For Joe Conway, Founder & CEO of stable|kernel, the entrepreneurial journey from a keen interest in programming and software development to becoming an award-winning developer and author was rather destined.
Journey of Building Business Around Passion
Since his formative years, Joe wanted to pursue a career in engineering and therefore following his passion, acquired a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Later on, after working as an engineer, Joe felt the desire to own a company that solely focused on building great softwares for potential clients and solving their toughest business challenges. Moreover, his father had a huge influence on his views of what it takes to become a successful leader. Being brought up by a union leader of the fire department in Wisconsin, Joe understood that leadership is about fulfilling responsibilities to others.
Sharing his personal insights on building stable|kernel, Joe says, “Everything is a learnable skill – I taught myself how to be a great programmer and write great code, but I didn’t have experience of running a business. No one teaches you how to run a company; you learn as you go and make the best decisions you can with your employees and keeping clients’ best interest in mind. It’s all about learning from your mistakes and growing from that.”
stable|kernel: Delivering Smart Business Solutions
Established in 2013, with headquarters in Atlanta, GA, stable|kernel is a product strategy, design and development consultancy that offers unique end-to-end software solutions for solving clients’ business challenges and creating stronger brand relationships with employees, customers and end users. The leading software development company leverages its expertise in product positioning, mobile and web, back-end services, emerging technologies and the Internet of Things (IoT) to position its clients as industry leaders.
It is largely known that software development is more than just building a set of requirements. The purpose of a software is to provide custom based solutions for solving business operational challenges that ultimately impacts the customer interaction with brands. The creative team of stable|kernel has a solid understanding of its clients’ business goals as well as their associated requirements.
Defining stable|kernel’s mission and vision, Joe asserts, “We believe great brands deserve great software. Our product teams leverage tested processes for research, design and development to deliver a smarter business solution that delights users, disrupts industries and positions your brand as a leader in innovation. We’re your mobile product team.”
Multitalented Entrepreneur
With more than 16 years of experience, Joe has worked with Fortune 500 companies, technology start-ups and government entities to build mobile platforms, enhance existing applications and develop mobile strategies. As an award-winning author and programmer, Joe brings clients’ visions to life across multiple platforms. His team of developers takes clients from strategy through design, development and deployment, ensuring timely delivery of the highest quality apps. Most recently, Joe led his team in the creation of Aqueduct for Dart, a server-side framework for Google’s Dart language which is an open-source project that helps our internal team build scalable, secure and sustainable products for our clients.
Prior to founding stable|kernel, Joe served as a board member, lead iOS software engineer and instructor for Big Nerd Ranch. At BNR, he oversaw the direction of the company’s iOS division and managed large-scale iOS development projects for B2B and consumer-facing applications. As an instructor for BNR, Joe led Developer Boot Camps at BNR and on-site at global brands including Microsoft, Facebook, Google and Apple. Joe is a 2012 winner of the Jolt Productivity Award, an award presented annually to showcase products that have ‘jolted’ the industry with their significance and made the task of creating software faster, easier and more efficient.
He has also authored iOS Programming: The Big Nerd Ranch Guide, editions 1, 2 and 3, designed to take novice developers through the creation of their first apps. These books are step-by-step best practices on how a novice programmer can get started with iOS software development. These nationally recognized guides have helped Joe and his team tremendously with their recruiting efforts because developers find stable|kernel through the book and want to come work for them.
Raising a High Bar of Standards
stable|kernel does not build software and ship it off to clients; they are key strategists. Joe along with his team works with their clients to make sure that their software decisions are backed by data, thereby making data-driven business decisions and ensuring future success for their products. The team of stable|kernel starts with strategy and research for uncovering the software opportunities in solving business objectives which on the other hand, many of the leading developer consultancies do not execute before the initiation of software development or designing. stable|kernel also conducts user interviews and user testing to ensure its team is building products with the most seamless experiences that end users value and adopt.
Joe and his team walk their clients through the entire software journey. They are always thinking of new and innovative ways to incorporate smart technology into its client’s tech stacks. With time, the mobile product team knows its client’s business so well that it can continue to build highly-efficient products and bring a strong ROI.
Minding the Creativity Gap Between Generations
According to the Founder & CEO of stable|kernel, there is no correlation between age and creativity. Even though, the younger generation is well versed with technology and its advancements, older generations have vast experience and values to root for them. So evolved technology has no substantial role when it comes to creativity.
