We meet the new Exonaut® Risk Manager product owner, Vedrana Zeba and find out why it’s important to contribute to a safer society, why developers should join her new team and why she took up painting during the last year of restrictions.
Well, it’s definitely unusual. When I graduated from school I became a hairstylist, running my own salon. After five or six years, I realised I had done what I set out to achieve in that business and decided that it was time to start a new chapter in my life. I’d always been interested in computers, so, I sold the salon and started studying computer science.
I remember being thrilled the day my parents brought home our first computer – which I quickly began to experiment with. Fast forward a few years, when social media became a big thing, and I learned HTML and CSS to make sleeker-looking profiles on the different platforms, which then led me to developing blogs for friends. I guess it was natural to come back to this interest at some point, which I did by studying computer science and then joining 4C.
I was excited to get started following graduation. 4C’s values resonated with me – the fact that the company is actively working towards building a safer society. Working with the type of security that 4C provides to industry and governments and ultimately citizens, is important and fulfilling. How many people can say they work on projects that have made a difference and contribute to a safer society. I can, which is probably why whenever I mention what I work with, people want to know more.
…as a Requirements Analyst for our Exonaut software, which involves a lot of customer and developer interaction. There are always lots of projects on the go, which means planning and preparing different meetings and workshops before consolidating findings and creating requirement specifications. It also involves doing mock-ups, validating implementations, writing feature documentation and more. It has been a great experience to do this over the past two years, but now I’ve taken up a new role with more responsibility – as a Product Owner.
I am the Risk Management software Product Owner. Moving from working with Exonaut across the board, to a dedicated product means I have more say on certain matters, for instance prioritising different backlog items, but then I’m also held more accountable for pushing that development forward and all the obligations that come with this. It’s exciting and challenging. Right now, we’re at a pivotal point as we’re updating and modernising the solution to meet the growing needs of our customer base as we transition it to a web application. I’m currently defining the requirements in order to build a team to take us forward.
We want talented developers who can look at a pre-existing application, understand what’s good about it and what could and should be improved. That means people who want to be challenged on a daily basis and can think outside the box. We’re looking to create an amazing, user-centric solution through a process of iteration and improvement. We’ll provide an innovative and collaborative environment for this to be achieved, in an organisation that promotes growth and education, and rewards staff for their commitment. From a technical perspective, the frontend team will be working in Angular JS, while at the backend it will be Java.
Somebody who’s got their back and will help them to be successful. I really believe in the product and what we’re doing. I know code and have spent the last few years working with developers on a day-to-day basis, so I understand the challenges and demands put on them. I also consider myself to be a self-starter and I’m pretty notorious for getting things done. Nothing makes me quite as happy as checking things off my to-do list, which is essential to make sure we move forward in the right direction – not just with our product but in parallel with the Exonaut solution as a whole. Importantly, I also want to give people the same opportunity to grow in their roles that I’ve been given.
Nothing crazy. I hang out with my boyfriend, family and friends – we like to gather around food. I like to lift barbells and do strength training.
And surprisingly, I got into painting in the last year during the pandemic restrictions. It’s a great way to express creativity and have a bit of fun. At the moment I’m experimenting with acrylic paints and, well, you can see for yourself…
