Aries Systems Corporation

Tell us a little about yourself – how long have you been working for Aries? What did you do before joining Aries?

I have been with Aries for over four years now, joining as a member of the global Client Services (CS) team in April 2020. I actually worked in academic publishing prior to joining Aries, but had no previous experience with Editorial Manager (EM) or submission systems in general. My previous roles include sales, account management, medical information and I was a Clinical Biochemist in the National Health Service (NHS) for ten years.

What have your roles at Aries been?

When I first started as an Aries Account Coordinator, I supported my own clients – a mixture of single journal publishers and publishers with 30-40 journals. As my role evolved, I then split my time 50/50 to support the Elsevier Support team and recently have moved to that team 100% and now work solely on supporting Elsevier EM sites.

How have your previous roles helped you in your current position?

Having no experience of systems such as EM was both a bonus and drawback. Previous experience in academic publishing helped in regard to sector knowledge but it was a steep learning curve. I happened to join Aries at the same time as another colleague on the CS team in the exact same position, which was ideal for training, sharing issues, and problem solving. We leaned on each other a lot for bouncing ideas and sharing queries.

Tell me about your department and the people you work most closely with.

The EU team within Aries Client Services is quite close knit and we work well in terms of collaboration and EM knowledge. Some members of our German-based team have over 40 years between them! Pairing this expertise with members of the UK and US teams, everyone has an opinion and will happily share that knowledge if needed.

I work most closely with the CS members who are dedicated to Elsevier support. Recently, we have been busy helping our newest team members troubleshoot issues and slowly getting up to speed on the volume of script requests and Elsevier requests.

How do you collaborate with other departments within Aries?

I escalate a lot of support cases over to the Aries DBA department – they are the team I talk to the most over the course of my day. These can be simple issues that require an undo, or something a bit more complex that may require a discussion or some research and investigation. On occasion, I need to discuss something specific with Product Management to clarify exactly how a feature should work. Slack channels are a fantastic source of information – tapping into the company expertise.

Describe your typical workday.

I typically start at 7am and finish at 5pm – so I tend to log in early with several large coffees looking at the support cases that have been escalated over to us by the Elsevier APS team. I get on with a few cases prior to the US team coming online. Communication has always been a key part of our team’s daily routine, and I spend time every morning discussing cases with at least two other colleagues. We discuss what has arrived and look at support trends across different publishers (this can help with identifying potential problems). Our team has some new starters so training and bouncing ideas across each other forms a key part of the daily routine.

What do you most enjoy about your job? What do you enjoy most about working for Aries?    

Every day is different and some days are all hands to the pump, but the key theme is people interaction. I have always been an early starter and think more clearly on early morning and so starting early is a boon. Additionally – the work life balance combined with lack of micro-management at Aries is a plus.

What are you currently reading, listening to, or watching?

I have always enjoyed science fiction and dystopian novels and am currently revisiting my teenage Isaac Asimov years.

Tell me about some of your hobbies/interests outside of work.

I have always been interested in repairing mechanical and electrical/electronic items and discovered Repair Café’s a few years ago. I spend a few weekends a month as a volunteer repairer and combine that with repairs for the Oxford Library of Things. Outside of that – running every other day and welding scrap metal into something else feature highly.