Growing Proactively through Lifelong Discovery
Marc shares some of the early career lessons that instilled in him an innovative spirit, how he encourages his team to be proactive in career development, and how Verisk culture inspires discovery.
My Role
My Role
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Head of Engineering in a startup called Commerce Signals, an innovative data-sharing platform that provides deep insight into consumer spending behavior across the globe. Acquired by Verisk in 2019
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Leading our engineering team in the exciting work of Verisk Financial's Spend Informed Analytics team, focused on changing their model from consultative engagements to delivering products to more customers in a repeatable fashion
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My team continues to operate as a small company; nimble nature allows quick innovation and delivery to meet customer needs with speed and quality
How My Team Makes a Difference to Customers, Communities, and Society
How My Team Makes a Difference to Customers, Communities, and Society
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Mentorship inside and outside of the organization
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Some team members are Boy Scout leaders; two people created a website for the kids in their neighborhood to teach them how to program and held a code competition to get kids motivated and online, where they were talking to one another and sharing experiences
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Provide this level of mentorship and leadership at Verisk and outside of work
Why Verisk
Why Verisk
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Joined when Verisk acquired Commerce Signals in 2019
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Grateful to be here because of thoughtful and inspiring leaders and colleagues
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The vast amount of data available to my team makes this an absolutely wonderful playground for discovering innovative ways to give customers a better understanding of the unique issues facing retailers and help marketers optimize advertising’s impact on in-store, online, and app sales
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Appreciated Verisk’s openness to new ways of thinking and willingness to evolve. When we became part of Verisk, I was immediately struck by the open mind with which they listened and their willingness to say, “Okay, we’ll try it that way. And if it works, we can encourage others to try it that way as well.” I find this to be a very strong characteristic for an organization.
A Typical Day
A Typical Day
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Get up at 4:30 a.m. every morning; in the office by 7:00 a.m. or 6:30 a.m. when working from home
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Spend most of my time getting involved with my team’s work rather than developing software on my own
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Make sure that everyone on my team knows how valuable they are and how much their work matters; challenge them to continue growing their skills
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In and out of meetings all day, and I try to perform all the day-to-day operational tasks required for my team, so they can focus all their effort on the critical tasks at hand
My Growth Over Time
My Growth Over Time
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Began my software engineering career in 1991 when the industry was being born; became successful and remained relevant by continuing my education; I'm extremely proactive, as I stay ahead of new trends and technologies
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Became an early adopter of new languages and tools. Any time there’s a new tool or a new software language, there are gaps in what it provides. I'd find those gaps and try to solve them, not only for myself and my team, but also for the larger software communities we’re a part of.
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Lately, I’ve focused more on helping my team become the best they can be; I’ve started to make people my business
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When someone joins my team, I make sure they understand that when they’re ready to move on to another opportunity, I expect them to be better software engineers and for their resume to be massively improved. If both of those things don’t happen, then I’ve let them down, and I’ll do everything in my power not to let them down.
Software Engineering Five Years from Now
Software Engineering Five Years from Now
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Personally, I expect to build a platform that provides data as a service.
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We’ll always build bespoke dashboards and software, and we'll strive to provide a way for customers to define the data they want in the way they want it.
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My platform will protect the data from misuse, provide a cost calculation, and meter the usage for billing—all without human involvement.
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Moving from crude entity-level metrics to data that makes sense of the impacts and dependencies of a company on economies, societies, and the environment across all its operating locations
My Career Advice
My Career Advice
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Give maximum effort—at Verisk and beyond
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Your intelligence or talent isn’t all that matters; there’s no substitute for being the hardest worker
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In all situations, be honest and accountable; making a mistake is not something to be avoided—it’s a laudable moment, as long as you learn from it
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