Hindsight is 2020: Reflections on a Challenging Year

As we wrap up the year, many of us will not be able to celebrate the holidays as usual: hunting for a carefully hidden elf in our Los Angeles office, cheering with wine and panettone in our Brazilian office, and exchanging gifts during holiday potlucks. 

However, we still want to look back and celebrate the accomplishments that were made in the midst of immense trial. 

The Adaptability of our Customers 

Our customers have exemplified resilience throughout the uncertainties 2020 has brought. It’s such an honor to know that our customers have taken Liferay to build solutions to enable frontline workers, expedite loans, and even gather research for a vaccine. 

The Digital Connections Forged by Partners

Though we would have loved to have met in person this year, moving to virtual events has had some unexpected benefits. This year, we were able to connect with even more attendees, speakers, and partners! 

With our first global virtual partner summit, we had over 12 hours of live streaming from 3 stages, with over 20 sessions, 18 speakers, and 600 attendees. 

Our office in Brazil preparing for the Virtual Partner Summit

In addition, our partners donated over $2,000 USD together for the Red Cross during the course of the event. We are grateful to have partners who can roll with the punches and who have continued to enable the adoption of Liferay solutions worldwide. 

Life(ray) Goes On 

Our teams have shown incredible strength and flexibility this year in order to maintain our commitment to serve customers and partners. For example, the teams worked hard to adjust and transition into fully virtual events. For our Spanish team, their Symposium had 2 full days of content with over 980 attendees! In our Italy, France, and the UK offices, they are also finding innovative ways and creating an engaging format to make their digital events a success. 

In addition to adjusting to full-time remote work, our team has been finding new ways to use their talents and skills to bring people together and to inspire others. 

Viva La Liferay 

One of our frontend engineers in Madrid had the idea to bring the Spanish office together to sing Coldplay’s “Viva la Vida” together; the message of the song felt appropriate especially during this time of quarantine. Plus, it’s a fun song to sing and play along to! 

Watch our Spanish Team sing Viva La Vida

Seeking out talent among the Spanish office is not a hard task; our team members are also musicians, singers, video editors, producers, and even a professional flamenco dancer on top of their roles at Liferay! 

Celebrating Global Accomplishments

Our Dublin office was awarded the “Great Place to Work Award” earlier this year. They were also shortlisted in four categories in the Diversity in Tech Awards and in the Sustainable Business Impact Awards for their Refugee Program. 

Our Hungarian office was recently awarded the Best Cooperation Award Between NGOs and Companies for their volunteer work with the InDaHouse Foundation. 

So Long 2020 

Even through this challenging year, we’ve seen great resilience, adaptability, and unification. From all of us at Liferay, we wish you and your families a safe and healthy holiday season and look forward to the day when we can all reunite face to face.