While everybody is hopefully enjoying a lovely summer break, we have another Employee in the Spotlight for you! In this blog series, we introduce all of our team members to you. Last time we spoke to Rigo Brinkman, our newest addition to the development team. This month we stay in the development area, we sat down with Jos van der Kooij, Mopinion’s Product Manager.
Meet Jos. Jos joined Mopinion 8 months ago, and he is already known for his funny GIF’s and team spirit. As our Product Manager, he is constantly trying to find new ways to serve our customers with our feedback software. Jos is like a walking version of IMDB, ask him anything about movies, and he’ll know the answer. When he’s not behind his computer, he is a real family man, enjoying every minute of it.
What does your position at Mopinion entail?
As a Product Manager, I need to make sure we’re working on ‘the right things’: To bring the most value to our users. What do they need/want within our software, and how can we amaze them? And equally important: how and when are we going to achieve that?
What initially drew you to Mopinion?
The work field of feedback collection, combined with the approach of Mopinion; standing out by not standing out. Besides that, the culture is great for me; getting loads of freedom and responsibility to make my mark. The team is really eager and ambitious, with the right dose of fun!
What does a typical work day look like for you?
I usually start the day by checking the latest data and feedback; how is our platform being used, is everything working accordingly and what bugs should be fixed asap? That is followed by recurring check-ins with different colleagues to collect their feedback and suggestions. Based on that, I create the needs for our software, so we can look for a solution with the development team. Also, frequently appearing; testing new features, market research, preparing releases and other product marketing related work. A proper variation!
What is your favorite part about working at Mopinion?
While Mopinion has been an established company for quite some time, we still have that start-up vibe; we move fast, improve on the spot, and there’s an overall Rotterdam mentality of ‘niet lullen, maar poetsen’. I really feel comfortable in that environment.
From day one I felt part of the team and was involved in various projects. Everybody is easy to reach and happy to help each other out, even remotely!
What are the biggest challenges you face in your job?
There’s always more to do than we can. We’re always fizzing with countless new ideas, improvements and wild features. But we can’t do all of them at once, and we prioritise what will be picked up and when. Sometimes that can lead to disappointment if a good idea is not being worked on, when it does not fit our roadmap and other topics are more relevant. I’d love to please everyone, but in my role that’s not very realistic. 😉
At the moment we’re busy finishing the Enhanced Exports. This new feature is a great example of team effort. With our customer success team and the support team, we spoke with our customers and found out that an enhanced export feature would be of great help. This feature was used very often by our customers, and we decided to move forward with developing this new feature. And because of the requests, we gave it priority, so we will launch this feature a lot earlier than we had initially planned it.
What is your proudest moment at Mopinion?
I was very happy to see all the enthusiastic reactions to my announcements and release notes. I loved to hear that our product is even more ‘alive’ within the company since I started. Every colleague is important to create the best product experience, so it’s great to see everybody is heavily involved!
And now for some fun questions…
What do you like to do in your free time?
I have way more hobbies than free time, so I have to choose carefully: I love gaming (as a couch potato on my PS5 or Switch), watching movies (I had a DVD collection of over 1000 movies, which feels ancient now), listening to music (very broad interest). To even those passive hobbies out, I (try to) go to the gym regularly as well.
What is your guilty pleasure?
Though not really ‘guilty’, as a gazillion other people listen to it as well: I’m really a sucker for the Top 2000 on NPO Radio 2. My favourite song of all times is Sultans of Swing by Dire Straits or when I’m in a romantic mood I’ll put on Songbird by Fleetwood Mac, that was our wedding song, so it brings back great memories. I’m also a sucker for those special days between Christmas and New Year when you can fully ‘cocoon’ at home, enjoying family, feast on infinite Christmas snacks (my favourite are the ‘Bolletje Chocoklokjes’) and drinks, making puzzles deep in the night, all while listening to all those beautiful songs on the radio that take you back to times when I wasn’t even born yet. Is it December yet?
Who inspires you?
I don’t have one particular person in mind. I’m inspired by people who are very passionate about something, may it be their niche hobby, an unknown sport, their country or hometown, or their job. If somebody is excited to share what drives them, that’s what inspires me the most.
What is one thing you can’t live without?
I could come up with coffee, music, games or a proper IPA, but I would easily drop all of that for my family. My wife and daughter (5) are the world to me. When I see the pure love my daughter has for even the smallest things, it brightens up my day. Her enthusiasm is so contagious. Every day, she reminds me of all the beauty there is in the world.
What is your favorite quote?
I have never tried that before, so I think I should definitely be able to do that.
Pippi Longstocking
What is your biggest fear?
I used to be afraid of those big ass dragonflies. I get some really prehistoric Jurassic Park kinda vibes of them, and not in a good way. Over time, the biggest fear went away, but I’m still not overly fond of them.
Where do you see yourself in five years?
Usually I answer this question with ‘I don’t even know what to have for dinner tonight’.
I’m currently in a very happy place, with my family and friends, a job at a company that I both love, and I’m in good health. In five years I’d love to be in the same place, being able to look back on 5 great years, with great new memories.
What is something that not many people know about you?
I’m a huge fan of foreign supermarkets. I love to buy the weirdest things I can find while I’m travelling. USA is winning for me. One of my favourite things to do is to go to a Walmart and look for all the M&M’s or Oreo flavours they have. That usually means we already have a year’s supply of candy and cookies in the first week of our holiday.
Stay tuned for more!
This was the life of our Product Manager in a nutshell. We almost forgot to mention that Jos is also known for his inspiring GIFS and great sense of humor. We hope you enjoyed this edition of the Employee Spotlight series! Stay tuned for our next spotlight where we will introduce another Mopinion team member to you.
