Founder Spotlight: Meet Elise
Elise is passionate about delivering impact for customers by leveraging technology to create a personalised experience for them.
She was recently on our Lambeth ‘How to start a career in Tech’ program to get some insights into how to pivot her career into Tech. She has since then got a role as an Operations and Customer Support intern at Wealth8 and gained key fintech experience allowing her to grow her skills in different tech areas.
Elise tell us a bit about yourself?
I’m currently an Operations and Customer Support intern at Wealth8 — an investment platform on a mission to reduce the racial wealth gap by democratising access to global funds and accessible financial education. Prior to this, I was a management consultant analyst for a year. Whilst doing consulting, I noticed that I really enjoyed the customer aspect of the job in which I would interview clients’ customers. It would often reveal interesting aspects of the customer experience and perhaps how they were not being met. However, consulting firms can rarely implement direct change onto clients after analysing and finding interesting insights so this led me to think about new career paths where I’d be able to have more of a direct impact on customers.
I decided to pivot into tech specifically because it’s such an ever-developing industry and an exciting space to work in. When I worked in consulting, often the companies which leveraged technology the most to optimise their offering were leaders in their sectors.
By reflecting on work that I enjoy, I decided to specifically explore roles such as project management and product management. My current role has allowed me to explore this as I’ve been able to shadow the product team and work with customers to solve their issues. I’ve been enjoying the aspect of stakeholder management and having the ability to more directly provide a better experience for customers.
In the future, I’d love to continue to serve customers either as a project manager or a product manager.
Outside of work, I like to bake, and I have my own handwritten calligraphy card business on Etsy called What A Cheek. I am also currently teaching myself how to DJ! I’m inspired by a lot of disco, funk and jackin’ house. I’ve started doing biweekly mixes to share with my friends and family so that’s been exciting. If you’re curious my Soundcloud name is Vigilante :)
How did you come in contact with Foundervine and why?
I saw an Instagram advert from Foundervine for the ‘Launch your career in tech program’ which was done in partnership with Lambeth Council. I applied for the program because at that time I had decided that I wanted to pivot into tech and thought this would be a great platform to give me a breadth of insight.
How was your experience on our program and what were the 3 biggest takeaways?
I had a great experience in the program. It was well run, the sessions were interactive, the teachings were highly valuable and the speakers were incredibly dynamic. So many of the speakers were so clearly passionate about what they do and their desire to share that.
My biggest takeaways from the program were:
- Opportunities in tech are plentiful and diverse. There is a wide array of non-technical tech jobs that I didn’t know existed before.
- Although new skills are great and desired, a lot of my past experience could be easily leveraged to support a move into tech.
- The size and the stage of funding that a company/startup has gone through will strongly influence the work environment and job role. This is something to consider when applying for roles.
How did the connection with Wealth 8 come about and what is your job role?
The opportunity came about through Foundervine as the position had been put up on our program’s community slack channel. Per the job description document, I reached out to David Fisayo (Founder of Wealth8 and Fellow of Foundervine) and went through the interview process.
The internship has been an invaluable experience for me, I’ve been able to shadow the product team and have had strong ownership of the customer support program. Wealth8 has a great mission and a great team, so working alongside them has been a privilege.
Any top tips for people signing up for programs at Foundervine?
I believe it is key to have an idea of what you’d like to get out of Foundervine programs. Once you have defined outcomes, I think it is easier to establish the small steps that will get you to those outcomes. Foundervine is really helpful in facilitating this.
For instance, if your goal is to establish a larger tech network, be sure to be friendly during the sessions, connect with your peers and students on Linkedin after, show support and share resources with others using the Vine Community platform.
If your goal is to increase your understanding of the tech sector, be sure to be interactive in the sessions and ask questions. So many peers and speakers at the programs want to help, so leverage this.
Definitely, do you have any asks or gives to the vine community?
I think community and networking are really important so I’d be more than happy to chat with others in the community about my time in consulting or about starting in tech.
I’d also love to chat with more people in the community about entrepreneurship and tech careers, especially with those who work in project management and product. Any advice, insights or opportunities would be greatly appreciated.
So what are some of the goals in your journey ahead?
I’d love to work in a role in which I get to liaise with a range of different stakeholders to ensure the best outcome for customers. A role which would allow me to have key relationships with customers in which I can provide the best solution, whilst also working alongside the product team, would be my main tech goal.
Outside of tech, I also have an entrepreneurial goal to launch a solid gold jewellery business by the age of 30. Jewellery is a passion of mine and I think it’s a great way to express oneself. However, there are issues in the current offering that I have noticed as a consumer. So in the future, I’ll flesh out that idea. Watch this space!
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