on my mind is to give Adwords trainings. Being a Google certified Adwords Professional I know the topic inside and out. I have a gut feeling that many small and medium enterprises have a need for short focused trainings on this topic. This idea is brand new and came into existence during a phonecall with on of my business
partners today. You are the first person to know about this. I’m looking forward to announcing this service and getting feedback about it. Wish me luck!

You probably already know Cevahir, he started working at betahaus last September and he is the barmanager of our café. You can recognize him because he always wear a mütze. Thanks to him we can enjoy the weekly event betabreakfast and he is also an important member of the events team.

He moved to Berlin from Bielefeld to attend university – majoring in hospitality. During those two years he was gaining a lot of experience as a bartender in many locations in Berlin. After finishing university he decided to have a life experience and improve his english; therefore, he moved to Australia – in the east coast, for one year. He said that it was one of the most important experience of his life. After moving back to Berlin, he started working in casual jobs until he became a member of our team at betahaus last September.

Why did you decide to work at betahaus? (weiterlesen…)