This week on Behind the Scenes we're talking Ellie, our people experience lead.
Ellie started at Florence in 2019 as a customer success executive, she’s tried out a few roles here at Florence before landing in the people team! Read on to find out more about her Florence journey.
Who are you and what do you do at Florence?
I’m Ellie, I’m the people experience lead so obviously I work in the people team! I deal with a lot of different things, my main goal is to make sure everyone is happy with work and what they’re doing.
I onboard everybody; meaning I get everyone set up with their laptops, software, and go through the policies and benefits. I also organise orientation days, I run our All Hands meetings and I do a lot of surveys across the company.
Our main aim this year is to make our onboarding process more structured.
I started Florence two and a half years ago and I’ve been part of loads of different teams and had loads of different roles and when I first onboarded we had an intense two weeks of training.
We were in back to back meetings - whereas now, we’re trying to streamline it because we are growing massively, by the end of the year we’ll be over double our headcount we’re currently on!
We need to make sure that everyone has the same great experience when they join!
What made you want to join Florence?
I started at Florence as a customer success executive. I guess the initial interest that drew me to Florence was that it was a technology start up. I came from another startup but I have no background in healthcare.
I remember in my interview I was adamant I wouldn't get the job because I studied Fashion Business at uni! I met the majority of the team at the time in my interview which is quite uncommon.
It’s very rare you’ll meet the tech team, the marketing team and lots of other teams all in one go.
I remember everyone being really passionate about what they did and I think that’s the one thing that I would say that we are proud about; everyone that works here is very passionate about what they do and I truly believe that we’re going to be a really successful company.
What’s the best advice you’ve ever been given?
The thing that initially came into my head was something I didn’t really do until I started at Florence, it’s actually one of our values.
It’s to ‘ask another question’: we pride ourselves on being open and transparent at Florence, you don’t need to ask anonymous questions, you can just ask that question.
I’m always the person that’s like “this is a stupid question but I’m going to ask it anyway” and then most of the time the person I asked is like “that’s actually a really good question”.
I wish I’d had that mentality at previous places I’ve worked, I think that’s one really good thing about Florence, how open we are and it’s one thing I’ll definitely take with me going forward.
What’s your favourite thing about working at Florence?
The people; which a lot of people don’t really understand.
I’ve made some of my best friends at Florence and a lot of people who have left the company I still talk to regularly, I still meet up with.
In fact, we have yet another person coming back after having previously left the company.
I think that speaks volumes about what it’s like to work at Florence, having people want to come back to work with us again.
What’s the biggest challenge Florence is facing at the moment?
Scaling, we’ve got some pretty big targets this year.
Not just internal hires but us as a company, our plans this year to go international and stuff like that.
What’s a fun fact about you that might surprise us?
I can do four shots in four seconds.
No more comments.
What piece of advice would you give to someone thinking about joining Florence?
I would say get involved in other teams!
The best thing I've done whilst being here is being cross-collaborative and working on different projects with different teams.
I think it’s always nice to understand different teams and what they’re working on and their workload and how they work.
It just gives you a better understanding of the company in general and what you do and what you could do to help somebody else.
Where do you see Florence in five years?
Obviously much bigger than we are right now!
I would probably say, in five years’ time we could be on almost 1000 headcount and definitely global! I’d like to be in America, if I put it out there into the world then maybe, but we will see!
Want to join Ellie and work at Florence? We’re looking for people to come and join one of London’s best startups to work for in 2022. Check out our open roles here.
