Monzo Staff Weekly Q&A - Richard Cook (Online Community Manager)

Monzo Chat
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Note : All Monzo Q&As to date can be found here :grinning:

Community People of Monzo!

Gather round my lovelies, for it is a wondrous day. One that shall go down in history in Monzo lore. It’s the 12th Community Q&A, and things are about to get real up in here.

First though… catch up time!

Week 1 : Chris MacLean, Customer Operations & Vulnerable Customers :santa:t2:
Week 2 : James Nicholson, iOS Engineer :green_apple:
Week 3 : Tara Mansfield, People Operations Manager :woman_technologist:t5::man_technologist:t3:
Week 4 : James Routley, Backend Engineer :hammer_and_wrench:
Week 5 : Hugh Wells, Customer Operations :policeman:t3:‍♂
Week 6 : Naz Malik, Technical Specialist :computer:
Week 7 : Fred Morgan, COps Squad Captain (Calls & Social Media) :telephone_receiver:
Week 8 : Emma Northcott, COps Scaling Team :balance_scale:
Week 9 : Jarno Wolf, COps Financial Crime Specialist & Squad Captain :wolf:
Week 10 : Maria Campbell, Head of People :woman_office_worker:t2::man_office_worker:t4:
Week 11 : Jim Amey, Night COps Captain :bat: :crescent_moon:

You may have noticed that changes are afoot on the Monzo Forum recently! We have put in place our Code of Conduct, provided some clarity on our Leadership program amidst a revamp, we’ve got new staff joining us on the forum, and much more!

So what that said - our Staff Q&A this week comes from our awesome Online Community Manager @cookywook!!!

WELCOME TO THE DANGER ZONE. (If you don’t hear the song in your head right now… I don’t know what to tell you!)

tenor-203655822

Here is where we would usually upload a photo of the staff member in question.

Richard insisted that I upload all three that he sent.

GMP20482_preview 15385523_10157851523240405_3679101807619522770_o 26232036_10159852499035405_6192565383531540431_o

They say a picture tells a thousand words. So there’s…um… 3000 words. Give or take a few.

FACTS TIME!

Richard joined us in January 2018! His job includes looking after this forum! (And also managing the Developer’s Slack and our social channels).

He was in a children’s TV game show when he was a kid where he won a MiniDisc player and a Game Boy Advance… (LOL)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6aHgDzxFX90

He used to work at Spotify :musical_note: and his favorite thing about working at Monzo is to be working at an exciting startup that’s still growing! :muscle:t4:

QUESTION TIME!!! Get them in below!

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What is on your Spotify playlist? Do you like cats? If you could give a medal to anyone in Monzo, who would it be and what for? Do you speak any other languages? With different personalities and writing styles, how can you ensure consistency of responses across the Leaders? Marmite, love it or hate it?

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What’s your typical day like at Monzo?

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Princess Fiona as an Ogre or as a Human?

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Can I come back to slack?

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How do you look so different in every picture? Is this the power of Shrek? Which is your favourite Shrek movie? Is the working environment at Monzo very different to Spotify? Why or why not?

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Marvel or DC?

Favourite author?

Comfort food of choice?

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Why didn’t you come to the Crystal Maze with the remote teams!?!?!

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What do you think got you the job at monzo?

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Richard, mah dude!
What is your favourite thing about working for Monzo so far?

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Hey Richard!
What do you think will be the most challenging thing for you at Monzo this year?

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How is Shrek doing?
I’m concerned for him. :worried:

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What feature are you most excited about Monzo releasing this year?

What would a staff Q&A be without me asking this question? Are you a pineapple :pineapple: on pizza :pizza: sort of guy? (:pineapple: + :pizza: = :question:)

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What’s the biggest thing you’ve ever eaten?

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Hey everyone! Thanks for all your wonderful questions. Here’s your answers!

Great question! If you want to know what I’ve got in my rotation right now, check out my insync playlist.

Otherwise, my favourite playlists that I’ve made myself are:

  • Glaze - shoegaze and postrock
  • Covers - a collection of cover songs
  • QQ - just sad songs
  • Wes - the songs from every Wes Anderson film
  • jimmy unrustler - chill out
  • beep boop - chiptune stuff (music that sounds like it’s coming out of an old gameboy)

Of course! Here’s a pic of my family cat, Splat:

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Way too difficult. But I think @simonb deserves a round of applause for his tireless work here on the community, and being a real champion of this place inside the company :clap:

Fun fact: I have a GCSE in Latin?
Sad fact: I never use it.

Good question! It’s hard to say. Leaders aren’t Monzo staff, I can’t tell them how to talk! And it’s better if I don’t. Everyone has their own voice and I don’t want to stamp that out.

I eat nothing else.

Coffee. Breakfast. Coffee. Biscuits. Community. DevSlack. Coffee. Social media. Coffee. Meetings. Lunch. Tea. Community. Meetings. Thinking about my life. After-work event. Home!

Seriously though, as the Online Community Manager my main responsibilities are looking after this forum (plus the DevSlack) and our social channels. So every day is different and varied. There are no ‘typical days’.

I have written extensively on why the moral of Shrek is that appearances are deceiving and it’s what’s inside that matters. So they’re the same.

Good lighting.

Sure.

Shrek > Shrek Forever After > Shrek 2 > Shrek The Halls > Shrek The Third > Scared Shrekless

It’s more similar than different! It’s got the same kind of vibe - a young, tech company full of smart and motivated people. People just drink more Huel here I think.

DC comics. Marvel movies.

Douglas Adams is probably my #1. But I really love Alex Garland too. Honourable mentions for Stephen King, and - of course - Lemony Snicket.

Is sugar a food?

WAS I INVITED?!

My winning smile and charming personality.

Working in a small team for a growing company with lots of responsibility but also freedom to do what I think is right! And the seemingly endless party rings.

Growing this forum. It’s what I’m most motivated about doing at the moment. I think it’s got so much potential to be a core part of the Monzo experience.

Currently back in his box, I’m afraid. He got packaged up when my team moved where we sit. I’ll make sure he gets properly set up soon.

There’s a certain payment method I could mention that I’d love to see supported soon :slight_smile:

But otherwise: CASS! The redesigned spending tab! More fun experiment with Pots.

Absolutely not.

Really fantastic question. Despite asking this question a lot, I don’t really have a good answer myself.

But I did once see one of my flatmates order two pizzas at Pizza Express, put one upside on top of the other and eat it like a sandwich. I’ll never forget it.

Let me know if you have any other questions! You can reach me here on the forum, or over on Twitter.

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Wow! So you also want Samsung Pay :wink:

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Nobody in their right mind wants Samsung Pay. Those who do are wrong.

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I think it’s Fitbit pay …:stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

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Amazing answers, thanks Richard for doing this! :smile:

Ahhhh that’s too kind. I appreciate that. It’s a team effort though! I feel like we’re just scratching the surface of our potential here.

That’s it for this week, there will be another Q&A coming next week!

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Oh, and by the way -

Anyone who wants to discuss moderation decisions made by the community team is always free to to do in private. There’s very little value in discussing them in a public space, because that presumes that everyone knows and cares about why those decisions were made, which is rarely the case - and it opens up the idea that those decisions are up for public debate, which they aren’t.

We won’t tolerate public space discussions being derailed by individual axe-grinding.

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