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Floop Intern Spotlight: Kenny Ma

Kenny Ma (LinkedIn) interned with Floop from Dec 2019 - Sept 2020, working as a Program Manager (PM) & UX Intern and then a Software Engineering (SWE) intern on improving Floop’s onboarding experience.  He is a sophomore studying Computer Science at the University of Washington graduating May 2023, after which he will be looking for opportunities in software engineering and product management. We loved working with Kenny because of leadership, self-awareness, and self-advocacy. Learn more about what Kenny accomplished in his internship with Floop.

Kenny is a fast learner and impactful contributor in both individual and leadership roles. At Floop, Kenny excelled as both a Program Management intern, helping his team consistently meet milestones with high quality, and as a Software Engineering intern, driving his own learning and projects to develop features end-to-end. With his keen sense of self-awareness coupled with self-advocacy, Kenny will continue to grow and thrive in whatever role he finds in the future.

Top Accomplishments

Program Management:

  • Led a UX intern team of 4, auditing onboarding, customer success, and marketing UX for the beta-launch

  • Employed Agile and Scrum methodologies, always guaranteeing delivery and exceeding expectations

  • Coordinated user research interviews and spearheaded a final, comprehensive UX research audit—45+ recommendations were promptly implemented, streamlining the app for the beta-launch

Software Engineering:

  • Self-learned HTML, CSS, JavaScript, React, and Redux to be ready, Day 1. Started with fixing bugs, ended having implemented critical, front-facing functionality, including the signup page and interactive tutorial

  • Researched industry best practices to iteratively redesign Floop’s onboarding with the CEO & COO

  • Implemented the final, responsive redesign, reducing friction in the sign-up flow and initial app usage

Top Strengths

  • Leadership - As a Program Manager intern, Kenny led a team of three other interns in a project to improve Floop’s onboarding experience. After walking through the overall project requirements, Kenny took ownership and directed the project, breaking down requirements into concrete milestones and tasks that he delegated to team members. With his consistent communication, he helped his team meet all their deadlines and produce extremely high quality work. From Floop’s perspective, we were able to step back and completely trust Kenny to lead the team. From his team’s perspective, they praised Kenny’s organization and clear communication of instructions, expectations, and feedback.

  • Self-awareness - Kenny demonstrates self-awareness beyond anyone I know at his age. From his initial interview and through our ongoing 1:1’s, Kenny could always clearly articulate his strengths, interests, and areas of improvement. When we debriefed his team’s midpoint feedback, Kenny was not surprised by any of the feedback, both positive and suggestive.  After hearing a particular piece of anonymous feedback, Kenny immediately identified the person and described the situation. He was able to respond so quickly because he had already reflected on that situation on his own and considered ways that he might improve moving forward.

  • Self-advocacy - Not only does Kenny have high self-awareness, he is able to identify and communicate what he needs that will help him continue to grow. Because Kenny explicitly expressed a desire to improve his web development skills, we happily kept Kenny on the team after he finished his PM internship and transitioned him to a Software Engineering role. During the transition period, he filled gaps in knowledge through self-study and was ready to dive headfirst into the code base. While in his engineering role, Kenny shared that he was interested in learning more about running a startup. At Kenny’s suggestion, we spent part of our regular 1:1 meetings discussing the business aspects of Floop, with Kenny coming prepared with a list of questions. Kenny’s self-awareness of his needs coupled with his self-advocacy make him an incredibly fast learner and impactful contributor.

Summary of Work

Intern Takeaways

Here is what Kenny learned during his time at Floop:

  • PM: From every leadership experience, I try to take away a specific new mindset. My focus coming in was quality and efficiency. I’ve come to realize that, by being more flexible, sacrifices to either can be outweighed by the improvement to everyone’s experience. In the long run, this is even more effective.

  • SWE: 9 months ago, I had never taught myself a software skill. Now, I feel like I can learn anything. Learning by doing all the way.

  • This was my first time at an internship, a company...and a startup. I hope to have my own someday. Floop has been an important step in many different directions.

We loved working with Kenny this year. Best of luck in future endeavors!

Contact Kenny Ma through LinkedIn.

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