Resolverite Spotlight: Matt Gawlik

The Resolverite Spotlight gives a glimpse into our culture through our Resolverites!

Alexa Sutton, our People Ops Specialist, virtually connected with Matt Gawlik, a Product Manager based in Toronto, to learn about his journey at Resolver. 

Alexa: As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

Matt: I don’t think I understood exactly what I wanted to be as a kid, but I knew it was definitely something involving computers. Even as a kindergartener I was drawn to computers, and I’ve been very fortunate to have had a computer at home almost my entire life. At an early age I was taught how to boot up programs from floppy disks, so that I could switch games without calling for help. I was clearly gravitating towards a career in tech as a kid - I just didn’t understand what that actually meant until years later.

Alexa: What finally drew you to the Product field?

Matt: Throughout my initial career as a Developer, I loved taking on additional responsibilities that were outside of my regular day-to-day duties. I helped with things like project planning, writing customer documentation, and serving as the point person for technical support for the things I was working on. When one of my previous employers identified a need to expand their Product team, they felt I was an obvious choice to fill the role. It was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up, so I made the jump from Development to Product, and the rest is history!

Alexa: Why did you choose to join Resolver?

Matt: When I was looking for my next opportunity, culture and the general work environment were important considerations for me. I started reading up on Resolver after I saw a posting for a Product position, and I was impressed by what I found - especially from employee reviews. It seemed like a team that was proud of what they were producing, with a healthy work-life balance in mind. Resolver also represented an opportunity to move from embedded devices into the SaaS space, which I was really excited about!

Alexa: You started at Resolver almost 3 years ago as a Product Owner – how has your role evolved over time? Tell us about how you got promoted.

Matt: Resolver is great about letting us take on things that we’re interested in or passionate about, regardless of if it’s in our job description or not. From the get-go, I eagerly took on additional responsibilities around tooling and process, doing my best to fill in any gaps that I saw. I even had the opportunity to cover a paternity leave for a Scrum Master position. Being encouraged to grow and take on new things that interested me allowed me to show what I was capable of. That led to Resolver wanting to more formally entrust me with additional responsibility - and a promotion!

Alexa: What has surprised you the most about Resolver after your 3 years here?

Matt: The employee investment! Before I joined Resolver, I had never worked on a team that made a healthy work-life balance as much of a priority, or that provided as many opportunities for my own professional development. I even get gentle-yet-firm reminders from my boss to take time off if it’s been a while, or if things have been particularly busy. Resolver is also fantastic about growing and promoting their own - even if it’s across different departments. I’ve worked with multiple Resolverites over the years who have expressed an interest in Product and I’ve always been given the opportunity to show them the ropes, be it letting them shadow me as I go about my day or showing them what goes into something like feature development. It’s great to see people excited about the type of work that I do, and to know that Resolver will help us grow in whatever way we want!

Alexa: I hear that the relationship between Product and Engineering is awesome. Can you tell us a bit about what makes it special?

Matt: Those of us who work on the platform side of Product at Resolver are really “in the trenches” with the Engineering teams. Be it feature development, deploying a release, or dealing with a customer issue, we’re working with them every day - and as a result we really are considered part of their team. Collaboration is one of Resolver's values – this really shows up in the Product-Engineering relationship. We believe it’s important for Engineering to know that Product has their back, and we’ll go to bat for them if we need to. (Plus, it gets us included in the fun stuff like games and hackathons!)

Alexa: How does Product collaborate with other teams, like Professional Services and Sales?

Matt: Product is the bridge between the Engineering team and the rest of the organization. We work with teams like Services and Sales to better understand what our customers need, so that we can make sure we’re building the right things at the right time. Once we’re done building those things, Product then gets to show them off! We offer training to help teams understand the new ways that we can help existing customers, and the new problems that we could potentially solve for prospective ones. And throughout the process, Product is there to answer questions and provide support.

Alexa: You started the Movember team at Resolver – how has Resolver enabled you to run with this cause?

Matt: In 2018, I decided that I was going to shave my beard (for the first time in over a decade!) and raise some funds for Movember. Given that Resolver has a great culture surrounding volunteer participation, I figured it was worth a shot to see if anyone was interested in forming a company team. True to form, a number of people pledged to take part! We’re now in our third year of fielding a Movember team awash with both distinguished and embarrassing facial hair, and Resolverites across the company are once again stepping up to donate. It has been fantastic watching this turn into an annual tradition at Resolver, and I’m glad that I was given the freedom to just take an idea and run with it. (Even though it does mean braving the harsh Canadian November weather with a bare face…)

Alexa: Can you tell us about one of your proudest moments at Resolver?

Matt: Hosting a panel on diversity, inclusion, and belonging in tech at Resolver. I had noticed a lack of conversation around being LGBTQ+ in the workplace outside of Pride Month, and eventually realized that I couldn’t just sit around and hope that someone else would do something about it. The Talent team at Resolver embraced my idea of hosting a panel event, helped me broaden the scope to include other communities, and lent their time and energy to make it happen! I had never hosted a panel event before and was grateful for the opportunity to do so - especially for what turned out to be such a great event filled with important conversations!

Alexa: What’s next for Product at Resolver? What are some exciting projects you can share?

Matt: Our team is growing! We just added two new Product Owners to help strengthen our integrations portfolio and explore new ways to leverage machine learning. We’re also continuing to evolve and mature our processes as we grow, so that we can be more efficient with how we go from ideas to solutions. Working with stakeholders from start to finish, bringing an agile process to everything we do… All great things on the journey to make the experience better for our customers!

Alexa: What’s the best thing about working at Resolver?

Matt: The people - it’s so cliché, but it’s true. I really enjoy working with this team. They’re proud of what we make, and they ensure we still make time for fun. The people are what make Resolver’s culture what it is. The Movember team, the panel event, hackathons… none of that would be possible without the people here embracing it. Being on a team that works hard is great, but being on a team that is great to work with is invaluable!

Thanks for sharing, Matt! If you liked getting the inside scoop on what it’s like to work at Resolver, be sure to come back next month for our next spotlight.