My Name Is Spencer Abrams — This Is Why I Joined Aha!

I started with odd jobs. My family owns and operates a trucking company in Rushville, Indiana. From the age of 12, I did anything I could to help — painting, cleaning, and answering the phones. But I wanted to contribute more as I got older. So I volunteered to help do expense reporting and negotiate rates for load hauls with drivers. All of this gave me a front seat into what it takes to serve customers and run a successful business.

The puzzle of understanding exactly what a customer needs and then personalizing a solution that addresses their specific problem keeps me engaged.

To learn more about business, I pursued a combined bachelor’s and MBA degree in management at Purdue University. I spent two summers interning at a software company focused on marketing communication. It was an exciting time — email marketing was starting to take off, and we were finding innovative ways to customize messages to people on different digital channels.

I happily accepted a full-time role there after graduation and began a rotational program, which exposed me to multiple areas of the business. Initially, I worked in marketing and sales. I implemented an onboarding program for the marketing consulting group and analyzed how our top customers used email lifecycle campaigns to communicate with their target audience.

But I was curious about how our products were actually built. So I spent the final leg of my rotation program on a newly-formed product team. I spoke to customers, built initial product requirements, and created mockups for a new content management application.

I quickly fell in love with product management — working closely with customers and solving real problems.

This was just a temporary assignment. I convinced my manager to let me stay on the product team permanently. Over the next five years, I led ongoing requirements and prioritization and helped coordinate the launch of a new content management application to more than 10,000 customers.

I was proud of everything I had learned and wanted to apply my knowledge to bring a new product to market quickly. So I joined a startup in Indianapolis that had a small development team but no established product management function. I met with at least one customer per day and created the structure and processes needed to collect user feedback, iterate quickly, and continuously deliver software enhancements to our customers.

Startup life was informative. But I wanted to share product management best practices and help others build great products. I found Aha! through an online job posting and signed up for a free trial. The more I learned about the software, the more I wished I could have used it in my prior roles. It was obvious that this was a tool built to solve actual problems that product and project teams face.

The interview process at Aha! moved quickly. Each person I spoke to helped me deeply understand the team and company culture of excellence. Since joining as a Customer Success manager, I spend almost every minute helping people — teaching them how to use the product, offering best practices, or troubleshooting functionality. I enjoy connecting with our customers over live video calls so I can better understand exactly what they need.

The most gratifying part is seeing customers’ eyes light up once they realize how they will be able to make better decisions and build what people truly care about.

I had never worked remotely before. But I quickly realized what a tremendous asset it is to be part of a company that has always been entirely distributed. Instead of commuting 90 minutes each day as I had before, I now spend that time with my family. The team is also more caring than any other company I have ever worked at. This is reflected in our Aha! Cares program. Twice in the last year, I have been able to champion a nonprofit organization that is working to end homelessness in my community.

Making a meaningful impact on others is incredibly rewarding. I interact with hundreds of customers each month and show them how Aha! can help them achieve their specific goals. I am still finding personalized solutions to customers’ problems — only now I have the privilege of doing this work on a large scale with like-minded teammates.

That is why I joined Aha! — and why you should too.