Marite F , London, United Kingdom

I like to think that Product Persons are “Bridge Builders”. I often think of a poem that deeply resonated with me, even as a child. It’s the Bridge Builder http://*****.***) written by Will Allen Dromgoole. This poem put me on my track to an eternal curiosity to understand and learn how things are and a passion to make some of these things better for other people.

Simply, a Product Person is someone who looks back, understands, and empathises how others would traverse the same chasms so ‘bridges’ can be built to make other peoples’ journeys safer, simpler, and smarter. A Product Person usually has the necessary emotional intelligence and social awareness to understand others’ pains, needs, emotions, and concerns. From an organisational and business point of view, a Product Person understands and empathises with how Engineering, Marketing, Sales, Operations, Customer Service will support the realisation of the Product and its features.

A brief history of my studies and work:

I first enrolled to study Industrial Engineering. It wasn’t quite what I thought it was. I transferred to Business - Financial Management & Accounting. This made sense. Yet, there was something missing. I needed to learn how to build. This led me to a second field: Computing Information Systems. Combination of business & technical now made me see if & how I can build these 'bridges'.

Fast forward: Co-Founder of 2 startups (U.S. and France); Named Inventor of a USPTO granted patent.

Worked on the delivery of several digital greenfield & business transformation projects for a broad range of sectors: B2B / B2C / Media / Marketing / Advertising, Financial Services, Banking, Corporate / Brokerage / Asset Management. Collected specific knowledge on Payments, Banking, Issuing, Acquiring, Analytics, CRM/Sales/Service, Design Thinking, Service Design, Marketing, Data & Ad tech.

Technically proficient individual: passionate about designing, developing, delivering, deploying, and launching innovative Products, Tools & Services that contribute to clients’ digital business transformation. 20+ years of experience leading & managing large diverse local and remote project teams and thrives in high pressure, challenging product & project environments. Certified Professional Scrum Master; Agile practitioner; Certified Salesforce Einstein Tableau Analytics Consultant; Trade Desk Certified in Programmatic Advertising.

Soft Skills:
Relationship management: I enjoy forming trust and confidence with both internal and external stakeholders. Successful in working with business teams, technical teams, and executive team. Strong ability to: foster cooperation amongst members of cross-functional teams; achieve conflict resolution; unblock blockers; establish cadence and teamwork that inspire and motivate everyone involved in the product development and delivery toward a shared goal.
Social awareness: Empathy with customers to ensure a product-market fit.
Organisational, sales and service awareness: I always try my best to get a deep understanding of how organization operates to build social capital to influence the success of product/service.
Self-awareness and Self-Management: I am self-aware to the extent that I understand my own preferences should always take a back seat to target customers’ preferences. I’m strong with self-management which past colleagues would attest to. I have strong abilities to constantly pivot as required to manage tight deadlines, meet targets & market demands, manage prioritization conflicts & resource constraints – thereby providing a natural leadership to the teams.