Geocaching Employee Spotlight: Product Owner & Avid Geocacher, Ben Hewitt
This is part of a series of blog posts shining a spotlight on the people of GeocachingHQ. We hope to show you the “geo-who” behind the “geo-what”. 🙂
What is your name?
Ben Hewitt
Yeah, but what’s your Username?
benandjayme (shared with my wife!)
How did you come up with your username?
Hmmmm… it’s not the most creative username, but it’s certainly representative of the two of us!
What is your job title?
Product Owner
What does your job title actually mean? In other words, how do you explain what you do to someone that has no idea what you do?
I’m one of the six members of HQ’s Product team. As a team, we’re responsible for identifying and defining the best new features to add to Geocaching.com and the official mobile apps. “Best” is a lofty and sometimes tough to define goal, so we’re constantly striving to create features that are good for the community, good for the game, and good for the business. Individually, I’m responsible for managing the flow of design and development work that passes through one of our three product delivery teams at HQ and for helping making sure that the team meets our timeline and quality commitments.
Tell us about your geocaching style (exotic locations / quality over quantity)?
I love to use geocaching to explore new places. One of the things I’ve really come to appreciate after almost 8 years of geocaching is that exploration and discovery are always just around the corner. I’ll always love flying across the world and discovering a new country or culture, but I’ve had just as many amazing experiences discovering new places just a few blocks outside of my well-worn everyday routines.
What’s something that surprises you about geocaching – whether it’s the game itself, working at headquarters, or anything else?
I’m always amazed at how many different ways geocachers come up with to play this game. Any time you think you’ve got it down (“THIS is geocaching”), some new and unexpected geocache or trackable experience will surely come along to defy your definition. I love that about this game!
What’s the best piece of geocaching advice or information you ever learned?
An oldie-but-goodie that I do believe: it’s not about the numbers!
