It has been a bit over two months since I have started at Castor as a Customer Success Specialist. When I was having one of my first interviews, I asked Elena, my future colleague, to describe a typical working day at Castor. Her answer was: “There is no typical day here!” which intrigued me from the first moment. Now, after two months at Castor, I can confirm there are no typical days and it is one of the many advantages of being part of this awesome team, a team that has ambition to impact the way medical research is conducted!
Having said that, I will give you an impression of what one week at Castor might look like, as friends and family have been asking me for a long time what I am actually doing and how it feels to be part of a growing start-up. I wrote down everything that happened in my role for one week, and will share the result with you below.
Monday
The start of a new week! Today is a public holiday, but it is nice to look back at the weekend during which Castor team participated in the Strong Viking challenge – a run filled with obstacles, mud, and fun! Normally, if there isn’t a public holiday, Monday is reserved for meetings. For example, as Customer Success Team, we meet bi-weekly on Mondays to go through some important to-do items. Last time, we brainstormed on how we can work better as a team and ensure researchers are getting the most of the product, discussed case studies based on previous tickets, and reviewed the progress of our goals for this quarters.
Tuesday
Everyone is back at the office after a long weekend. 9:41 am and our team is gathering in a circle. What could that be? Our daily stand-up! We like to keep each other updated and use this time to discuss our plans for the day. After this short update, we meditate. The meditations are daily and you can choose if you want to join, but it really helps me to stay relaxed, focused, and productive during the day. It is something I really appreciate – as a medical company, healthy habits are quite encouraged here 🙂 At 12:30 we are having lunch together. Afterwards, we get back to answering more tickets!
Wednesday
After our daily stand-up, we head to Leiden. It is just 1 hour away from Amsterdam. We give training for medical researchers who are just starting to get to know Castor. My colleague Elena guides users through Castor EDC and I answer their questions and help with hands-on assignments. It’s so rewarding to see that they can pick it up really quickly and enjoy using our platform!
Thursday
Today my colleagues are taking care of tickets, so I can work on other things. For example, last week I was writing this blog. My other projects include analyzing our Knowledge Base (aka our ‘user manual’) and making suggestions and improvements to it. The self-starter culture and initiative are really appreciated here and everyone is open to ideas. For example, I really enjoy online learning and making videos and proposed to make tutorial videos on how to use our ticketing system. Everyone liked the idea and soon the videos will be published on our internal training site. 🙂
Friday
I am on support duty today which means it’s time to reply to user requests. I must warn you – it is quite addictive, as if you are trying to solve a puzzle. Sometimes questions are quite easy and it takes less than a minute to reply, while other questions will put your problem-solving skills to practice. On Fridays we have a company-wide stand-up to recap what happened in each team the previous week. In the afternoon, we gather for regular company-wide meetings to make sure we are aligned with our mission. One of my favourite parts of the day includes a demo where the developers showcase new awesome features. It is great to finish this week with drinks at the office!
That’s all for now. I hope you enjoyed a glimpse of working at Castor as a Customer Success Specialist. If you feel like this might be something for you, take a look at our vacancies.