| Name | Ben Slater |
|---|---|
| Role | Chief Product Officer |
| Location | Canberra, Australia |
How did you get started working in IT?
I’ve done quite a few jobs in my IT careers, but prior to Instaclustr I worked for Accenture for 10 years with a speciality in BI/Analytics and also some time setting up and running an enterprise managed service in that space. I grabbed the opportunity that came up (at a BBQ down the coast) for a change of scenery and the chance to work on something a bit more fun than the typical enterprise IT scene.
What does your role as ‘Chief Product Officer’ at Instaclustr entail?
Basically, I have responsibility for managing the design, build, and delivery of everything we sell. Our product development, technical operations/support and consulting teams all report to me.
What sort of training or education do you have?
I have a Bachelor of Economics and a Bachelor of Science (Computer Science) from the Australian National University of Canberra. I also have a Grad. Dip. in Management and too many other training courses to possibly count.
How long ago did you join Instaclustr?
I started in Feb 2015.
What’s your favourite part about the company?
Working with some really cutting edge tech and cutting edge customers without the hassles of moving to Silicon Valley.
What is a typical day like at your job?
Pretty varied from product roadmap planning, to helping out consulting or tech-ops teams with customer queries, writing blog-posts, customer sales calls, partner meetings, etc.
What is your favourite thing about working in a start-up company?
Lack of bureaucracy and the ability to change things quickly is the obvious one. For me, flexibility of work hours and work location is also a big plus over previous roles (even if that does include 6AM and 10PM video calls).
What do you enjoy most about your job?
Seeing new features delivered for our customers.
What is your advice to someone interested in working for a company like Instaclustr?
Technical understanding and a love of technical work are a must, but this also needs to be balanced by a focus on delivering results for our customers. There are less technical jobs in the IT industry, but with most of our customers being dev and ops engineers, our job is a very technically demanding role.