Let’s meet the IT-team. A team that has plenty of fun, play off each other’s strengths, communicate well and work hard to perfect our product. A team whose mission it is to develop and improve our IT system. Here all the information about our matches is stored privacy-proof and can be used by newbees, matchers and managers.
So first, we have Essam. The man whom it all started with. He started learning different programming languages a long time ago in Syria. When he came to the Netherlands, he put it into practice. He applied for HackYourFuture and at the end of the program joined NewBees. He found our system at the very beginning and patiently developed and improved it to the solid, reliable and useful system it is today. When he loses track of time, we find him behind his computer coding in the back end of the system.
But he didn’t build this all by himself! Accompanied by the skilled Nagham, they crunch the data together to make the system better every single day. Then there is Gert, our real-life tester. He takes the point of view of the matcher and has had many ‘shiny ideas’ – as they call it – for improvements to help make matches that matter.
‘Hypothetical working space’
We meet each other in their ‘hypothetical working space’, where you can hear the laughter and ticking on keyboards from far away. The inside of the office has a blue sky, as our system is up in the cloud. Furthermore, there is a good coffee machine, and that’s it. This is all they need.
This clean style of working is also typical for our system. Every feature is thoroughly discussed and assessed before implementing, thus ensuring no unnecessary complicated features are added unless it improves the user experience.
‘The goal is always for it to be super intuitive. It only has the features we really need’, says Essam.
Our system is build from the view of the newcomer
But when we talk about user experience, which users are we talking about? ‘What makes our system unique is that it is built from the view of the newcomer’, says Gert. ‘It comes in multiple different languages, and we capture the ambition, education, experience and dreams of the newcomer. With this information, we look for a vacancy. So, we don’t put up vacancies and then see who fit’s the criteria.’ This is interesting for all companies who match two parties together. The blueprint of our system has already been sold to and customized for three other clients.
The future holds the desire to use more of the valuable data stored in the system so we can understand more about the impact we make. But the near future holds the biggest wish to see each other in person again soon. It feels somehow comforting that even the digital people are fed up meeting digitally. Time to meet up!
