Congrats to our Project Manager of the Quarter!
We are so very pleased to announce our PM (project manager) of the Quarter is Kelly Clendenning!
Kelly has been with Metaverse for almost 3 years now (she joined on her birthday in August of 2012), and she is highly adored and respected by all of Metaverse. She has been the project manager for our long-time client WildWorks (previously Smart Bomb Interactive) on their super fun virtual world for kids, Animal Jam.
Because of the work she does for projects like Animal Jam, Kelly excels in customer support and managing call centers, community moderation, community engagement, and building strong international teams.
Needless to say, Kelly is driven and creative (although she refers to it as “random”). Despite proudly referring to herself as a workaholic, she recently had a darling little girl whom she dotes on. Some other hobbies for Kelly include video games (console, PC, and PVP), playing piano, writing, and martial arts.
Before Metaverse Mod Squad, Kelly went to college with a computer engineer major. At the same time, she was working professionally as a martial arts instructor. She started teaching martial arts when she was 13 years of age, and learned a lot about business management from the experience. By the age of 17, Kelly helped to run after school programs, developed marketing programs, as well as sales and administration. After leaving school, she worked at Bioware in community moderation, and learned much about the industry, particularly the game space.
Kelly works hard to constantly improve her projects, from team morale, productivity, and quality to project efficiency and building positive customer experiences. Kelly demands the best from her team leadership, as well as from her mods, because she knows they can deliver. She wholeheartedly believes in organization and efficiency.
Kelly’s philosophy:
You hear horror stories about certain company’s customer service, where agents are either poorly trained or simply apathetic. It can be difficult to care about the customer screaming at you on the phone, but it is my hope that we can focus on continually improving a customer’s overall experience. That’s the beautiful challenge. The most important thing I can do for my team is be innovative and continue to try to make things better for my client, customers, and mods (agents). To me, facilitating a positive community in all services (from moderation to customer support) should be a priority. Your audience and your customers are the ones who are going to support you and lead you to success.
This will sound cheesy, but perhaps it is the teacher in me. My proudest moments [at Metaverse] are when I see the people I’ve trained and managed move into leadership roles in the company. While it is definitely on their own merit, I like to think I have a hand in helping to shape their leadership skills.
Here are some things her coworkers had to say about her:
Kelly Clendenning is a star amongst stars in our project management program. She spends every available moment either coaching and motivating her team, or being a world class advocate for her client. Her constant desire to find new and better ways to perform even the most streamlined of tasks is second to none.
She’s been directly responsible for mentoring a number of now very successful project managers that have moved on to other areas of the company, and takes great pleasure in helping others whenever possible.
– Josh Smith, Strategic Management Specialist
Kelly is extremely proactive and thorough in communicating with People Operations. She always includes all necessary information in her emails and communication, allowing People Operations to efficiently handle her requests.
– Gina Miller and the People Ops Team
While all Metaverse Project Managers go above and beyond for their clients, Kelly’s dedication is unrivaled. Her willingness to do whatever it takes has helped her to earn the respect and admiration of both her colleagues and clients. She’s a strong leader, reliable, a natural problem solver, and an overall stellar Project Manager.
– Jason Ferguson, Director of Client Services
To see more about Kelly, and other mods like her, check out our Instagram Account!