Hannah Sowerby joined the marketing team at Volta Trucks in February 2022 after starting her career in a contract hire and truck rental company and wanting to make a real impact in helping the industry become greener, cleaner, and overall more sustainable. In this blog post, she reflects on her time at Volta Trucks so far.
What does Volta Trucks mean to you?
Volta Trucks is a chance to reinvent an industry that is traditionally seen as dangerous and detrimental to the environment.
How was your first week at Volta Trucks?
Due to living almost three hours away from the office, my first week was spent at home getting to know my team via video calls and learning the ropes of working for a whole new company.
At the moment, due to the scale-up nature of the business, around six or seven people join each week, so I actually joined on the same day as two new members of the marketing team, so it was nice to have them to lean on for support.
What’s different about working in a start up?
It’s incredibly fast-paced, full-on, but most of all really exciting. I came from a medium-sized business to Volta Trucks and the feeling is completely different. Volta Trucks embraces new ways of working, such as working remotely, having an office that is open 24 hours, and nearly all meetings and calls are conducted via Teams, Zoom, or Slack.
The most exciting thing for me was, when I did get down to the office, the atmosphere was infectious. There are people who have joined the company from all over the world and have moved to England purely to help with Volta Trucks’ mission. There are also some of the best engineers, finance professionals, and data specialists (just to name a few) coming from huge companies. It certainly doesn’t feel like a ‘normal day in the office’.
How do you stay connected to your teammates in a global and virtual environment?
Staying connected is really important for my role as our team consists of members from all over Europe, and we want to make sure our message and mission are understood by our customers and the public in a number of different countries and languages and that nothing is lost in translation (literally).
To remedy any issues of disconnect, we have a meeting every Monday with everyone from our team. I also make sure I stay connected with my team throughout the week via Slack and Teams.
What job would you like to have, if you didn’t have this one?
I am interested in electrics, so in another life, I would love to be an electrician working with renewable energy to help stop our reliance on the grid (and allow people to charge their cars, vans and trucks completely in a cleaner way!).
What’s one lesson your job has taught you that you think everyone should learn at some point in their life?
Although the transport industry is often perceived in a bad light, it is undoubtedly important. Without it we wouldn’t be able to purchase food the way we do (remember the empty shelves in lockdown), medication would be difficult to get hold of and everything we own inside our homes must be transported from place to place.
However, what working at Volta Trucks has taught me is that can reinvent the wheel, so to speak. If you have a great idea, you can absolutely make a difference and change the status quo. We’re here to disrupt the commercial vehicle industry and change people’s perceptions of it. It feels fantastic to be a part of that.
About the header image: In this picture, Hannah is in Słowiński National Park in Poland, part way through a six-month campervan trip around Europe she did in 2019.
If you would like to find out more about Volta Trucks and our mission to make cities safer and more sustainable, you can see where we are on our journey by clicking here. If you are interested in joining the team, please take a look at current openings we have available here.