My Compass Journey ??

Meet Nicola Crowley - Nicola has played an integral role in a handful of our teams across the years. Get to know more about her Compass Journey.

Where did you start your Compass journey?

I started with Compass back in 2018, as a casual in the photography department. Then I moved across to the Support team. It was my first full-time job which was exciting but brought a lot of new challenges. I started working in the 'green' team which looks after timetable imports and the financial management side of Compass.

What kind of career growth (and promotions) have you experienced since joining?

When I was in Support I had the amazing opportunity to go across and work from Ireland. As part of that, I helped to set up the Irish office and develop the market over there. I got to train all of the new staff, and also start to work more on the consulting side of Compass - building relationships with clients, and onboarding new schools. I enjoyed working closely with schools, so when I came back to Melbourne, I moved into the Customer Success team and became a Customer Success Manager. In that team I worked a lot with the platinum schools that we had at the time, specifically I helped to troubleshoot and manage the ongoing relationships with them.?

Additionally, I helped set up a new process for product suggestions, as we didn't have a clear way to collect ideas from schools and build them into our product. In creating that process it was clear there was quite a big gap in our Product team, as we didn't have any way to develop ‘quick wins' or turn out fast changes that would bring in a lot of benefit to our schools. For example, it might have been adding one column onto a CSV but we were finding it hard to schedule time for that to be prioritised within Product. After we identified this gap, we created a team in Product to specialise in those ‘quick wins', which is now our fantastic Customer Love team. The purpose of this team is to work directly on the suggestion backlog or from features raised to the Customer Success team to implement ideas directly from schools.

I was lucky enough to move into the Product Owner position in that team, and into the Product department. I’ve been in Product for about a year and a half now - I was in the Customer Love team, and more recently have moved into the New Markets team.

Tell me about a time when you were challenged to grow in your skills and capabilities.

For me, the biggest shift I’ve had was moving into the Product side of Compass. I was very used to working with our schools and talking through their issues. From starting out in Support, you quickly learned how to effectively work through issues with clients on the phone, or speak with clients face-to-face. Moving into Product, it was a completely different dynamic and the processes were very different as well.?

That was a big challenge for me because I felt as if I didn’t really know much about the processes in Product. I didn’t have an understanding of how to scope a card or break down an idea from a customer into something that can be developed and brought through into production. It was a steep learning curve for me to try to pick these skills up quickly, so I could support my team and provide features to customers. I took a Product Management course last year that Compass organised when I first moved into the position. It went through all of the basics of the Agile Methodology and the core fundamentals of Product Ownership. More recently I completed the Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO) course which helped to further solidify these practices. Overall, I enjoyed the challenge and learning new skills both through the courses and working day-to-day as a Product Owner.?

Tell me about a new skill you’ve learned while working here.

As I mentioned before, I did have to pivot quite a lot moving into Product, but before that, in the Customer Success team, I learned a lot about relationship management, and how to speak to and engage with schools directly. It was important to have that ongoing open communication with them to ensure that they are happy, that was something that I never really had to do before. It was a learning experience, especially when you are going out to a school, face-to-face with our customers, and have to think on your feet to ensure that you leave them with a really positive experience and mindset.

Where are you hoping to grow in your career?

Before I joined Product, I never considered that this would be a route that would be open to me or something I might enjoy. Since moving into this team, I love that aspect of Compass, seeing an idea go all the way from development into production. It’s fulfilling to see schools love and use the features that you have worked on from the start. I enjoy the challenge my role brings me and I am looking forward to continuing to grow professionally. I am also looking forward to continuing to work on features that will make our product better and our schools happier.

Like Nicola, if you're keen to grow with Compass, please reach out to our People & Talent team at [email protected]! ??