What’s your name and what do you do at Liberis?

My name is Stephen Queen I am a Global Operations Manager!

When did you join Liberis and what were your first impressions?

I joined in April 2022, and from my first day, I was blown away by how welcoming and genuinely helpful people were! I made the mistake on day one of not reaching out to anyone on the dress code, so showed up in an entire 3 piece with tie clips and everything and was greeted by my colleague Lewis in his casual t-shirt and jeans 🤦‍♂️. From day one, it was immediately apparent that this was a business full of incredibly talented people, all moving in one direction.

What makes you proud to work here?

There is so much about my role that makes me proud to work here; the work that we do within our team in Global Operations to help the business become more efficient and be operationally ready for the stream of exciting projects we have coming up gives me real satisfaction in my role. However, the overruling pride is the fact that I believe as a business, we provide a fantastic product that fills a substantial gap in the funding market. We are positioned perfectly to do this. I’ve seen merchant stories discussing the value they get from our products to help them grow and thrive in some difficult circumstances.

What are your stand-out memories of working at Liberis so far?

From a work perspective, I have really enjoyed working with our Nordics team on a process review to make their already impressive work even more efficient and effective! It is so interesting to work with people across different countries and cultures. I have learned so much from it! I have also thoroughly enjoyed working on our Robotic Process Automation (RPA) pipeline, learning that not all robots look like the tin man and the incredible process improvements they can achieve!

Socially, the Liberis summer party is a massive stand-out. Getting to meet Liberites from all over the globe in person was great, and the venue was stunning! Team GlOps winning the inaugural Liberis five-a-side tournament was surprisingly easy, cruising past Commercial in the final and look forward to retaining our title next quarter🤪!

Since working here, what ways have you developed – personally and/or professionally?

Personally, I have seen a massive change in myself over the past 6 months. Joining Liberis was the first big change I had made in my career, which was a scary jump to make coming from a role I was safe and comfortable in, but I have learned that pushing yourself out of your comfort zone is the only way to grow and to achieve your potential. Being part of something so new and exciting has had a noticeable impact on my life outside of work; I am much more energetic and keen to do things in my personal life!

Writing this blog, I have looked back on the past 6 months and found it incredible how much I have learnt in such a small time. This was a completely new role to me, with my previous experience being focussed on data, and have had to pick up lots of domain knowledge on Operations, how to ask the right questions, and learning tools to structure process improvement projects. In addition, the scope of my work has been so broad I have developed massively in terms of soft skills. In operations, we have touchpoints with every area of the business and managing projects across such a broad stakeholder group has taught me a lot.

What makes Liberis different from anywhere else you’ve worked?

Most of my previous experience was in consulting, which was great for my development as I learnt so much in different roles, but you can sometimes feel on the outside of teams on client side. At Liberis, I really feel part of a team, and this is a better fit for my personality as I get my energy from feeling responsible not just for myself but for others and for the success of the business. I am driven by expectations and trust, which I feel I have had in abundance at Liberis. The culture is also something I have found quite special, Liberis isn’t an “easy” place to work as there are an immeasurable amount of things we want to achieve. Hence, it isn’t somewhere you can coast, and often this can translate into a toxic workplace environment but couldn’t be further from the truth here. There is a huge focus on work/life balance and a lot of structures in place to maintain a healthy and happy working environment. I have recently joined the D&I council and it is great to see the power and freedom the team have and the work they have done in the business so far.

What makes you stay working here?

What makes me stay at Liberis is the people, the culture and the super exciting things we want to achieve in the future.

What do you look forward to most in Liberis’ future?

I look forward to the role everyone at Liberis truly believes we can have in closing the global funding gap for our merchants, diversifying the merchants we work with and offering support in what looks like a challenging economic environment to come!