My view on customer engineering

A team dedicated and focused to long-term technical success of the customer and their experience is critically important to a business and company being successful. Each customers’ motivations and needs are different. When you orient yourself around understanding and nurturing these aspects of the relationship you earn their trust and are positioned to sustain that trust indefinitely.

Preferred learning styles

I am both a visual and verbal learner. Reading something and then subsequently writing out what I read helps me reinforce new information. Visually I often try to connect pieces of information or map out a complete picture.

Communication style

I prefer direct communication and assertiveness. I am a big believer that the strength of your relationship with any individual is only as strong as the depth of a conversation you can have with them. In deciding upon and communicating decisions, the ‘why’ is important for me to understand and I find it useful for me to communicate my intentions as well. For broad topics or bigger picture discussions, I prefer to have time to process and think about various impacts or considerations versus likely having an immediate response.

Preferred way to collaborate

Day-to-day, 1:1 settings and / or asynchronous communication for collaboration is great. For projects, I like to divide and conquer. I find it productive when smaller teams are assembled to break up and share the workload.

Time of day where I’m most productive

I’m most productive first thing in the morning.

How I approach problems

I first want to understand why a problem is a problem—what’s the impact. From there, I try to consider various outcomes or potential solutions. I do appreciate varying perspectives and ideas about potential solutions. And then from there, try to determine the path forward.

Preferred way to be recognized/appreciated

Direct recognition is my preference.

How to convince me to do something

I am more logical than emotional so when the logic of an idea clicks for me, you have convinced me.

Thoughts/feelings/preferences when it comes to asking for help

When I’m asking for help I’m the type of person who’s going to ask for volunteers. I might index too heavily to being sensitive to what other people have going on. I’m not scared to ask for help but too shy to put that request on any one person.

When someone comes to me for help, it makes me feel good. I want to understand exactly what help is needed from me—i.e., do you want me to listen, take action, etc.

How I like to give and receive feedback

When giving feedback I tend to first gain understanding and perspective—both from the person who provided feedback and with the person the feedback is about. From there, depending on the situation, I want to work towards a solution, whatever that may be. Whenever possible I like to orient feedback around what good looks like or what the expectation is and discuss how to accomplish that.

In receiving feedback, similar to my communication style I am very receptive and open to direct communication. Frequent feedback is very much welcomed.

What I find enjoyable at work

Solving problems and building new things!

What kind of work do I find easiest to do when

When I need to be heads down on something or catch up on a lot of little things it’s easy for me to quickly action or focus deeply in the morning.

How do I feel about getting messages after/outside of hours that are meant for me to see and respond to during active hours

I do not mind being contacted outside of working hours. Similarly, any messages from my outside of working hours have no expectation of acknowledgement. I try to schedule emails or slacks as much as possible to send during work hours where possible.

I am most sensitive to requests for meetings before my working hours begin because that is the time of the day that I prioritize my own self-care in the form of activity and exercise. Typically when asked or given a heads up I am able to accommodate everything but if I am not able to we’ll find a compromise.

How folks can best show up for me when I seem off

Asking me if I’m okay or even acknowledging to me what you observe / perceive can be really helpful for a quick self check-in. In this dynamic, fast-paced environment it can be easy to get caught up in the many things we have going on concurrently and forget to take a pause to check-in.

Things I am aware of that trigger anxious feelings/feelings of less than at work

Feeling like there is no progress or a path forward on a problem can cause me to feel anxious.

Three things that bring me back to center when I’m stressed

Exercise or any physical movement; a physical break to refresh and reset; quiet, uninterrupted focus time.

A pet peeve of mine

When problems are brought to the surface with no perspective or thought about potential solutions.

My areas of knowledge

Change management; mentorship and development; creating a plan from ambiguity; technical software implementation; customer success.

Areas of interest to learn

Machine learning is extremely interesting to me.

Current personal project

Countless home projects and a soon-to-begin project building a camping trailer from scratch!

Something I fear

Being stagnant and feeling like I’m not making forward progress in life.

A quote I find powerful

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. - Mark Twain

My Strengthsfinder results

1. Achiever 2. Restorative 3. Strategic 4. Responsibility 5. Learner