WorkTango Employee Spotlight: John D., Principal Infrastructure Engineer

Here at WorkTango, we’re on a mission to make (work) lives better, and we couldn’t do what we do without the incredible team behind our powerful employee experience software. 

For our next feature in our WorkTango Employee Spotlight blog series, we are highlighting John D., our Principal Infrastructure Engineer, who has been with the company for almost 5 years!  

1. What made you choose to join the WorkTango team?

I previously worked for a company that used WorkTango’s Recognition & Rewards solution, and I really enjoyed the product as an employee. Later, when I was searching for my next role, I saw the opportunity to work with WorkTango, who was trying to make employee lives better. The company’s clear mission and purpose was very appealing to me. I’ve always been a firm believer in that you should enjoy your time at work, and I saw applying at WorkTango as an opportunity to have a direct impact on the employee experience.

2. What are you currently enjoying most about your role here at WorkTango? 

I get to work with some of the smartest folks in their fields who are all focused on creating the best experience possible for our users by improving their (work) lives. We’ve made great strides as a company over the past few years, and working on improving work lives through our technology is a challenge I truly enjoy. Additionally, my teammates within engineering and across the broader company truly make it great to come to work every day.

3. How have you grown since starting at WorkTango? 

I started as the only DevOps engineer here, back when we had a manually managed software infrastructure. Since then I’ve grown to manage a team of engineers working to build an automated, secure, and scalable cloud infrastructure for our applications to run on. It’s been quite an adjustment, as now we’re seeing usage increase more than 5x what it was when I started. 

4. What is your definition of success?

Simply put, that our WorkTango platform just works. That is success. WorkTango is available whenever someone has that thought to give a colleague recognition after a meeting, write down that goal they just thought about whilst making a cup of coffee, or when a leader wants to ask their employees how they think the company could improve to inform decisions that help everybody be more successful and happy. Easy-to-use, reliable, always available software is my goal!

5. What piece of advice would you give to your younger self?

Trust your intuition. There have been so many times I thought something should have been done, but didn’t speak up or act on it and that turned out to cause an issue or worse become a missed opportunity. Over the course of my career, the regrets from acting have been far fewer than the regrets from not acting.

6. If you could have any superpower, what would it be?  

Teleportation. I love to travel and it would be great to just appear somewhere new whenever I want.

7. What is one thing you cannot live without?

Exercise. I’m a huge proponent of staying active. I love lifting and high intensity exercises, but also like a simple walk or hike. 

Building a culture of appreciation is something we take seriously here at WorkTango. We believe that by putting our people first, ensuring their voices are heard, and making sure every team member feels aligned and appreciated for their work, they will continue to drive us forward as an organization. Today, we are grateful for John, who works hard to make sure that our holistic employee experience software is as strong, secure, and powerful as ever. Thank you, John !