Behind the Flame: Adrienne

Welcome to Behind the Flame, a series created to showcase our incidentios.

Meet Adrienne Lichten, Events Marketing Manager here at incident.io.

Q: What has been your favorite incident.io memory so far?

I have a few memories stringed together as I go to many conferences. Every time I get to see people from the UK or our remote team members for the first time or haven't seen them in a few months. Those are always my favorite memories when you get to hug them, catch up, and grab a coffee. It's been really enjoyable going to each conference and event and seeing incident.io people I haven't seen in a long time.

Q: What is the value that most resonates with you?

Trust by Default. When you have a job and you don't feel trusted, it can be really hard to do your best work and really focus on the task at hand. I find that at incident.io, people really do trust you, your opinion and your thoughts. They trust that you're going to go on and do your best work, that's why it’s the most significant value for me.

Q: What is your favorite benefit?

I have my dog in the office right now. London is crazy and runs around, but I love bringing her in; allowing to have pets in the office has been such a joy for me. I get to spend so much time with her and she has a blast.

Q: What is your favorite Slack channel?

Following a theme here, this is not very unique, but #pets. I love posting pictures of London, and I love seeing everyone else's pets. You get to see a sneak peek into people's lives, whether it’s going on hikes or what they do on a Saturday with their dog.

Q: What advice would you give to yourself on your first day?

Be yourself. I think when we start a job, we can get in our heads and think, I need to be a certain way. I need to show my confidence, I need to speak up, and that's great if you're able to do that right away, but sometimes it takes time to fit it or have the confidence. Try being yourself, right away, people here really appreciate that.

Q: What advice would you give to candidates interviewing?

Have fun with it, we're a funny bunch. We like to joke around and make people feel comfortable. It doesn't have to be really rigid and hitting the perfect answer. We all appreciate someone being unique and again, being themselves.

Q: How would you describe the culture in three words?

Charismatic, supportive, and hardworking. Everyone here is a very, very hard worker and I really appreciate that all hands on deck mentality.

Q: Which incident.io employee would you want to be stuck in a lift with?

I think my girl Kate, who is on the marketing team with me. We've worked on crazy projects and been all hands on deck together. We've become really good friends outside of work too, which I think is really special; every time I see her, it's sort of like catching up with an old friend. So I'd love to just sit in an elevator with her and hear about her life.

Q: What does the last Friday of the month mean to you?

It's like a breath of fresh air. I think because we appreciate it so much, we really do what we want to do. Even if that's like sitting on the couch and doing nothing, it's just peaceful and relaxing and you can really focus on yourself.

Q: What are you most looking forward to with incident.io this year and beyond?

I think our growth, we've already hired quite a few people in the last couple of months. I think seeing all those new folks come in and seeing how wonderful incident.io is going to be will be great. Additionally, we just put on a big conference called Sev0, and seeing that grow will be a big milestone for me in my career, I'm excited to see where that takes us.

Q: What is something that you are excited or proud to have worked on?

It's hard to say anything but SEV0. It was a huge cross-functional team collaboration. We were able to be really creative and come up with cool branding, and great content and bring people from all over the world to one place, which was really special. There are talks of doing multiple cities next year, just a little, give a little, you know, breadcrumb! Seeing that come to life again will be great.

Q: What is it like being part of the Marketing team?

We are small but mighty. We do a lot, we put a lot out there, and we wear many hats. The experience you get with that is really unique and different. We get things done very quickly, and we work so well together; it can only go up from here!

Q: How does the Marketing team collaborate with other departments?

We get to work with lots of different teams, which is honestly one of the best parts of the job and being in marketing. We work with Talent who put a lot of content out there, making sure that new hires get the cool swag that marketing has been a part of ordering and designing. We also get to work with Engineering to organize speaking at events or as part of case studies. No two days are the same, which makes it really interesting. We love working with all the different teams and even seeing our customers in person too.

Q: What is something that surprised you when you joined?

When you are working closely with Co-founders or C-suite, you assume there's going to be a barrier almost. But here I am sitting next to a co-founder who I'm bouncing ideas off! That is so rare in a lot of working environments, but here they don't necessarily see themselves as different from anyone else. It’s been the most unique thing here, the Co-founders and Leadership team are right there with you, doing everything that you're doing.

Q: What has been your favorite customer interaction?

We had a meetup here in our New York office with HashiCorp and incident.io advocate from them attending, they ended up staying with the team afterward. It means everything that our customers not only love using our product but also work with us in person.

Q: If you were to join another team for the day, what team would you join and why?

It would be Engineering, I’d probably mess everything up in the process since my brain is the opposite of that, I'm more on the creative side. I would love to see how they work and try to learn at least one little thing that I can take away from it, also they’re just great people to be around.

Q: Why do you think companies need a reliable incident management tool?

Dealing with incidents can be really scary. We talk a lot about psychological safety, especially within engineering. Engineers are frequently expected to get stuff done, with no complaining or no sharing, even if something is stressful or anxiety-inducing. We take that out of the picture and help teams manage this. We put people at ease, not going to bed, getting an alert and just absolutely panicking. We help solve that, helping calm people down and making things easier. If you do get that on-call alert, it's not the end of the world and you know that incident.io has your back and we'll be there every step of the way.

Q: How does incident.io recognize and celebrate employee achievements and milestones?

We shout it from the rooftops! We have a gratitude channel and we amplify some of the messages during All Hands. We spend a lot of time spotlighting different things and teams, showing inclusion and fairness. If you do something really well or you work really hard, it’ll be recognized. We want to be rewarded for all the hard work that we put in because we're usually on to the next thing, so taking that time and acknowledging it is really important.