Day in the Life at Seeq: Human Resources Manager

Day in the Life at Seeq: Human Resources Manager

Hello! My name is Gail Wilson, and I’m the Human Resources Manager at Seeq. I currently live in Mount Vernon, Washington, that is until my husband, a Petty Officer First Class in the Navy, receives Permanent Change of Station orders elsewhere. This flexibility to work from any location without disrupting my career was one of many reasons attracting me to Seeq.

I’ve been with Seeq since February 2021, and have worked in several human resource functions prior, for nearly the last decade. In my role at Seeq, I am responsible for a variety of tasks, with new types surfacing almost every day. My core focuses are onboarding new employees—which you can imagine is different here than at most organizations, given everyone company wide is a remote worker–and managing contracts, payroll, and benefits. My days include a lot of documentation, reporting, editing, emailing, and figuring out answers to various questions. Here’s an example of this breakdown:

7:20 AM – I roll out of bed, wishing I could sleep longer, and zombie walk to my closet to get ready for the day, dressing comfortably and presentably for Zoom. Next, I get my seven year-old daughter dressed because she, like myself, is not a morning person. Then I wake my ten year-old son, and head downstairs to get breakfast going, while making sure lunches and bags are ready for the school day.

8:00 AM – With kids whisked off, I move to my home office, start my computer, and log into Qube, Seeq’s virtual office space. I monitor the various tabs I keep open, check Slack messages, and begin weeding through emails. On any given day, I may have between 16 and 60 emails to read and respond to.

9:00 AM – If we have new hires starting, I like to kick off orientation at 9:00 a.m. PT so I can catch those joining from the Eastern and Central time zones during the first half of their first day at Seeq. I walk the new hires through our tech stack, our performance management system called Lattice, our benefits package, and more. I also share Seeq values, explaining our culture and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.

10:00 AM – Once I’m done with onboarding and the paperwork it requires, I turn on a television series I’ve previously watched (so I’m not tempted to look!) to add background noise while I do my work. I must have noise while working, or I can’t focus. This is another perk of working remotely—I can run any background noise at any volume I want in my own office space. Today, I’m playing True Blood in the background.

12:00 PM – I meet with the Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Culture (DEIC) Guild for our monthly meeting. This month we’re discussing how to support colleagues through challenging times.

12:30 PM – By now, I’ve responded to all new emails and Slack messages, and am working on more complex items. This includes sending emails to Rippling, our employee management platform, or NFP, our corporate benefits broker, to resolve employee issues. My meetings are often impromptu, and I’ve met with a few employees throughout the morning who knocked on my Qube to check-in, and others who reached out with questions via Zoom. I’m realizing right about now that I’m hungry.

1:00 PM – The hunger is too much to ignore, and I take a quick 10 minutes to grab some food. Typically I eat leftovers, heat up hot dogs, or make a sandwich. Then I head back to my office to follow up on emails, address items that need it, and continue to tick items off my Trello workspace list, which helps me stay organized.

2:20 PM – At this time, I take an actual lunch break to pick up my kids from school. This is a chance for me to recharge, as I read a book while waiting for their dismissal from class.

3:00 PM – Once back home, the rest of the day is spent catching up, in impromptu Qube or Slack meetings, navigating through resumes for open positions (we have several current openings!) and following up on new tasks obtained during the day.

5:00 PM – Log off to get dinner for my kids, spend time with them playing video games or LEGOs, and then fold laundry or read a book to unwind from the day.