Shortlister Spotlight: Meet Abhishek Sharma, Performance Marketing Associate

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Shortlister Spotlight: Meet Abhishek Sharma, Performance Marketing Associate

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In this instalment of Shortlister Spotlights (a Q&A series to get to know some of our team members) meet Abhishek Sharma, our Performance Marketing Associate from Mumbai office!

At Shortlist, we love building our team almost as much as we love building yours! 

We have some pretty amazing people across our three offices who have a real passion for what they do and for the Shortlist mission.

Read to know more about Abhishek’s Shortlist journey. 

Tell us about your life at Shortlist.

Life at Shortlist is pretty amazing! I was the first employee to be onboarded 100% remotely in Shortlist’s history. I work as a Performance Marketer with the marketing team.

My work includes strategizing, running and optimizing paid online campaigns along with SEO to make sure that a lot of people hear about the amazing stuff that we do.

Coming from a Growth Hacking background, you can also find me excitedly proposing new marketing experiments or running one.

What I love about working at Shortlist the most is how everyone isn’t working in silos, and you’re free to take up any task outside of your area of expertise to grow. The growth opportunities at Shortlist are limitless.

When you were little, what did you want to be when you grew up?

Just like the seasons of a year, my career choices kept changing- until I was 20!
When I was 10, I wanted to become an astronaut 👨‍🚀. But then maths happened. I hated math, and you had to be great at it to become an astronaut.

So I set out to consider becoming a historian, scientist, psychologist until I finally found my calling as a marketer.

What is your professional background, and what were you looking for in your next career step when you found Shortlist?

I have been in marketing for more than two years now. I graduated in 2018 with an Engineering degree in Electronics but got my first job as a Marketer.

In my previous role, I was doing marketing alone based on whatever I have learnt via YouTube videos and books.

While searching for a new job I was looking for a place, where I would have exposure to working in marketing teams and have guidance from a senior figure (in marketing) to give my working style a process and a structure.

I was looking for a place where I would continuously be pushing my comfort zone, have creative freedom, and be surrounded by people who are driven.

Shortlist was just the company I was looking for.

How has your current role impacted you?

I have learned so much from my manager on handling people, creating systems and workflows, executing things rapidly and hacking productivity to perform 2x. This role has pushed me to be more data-driven, agile and process-oriented!

I absolutely love it!

What’s your professional superpower?

Generating (practical) ideas quickly! 💡

This helps a lot in creating new campaigns and finding unique angles to showcase our product’s particular feature.

What are three words or phrases you would use to describe Team Shortlist?

Collaborative. Fun. Supportive!

What is your favourite Shortlist value and why? Learn more about our values here!

Own it!

I love how one is given ownership of their ideas and suggestions at Shortlist.

It makes us (the employees) efficient and the mini CEOs of the particular task/campaign/idea.

Why is the Shortlist mission important to you?

Shortlist is changing the way companies are hiring and how candidates are assessed (based on their skills and not just pedigree).

Coming from an Indian engineering college, I have always realized how flawed the college placements were. Companies just hire people based on their marks, grades and stream of education.

I wouldn’t have been a marketer if I hadn’t found my calling and taken things in my own hands to get a job in marketing. But others might not be as fortunate in this attempt.

I think Shortlist is trying to change that, so the mission resonates deeply with me.

What do you like to do outside of work?

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While I was trying to figure out my career choice, I was also figuring out what I love doing.
In this process, I have gathered a ton of hobbies which I don’t particularly excel at but enjoy doing it nonetheless.

I love to read books of various genres ranging from- historical fiction, sci-fi, psychological thrillers to business, self-help, psychology and science textbooks.

When I’m not reading, I try out new things. I play guitar, ukulele and have started learning how to play a cajon. I also love to go hiking and explore the culture of new places.

Every weekend I try learning at least one new thing like building no-code web apps run on google sheets, making no code websites on tools like Webflow and Wix.
If not this- you can find me having a lengthy discussion ( or debates) on online communities like Discord and Reddit.

What are you currently reading, watching, or listening to?

I am the kind of person who reads 3-4 books of different genres in parallel.

Here are some books that I am reading right now:

  1. An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth by Chris Hadfield
  2. What If? Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions by Randall Munroe
  3. Actionable Gamification: Beyond Points, Badges, and Leaderboards by Yu-kai Chou and,
  4. The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

We like to give (virtual) high fives to recognize our team members when they do something awesome. Now is your chance to make a public high five to a fellow Shortlister:

Firstly, I’d give a big high five to my manager, Clement Tesconi, who has always been there to support and help me when I am clueless about how to take a certain experiment from 0 to 1.

Next, I’d like to high-five the entire marketing team- Mita and Brenda who help me out whenever I’m stuck with content (which is my Achilles heel) and are always there to bounce ideas off.

And the leadership team who strives to make work at Shortlist a pleasurable experience and encourage talent to grow.

Thank you, Abhishek! We’re so glad to hear your experiences on Team Shortlist.

Did reading about Abhishek’s experiences make you want to check out the rest of our squad? Check out the rest of our crew here.

If you would like help building your team, let us help you. Shortlist offers a wide range of recruitment solutions that help companies build great teams.

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