Almost two years ago I started my journey together with GANDT Ventures. Back then we were a Team of four, together with Remco, Tobi, Jacek and myself. Since then we have welcomed a handful of new Team members, we moved office and strengthened our position as data-driven digital consultants and venture builder.
I believe that this is a good time to look back at the last 24 Months and reflect on what has happened since and where I am today.
The interview
I met Tobi at a Job Interview for a different position, that I applied to, at our partner agency. The Founder asked Tobi to join the interview a few minutes prior. Before I even knew what happened, I was applying for a different job. In the next few weeks, we set up a second interview and a third one to meet Jacek. I was able to get to know the Team, their beliefs and what Vision they had for GANDT. Needless to say, after offering me the job I accepted and I haven’t looked back since.
Why did I take the Job at GANDT?
Ever since starting my career, I have always felt like there was a massive knowledge gap for digital strategy solutions. GANDT Ventures was founded based on the same belief. The founding Team has a century worth of industry knowledge, working for and starting digital ventures as Westwing, Miflora, C-Date, and Google. When meeting the Team I knew that I found the right place for me to grow as an individual and benefit from their knowledge.
Starting my career as a venture builder
In the first few months, I learned the ins and outs of current clients, took over my first projects and was able to reserve time to learn new skills and tools. I showed the team that they could trust me and I was able to take leadership roles inside the company. After 6 Months they trusted me enough to take the lead role at one of our clients in Salzburg and support a family business in the day to day operations of a fashion e-commerce store with a local and regional business.
At this point in Time, I felt like I have made the right decision. I was able to consult the C-Level on digital strategy solutions, create the adjacent agenda and take the ownership of multiple marketing and management matters. During this process, the team helped me create the tools I needed, develop my skillset and support me when I needed it.
My Second Year
Going into my second year at GANDT Ventures, I felt like I have gained a good grasp of the material and have benefited immensely from the team’s knowledge. In the first year at GANDT, I have learned more than in my previous 3.5 years of studies and working 2 years in the industry with different companies.
At this point, I had the ownership for our data-centric approach, product development, and customer relationship management. When starting as a venture builder I never thought that I would take the lead for our data-centric apartment. In the next 12 months, I developed our core framework for the majority of our top-level reports, marketing reports and datacenter setups with Tableau. We were able to create a framework that gave us the answers necessary to make data-centric decisions. The reports are giving us the necessary tools to control the strategies and understand where we are able to take a positive influence on our client’s development.
Beginning of 2018 I took a little detour, by becoming the knowledge holder for the implementation of the GDPR Guidelines. I helped our clients understand the scope of the GDPR landscape and supported them during the change process.
Next Steps
Currently, we find ourselves at a major turning point for GANDT Ventures. The last 6 Months have shown the impact we can have with our data-centric approach. We are consulting major players in Switzerland, Germany, and Austria on their digital strategies. The conversations that we have, show that we are on the right track and that our approach to digital consulting shows great interest in the market. It’s a great pleasure for me to see what we are able to achieve as a Team of motivated digital strategy experts. For me, this is proof that we are able to do so much more.
Going into my third year, I will take a more active role in our business development unit, creating the initial strategy solutions and implementing them into the daily processes of our clients.
GANDT Ventures
The last two years have shown me that there is a high demand for industry knowledge and support for operational teams that can execute the proposed digital strategies. However, too often agencies and consultants are withholding their industry knowledge to create a dependency on their resources. We want to take a different approach and openly discuss the current development of the industry, solution, and approaches.
All of us at GANDT Ventures have been able to benefit from the knowledge inside our group. Now it’s time for us to take a proactive role in communicating our thoughts and solutions to the outside.
The last two years have taught me so much and I am very proud to be working with such an amazing team. To anyone looking to make a change in the digital industry, feel free to contact us and tell us about yourself. Currently, we are looking for product developers, marketing experts, and motivated teammates from intern to senior positions.
Next year we will be celebrating 5 years of GANDT Ventures and I can’t wait to see what the future holds for us.
