When backend developer Veronica Gidén starts her workday at Blocket, it is with the purpose of enabling and visualising sustainable consumption of goods. She is motivated by her diverse team, the important purpose of her job – and last, but not least by making a difference for millions of people every day.
“Contributing to sustainability – especially saving mankind from a climate disaster – is one of the reasons I joined Blocket, and I am extra proud of my hackathon group’s work on sustainability features on our marketplace,” says Veronica Gidén.
In her everyday work life, Veronica spends most of her time working on Blocket’s safe shipping service. But, during 2021 an idea emerged from the Blocket Climate and Environment Advisory Board: What if we visualized all the climate savings?
“All of a sudden it’s the end of 2021 and we have been hacking away for five consecutive hackathons, in various fun constellations of all kinds of developers, UX and product designers,” says Veronica.
“ So far, we have created a new profile page where our users can see how they have contributed to saved CO2 equivalents by selling stuff at Blocket, and we have added climate savings data to our ad pages. And we are far from done!”
The team has been a mixed group of people, from various teams and with different competences. Veronica shares that the important purpose is highly motivating for her and the team:
“ I believe that most people get extra motivated by an important purpose. And of course, it goes without saying that the biggest motivation is having your creations used by actual, real users!”
Aside from the projects Veronica is working on herself, she is very enthusiastic about several of Schibsted’s initiatives. Blocket is a part of the Schibsted family, and in addition to her own projects she lists a few that she believes potential colleagues should know about.
“There is a lot of world-improving fun going on at Schibsted, and great special interest groups to join. One of my favourites is Shetech, whose vision is to promote and empower women in the tech industry. And both Blocket and other companies across Schibsted have Advisory Boards for several purposes, as well as fantastic people working on Diversity & Inclusion,” says Veronica Gidén.
