42 Interview: Hester Hoogeveen, Project Manager of the Cypriot Team

We’ve picked the right time to meet our cheerful Project Manager Hester Hoogeveen! She’s approaching her first anniversary of working at 42 Studio, and we’re thrilled she has lent her communication and leadership expertise to our team in Cyprus. That’s right – after meeting members of the Israeli and Serbian team, now we get to meet Hester, a true globetrotter whose professional path led her from her native Amsterdam all the way to Sydney and finally to the 42 Studio headquarters in Cyprus.

Now she handles project management for our team that deals with an important issue – web accessibility for people with impairments. How did she dive into this until-recently new topic for her? And how does she stay on her toes in the ever-changing landscape in digital marketing?

1. Walk us through a day in the life of a project manager. What are the most important skills a person should have to do this job day-to-day?

H: Every day is different. The mornings start with team meetings regarding all the pending tasks. We look if we have some urgent tasks on the to-do list that should be taken care of in the morning. Then I go over our 11 websites – I check to see if everything is working and then focus on the content itself. You have to check what’s new around that could be added to them. I also work on the sitemaps to see how the content can be incorporated in a more logical way. SEO is something I focus on, too, site-wide. We check if everything is accessible and if it ranks high on Google. The performance of all the websites should be high, and site visitors should be able to access all the information they need.

There are always last-minute tasks, so we have to switch priorities. You need to be flexible and have a problem-solving and organized mindset if some content needs to be changed ASAP. And finally, you need to love the digital marketing landscape!

2. We live in a fast-changing world. How do you keep up with the latest trends and developments in marketing?

H: I don’t have a TV at home – I do a lot of online courses and watch many YouTube videos. I have niche English and Dutch digital marketing websites that I follow because I’m from the Netherlands, and there are a lot of changes over there in the online landscape. I am very into SEO, so I search for such courses.

When I started working here, web accessibility was quite new for me. I never really thought about how websites have to follow all these regulations. So I needed to dive into the topic and understand all of its parts. That can change with the websites we get, so if we deal with cryptocurrency websites, I have to dive into that topic more.

3. What are the things that you like the most about working at 42 Studio?

H: We have a very multicultural team here in Cyprus. We have people from Israel, the Netherlands, Greece, Cyprus, and so on. I really think that having a different cultural background means you bring more to the table. Also, we have diverse educational backgrounds. Some of us have a background in Criminology, but we all rolled into the digital world in the end. I, on the other hand, studied Communications and worked in many other fields. It’s nice to be in a team where you’re entirely accepted, being from another country.

I like that we are a young team, in the 25-40 range. We’re an inspiring team that has a lot of freedom to develop, train, grow, do online courses, and handle the tasks ourselves. We can speak up and say how we would instead perform it. So I have only positive things to say.