Name: Megan Berry
Job Title and Description: Head of Social Product and Community at RebelMouse
College/Major: Stanford University/Political Science
Website: www.rebelmouse.com
Twitter Handle: @meganberry
What does your current job entail? Is there such a thing as a typical day?
I run social product here at RebelMouse, and I’ve been here since we started around three years ago. What it means to run social product is, basically I’m looking at our product roadmap to decide which of the features we think are going to help our clients grow and maximize their content.
That involves planning out the features on the highest level, working with design teams and engineering teams to decide how they’re specifically going to look, working with some of the logistics of timing and client needs and working with tech leads to decide who’s going to build it. It’s about getting that whole pipeline in place and then looking back once something has launched and understanding how it did and what that means for our clients.
In terms of a typical day, I usually wake up on the early side (around 7 am) and get on the computer in my PJs to check in with our global team. There are people finishing up their day in India and people in Europe who are at their lunch break, so I need to chime in where I’m needed. Once that’s settled, I get dressed and get into the office. That’s a nice time to catch up on product docs and get myself set up for long-term projects. As the day moves on, I’ll jump into client meetings and then I’ll probably head back to help teams of designers and engineers in other time zones.
I’m a huge fan of exercise, so after work, I’ll do a Soul Cycle class, eat, then check back in with our teams.
What is the best part of your job?
There are a couple different things in particular. One is that we have a really amazing team. When someone on the team has an idea and a designer pulls together something that’s even better than what we dreamed of, or when a design goes into engineering and they have a great suggestion, that collaboration is amazing.
The second thing is when something goes live. For example, we’ve been working on this feature for a long time called “The River,” which is like a Facebook newsfeed for the communities we build, and when it went live and we got featured in some press, it was really exciting.
What is one thing you wish you knew about your industry when you first started out that you know now?
One thing is that this industry is risk-friendly, so it’s better to take the chance or take the lead if you think something might work. Just go for it and really put yourself out there, because it’s an industry that really responds to that. When you take risks and just go for it, you tend to be rewarded and see things happen.
I think with that, on a personal level, I had a tendency in interviews and then on the job to be overly modest. I look back, and even when I interview college students to see if I want them on my team, I just see it so clearly. It’s a switch that you have to flip when you leave school that a teacher won’t be your advocate; you have to be your own advocate.
What do you look for when considering hiring someone?
I look at a couple things. First I want to know if someone is a self-starter and a go-getter. The way I’ll notice that is how much he or she has looked into the company and me overall. If you were taking extra time to do your research and read our press and check my Twitter account, that makes me think you’re going to put effort into the job.
The other thing is someone who’s generally really curious and really excited about the industry. When someone tells me that this is the thing [he or she] wants, that gets me excited. When people are unsure of what they want, it’s not as exciting to hire.