Fiona Cohen Tinyclues

7 Questions for Fiona Cohen, Employee Success Director at Tinyclues

Fiona talks about balancing the strategic and operational sides of work, the value of being a people person, and Tinyclues' major new phase of international growth.

VP Customer Experience

Time to read4 min read
May 30, 2018

Employee Success Director at Tinyclues, Fiona Cohen joined the company in March 2017, after ten years working in Human Resources with e-commerce actors like Prestashop and Twenga. Despite the strategic demands of her role in a fast-growing company, Fiona likes to keep an accent on the “human” in her Human Resource management. She’s excited about the challenge of recruiting 50 new team members this year across Tinyclues’ offices in Paris, London, New York, and opening new offices in Germany and Denmark. In this interview, Fiona talks about balancing the strategic and operational sides of work, the value of being a people person, and Tinyclues’ major new phase of international growth…

 What’s a typical day like as Employee Success Director at Tinyclues?

Part of my day is spent on concrete, long-term development projects; Tinyclues is in a huge growth phase right now – our workforce is going to double across 5 offices. Needless to say, this brings its share of HR challenges in terms of scaling! So right now I’m handling a lot of in-depth projects around company culture and work organization, which take up a chunk of each day. The rest of my time is spent on more operational issues related to recruitment, but also providing day-to-day support to people with all sorts of needs.

What’s your favorite thing about Tinyclues?

That’s a no-brainer: it’s the people I’m surrounded by. Tinyclues is a very positive, inspiring place to be; everyone’s united for a common project and the company’s success. Not only that, we have amazingly talented individuals across the board: experts in their field bringing real added value, and people with enormous drive and potential. The combination of strong company culture and high standards makes for a pretty special environment.

What are the most important skills required for your job?

Adapting and anticipating. These are hugely important, and not only because we’re in a growth phase. My ongoing role is to enable others to excel at their work – that’s my main objective.
This means adapting to each individual, taking their concerns and issues into account. So empathy is also an essential quality! Put simply, my job is to help people do their jobs.

What would people never guess you do in your role?

Given the scope of my position…I’d say it’s the one-on-one time I take with people to help them progress and deal with their challenges. You might not expect this to be part of my job, but I do spend a lot of time supporting people on an individual level. Even though my work is more and more focused on strategic development, the “human” side of my role is something I really take to heart.

When are you happiest at work?

When everyone else is happy! It might sound sappy, but it’s true; I’m happiest when the people around me are in a good place. On some level this means that I’m doing a good job, and makes dealing with issues much more pleasant. With all of the tensions in today’s world, a cheerful work environment is even more important.
I love playing a part in the company’s growth – with all the challenges it brings – and knowing that in the end we’ll get there! It’s crucial to me that, as Tinyclues doubles in size, people still thrive and keep their sense of belonging. I visit our London office regularly, and the three offices come together for a general meeting every quarter.

What advice do you have for prospective candidates?

I’d suggest that they get a good handle on artificial intelligence in the world of marketing, understanding deep learning is also a plus. This is very trendy right now, so everyone wants to get in on it, but it’s important to understand how it works. Our CEO, David Bessis, recently wrote a Medium article about building AI-first products that breaks things down in an accessible way. I’d recommend checking it out! We’ve even added the blog article to our on-boarding program for new team members.

What do you think will be the most in-demand tech profiles this year?

Engineers, data scientists and others with experience in tackling machine learning & deep learning challenges are definitely in-demand at the moment. On top of these technical profiles, we’re also looking for go-to market professionals for our sales, customer success and marketing departments.

With 50 positions to fill this year, we’re hiring across all departments! Don’t hesitate to check out our current openings at https://www.tinyclues.com/careers/.

 

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