Although he first went to university for sports management before getting a master’s degree in information systems, Michael had already gotten into the digital world by learning to code as a teenager; that’s when he first got into web design as well. Those activities turned into a bit of money during his studies, as he worked part-time as a freelance web designer.
“I got into code and design because of video games, I wanted to understand how they were actually built. At some point as I was googling around, I realized I needed to start to learn Photoshop — which was basically all there was at the time — in order to design. So I did that, and then kind of realized that while video game design was still beyond what I could do, I could keep going to learn how to design a website, how to use the basic coding languages for that sort of work.”
With that eclectic, do-it-yourself background, he was naturally drawn to entrepreneurial experiences. His first company, started at university, focused on providing wellness services to businesses and their employees. It got some good traction, and ended with an acquisition, making Michael one of the rare entrepreneurs to get a win in their first try at startups!
“We were helping people to do sports at some very cool French startups, Merci Handy, Algolia, and then we got bought by a larger competitor. But then I had to figure out what next, and building another company really takes all the stars aligning: founders, idea, product-market fit, etc… I didn’t really have any other big idea at the time, so I figured my experience could be a good fit as a product manager at a startup.”
That led him to a number of posts, including several years at Spendesk, where they grew to become part of the EU’s unicorn club. There Michael made a bit of a shift, moving from a focus on product to being on the marketing side of things as a Senior Website Manager.
“At Spendesk there was still a lot of emphasis on product, because the website was in many ways the product. So my team still had engineers, a full-time designer, and we focused on lots of product-related topics: CRO, UX, etc. It wasn’t exactly like working exclusively on the product, but it wasn’t full-scale marketing either. I liked the challenge.”
Despite being happy in his position, when the opportunity to join OrderCast came along he was intrigued. Moving from an established late-stage company back to an earlier-stage startup spoke to Michael’s love of creating something virtually from scratch.
“I like the OrderCast challenge because it’s very entrepreneurial. We have to figure out the business model, the best ways to reach out to our personas and more. It’s a real opportunity to build a great story.”
Welcome, Michael, we can’t wait to see how your design sensibilities quickly create an even better OrderCast experience! And if you’re reading this and want to be part of the adventure, reach out — we’re currently hiring for multiple positions 🤗
