One month into Levarne
Let me introduce myself..
My name is Carlijn. I graduated as a food technologist, the study I took was called Food Commerce and Technology, in which I eventually chose the Technology side. The study focuses on 3 aspects, the product development of new and existing food, the processes to get from raw material to finished product and ensuring the quality within the process and the product itself. I always found product development the most fun subject!
Before I started at Levarne, I worked for 2 years at Pim.Today, a project management software within the packaging industry. Where I was responsible for the onboarding of new customers, mapping customer project processes and implementing these processes in the application. In addition, I was also involved in devising/developing functionalities to make the application even more attractive to the customers.
When I started at Levarne, the variety of clients was a real change. At Pim.Today we also had several customers, but they all had 2 overlapping points, namely retail and packaging. The customers at Levarne do not have this, so it took some getting used to keeping track of what each application can do. Also, the team at Levarne is a lot bigger than at Pim.Today so there are a lot more things coming your way at the same time. Fortunately I can switch easily so I quickly found my way. Also the fact that we program in code at Levarne was something completely new for me. I do not (yet) have a lot of background in the IT world, because we worked with a no-code application at Pim.Today I really had to get used to all the new terms that were thrown at me.
The position I had at Pim.Today is very similar. Most of the things I am doing now within Levarne I have also done in the last 2 years. The only difference is the customers and the kind of programming, I still have to get used to that.
What is it like to start in a new environment?
To give an idea of what it is like to start in a completely new environment, I will do so with the help of an anecdote. How I see it, is that Levarne is currently a fast moving train, with each project as a wagon and all team members already settled on the train. I, as a newcomer to the club, did not have a ticket yet so I was too late to get on the train. I am trying very hard to jump on this moving train as soon as possible, but because of all the new things, this may take longer than I expected. But I am sure I will succeed!
The first 3 weeks within Levarne were like a rollercoaster. Fortunately, I started my first day physically at the office, so I felt more involved, which I find very important. After starting the day I was invited to join a meeting about the new design of the Levarne website. This made sure that I was immediately more aware of what is going on at Levarne and what we are doing. My first project was to incorporate the new design into the current website. In this way I could learn the way of working without any pressure from a customer. In addition, I was given some smaller customer tasks in between, so that I could get used to them as well. Little by little I got more responsibilities within my job and I succeeded more and more in keeping up with the moving train. The first customer project that I became closely involved with is the employer profile for our customer Memory. While managing this project, I find out more and more that there are so many more things you need to take into account, and I am still learning.
What is your job?
Within Levarne I fulfill the function of client coordinator, I will be Rianne’s right hand, sort of speak. Eventually I will have my own clients, for whom I will be responsible. But until I know all the ins and outs of each client, I will work more as a guiding factor of Rianne.
I find starting a new job during corona quite difficult, I notice that it is harder to be trained remotely. When I’m sitting at home I can’t really see what others are doing and I also don’t overhear anything of what is going on within the team and with customers. Nevertheless, you do find your way around fairly quickly; for example, we have the Slack chat where you can ask all the team members questions quickly and easily. I do hope that we can all sit together in the office again soon, because that really makes working a lot more fun!
I find the young team super fun, you can have really nice conversations with each other besides work. The atmosphere is very open and you immediately feel welcome in the team! Every time we are at the office and the weather is good, we play a game of soccer in the afternoon, this ensures that you are at a different level with each other and makes a workday even more fun!
