Product manager Mike van der Valk: If you know what you want, everything is possible
Six and a half years ago, Mike van der Valk took on an adventure called Pipedrive. A lot has changed since: The company has expanded its product portfolio, reached the “unicorn” status after receiving a major investment from Vista Equity Partners and has grown from a hundred people to more than 900 globally. Still, the biggest change Mike has seen is his personal career path. With an internal drive for growth from day one, his professional experience is an inspiring example of how everything is possible if you know what you want.
Spoiler alert! At the end of this story, Mike shares 6 tips that have shaped his career path and can help everyone else’s, too.
But first, let’s start from the very beginning. Born in the Netherlands, Mike earned his Bachelor’s degree in commercial economics from Hogeschool Rotterdam. He studied and tried out a little bit of everything. Then, something life-changing happened. About 8 years ago, Mike met his now-wife on Tinder. They started dating and realized soon after that they were serious about each other. One thing led to another and Mike visited Estonia, her birthplace, for the first time in his life. He decided that it will become his home someday. But before, he would need to find a job.
Chapter one: becoming a Pipedriver
Destination Estonia set, but Mike wanted to find a job first before moving to a new country. He started applying for random jobs. He was missing the right qualifications or experience in some cases, but figured it wouldn’t hurt trying. At some point, he sent his CV to Pipedrive and received a thank you letter from the recruiter with a message that he has been selected for the next round of interviews. “I applied for a position in customer support and met with the team lead. With the goal to make a good impression of myself, I decided to wear a suit for the interview. Honestly, given the company’s culture and friendly atmosphere, I felt overdressed, but they still hired me,” recalls Mike of his first interaction with Pipedrive.
Indeed, it’s the people, their mindset and internal drive that matter at Pipedrive. Mike recalls that striving for a better version of himself is something that has always characterized him as a human being. After some time at Pipedrive’s customer support, he saw the team was expanding quickly. Starting a new job is a big step for any person, regardless of their previous experience. Mike wanted to provide the new joiners a great starting experience and realized that there might be a better way to onboard future employees. That’s how Mike ended up launching and developing the very first training program for Pipedrive’s customer support reps, which allowed them to thoroughly explore the product and all tools.
At first, training new employees was his side project. He enjoyed the best of both worlds: his everyday job and helping new people familiarize themselves with Pipedrive and absorb its essence. Then, Pipedrive started scaling, which meant new offices and a growing number of newcomers. While working at customer support, Mike would run the training for support reps to ensure everyone was always on board with a new feature or product update while continuing to optimize onboarding processes for the entire department.
A step closer to product organization
Pipedrive’s onboarding process includes a variety of components, from understanding the product to setting up the computer, to learning how to use all the tools, to getting to know the office and workplace. The learning process is different for everyone. Some may find a question simple and others, complex. In many cases, learning the product does not only mean finding an answer but rather explaining the value of a function or identifying and addressing actual customer needs. As a result, Mike became more invested in the product organization.
“Step by step, I started to think that it would be so cool and rewarding to work on the product side. I decided that I wanted to become a product manager and that’s when I started reading books and job shadowing at Pipedrive. It was just a couple of dedicated hours per week, but this helped me better understand our product organization and get the feeling of what the job is really about,” explains Mike.
Then Mike realized something else. It’s not just new employees who need a great learning experience, it’s also Pipedrive’s new and existing customers. He pitched the idea of creating a learning base for the customers to Pipedrive’s chief product officer, who liked it. As a result, Pipedrive Academy and Pipedrive Community were born. The new articles and video content pieces have helped customers adopt the new platform easier and quicker. They also enabled the clients to explore the platform inside out and at their own pace. Lastly, they empowered users to resolve platform-related issues themselves.
The stars aligned
Creating this learning opportunity for Pipedrive’s customers was an eye-opening experience for Mike. The deeper he delved into the product, the more he realized he wanted to contribute to it. After two years of developing the learning area of Pipedrive, all the stars aligned — he teamed up with fellow Pipedrivers and participated in an internal hackathon where his team pitched a new project management tool and won second place for it. That moment, a new star was born. The newly-formed team started working on the tool.
“Thinking back, the natural growth of the company has helped me as well. I was curious about different things and I really wanted to improve my skills. I wasn’t afraid to tell people that I wanted to learn or experience something new, and this way I was growing together with the company. It was never about simply changing a job. I loved the things that I was doing at Pipedrive, but somehow I found ways for improving an important part of the company, and this way I developed myself as well,” recalls Mike.
Another key factor has impacted Mike’s 6.5 years journey at Pipedrive — the company culture. “At Pipedrive, we don’t say yes to everything, but honestly, we are close enough to doing that. If you ask any person and explain well what you need for your team, it’s possible to get it. This is the true Pipedrive culture for me — the “team first” value that we go by. In this sense, the Pipedrive experience hasn’t changed for me over the years, no matter if we have a hundred or a thousand people working in the company globally,” explains Mike about his philosophy on the company culture.
Mike’s advice on how to build your career
- Success at work does not necessarily mean being the smartest person — no one is! Finding the right path is a matter of learning every single day, being curious and continuing to grow.
- If you know what you want, everything is possible. Mike loved working for Pipedrive’s customer support. Still, being curious has led him to grow professionally and develop his career.
- Ask questions and don’t be afraid to share your thoughts. In Mike’s experience, even if you have a technical question that you don’t have an answer to, expressing it might spark an idea or a solution that would serve the engineers who are building the product. This works both ways: Listen to other people and prove that you deserve their trust.
- Voice your ideas to your manager and find people who can mentor/coach you and help you grow. Learning from your colleagues is the best way to explore new areas of expertise. If you are passionate about it, possibilities will follow. Soon enough, you might suddenly find yourself pursuing new professional challenges.
- Connect with fellow employees across teams. Getting to know people, being open to communication and learning from people around you can help you make more informed decisions.
- In Mike’s experience, the executive team is never far away. If you have a great idea, they will find time for you. Remember that you are a team working towards the same goal, no matter the position or task at hand.
Interested in working in Pipedrive?
We’re currently hiring for several different positions in several different countries/cities.
Take a look and see if something suits you
Positions include:
- Product Manager
- Group Product Manager
- Product Designer
- Product Data Analyst
- Mobile Product Manager
- And several more
