ShipEngineer Spotlight: Kasey Cantu

What is your role at ShipEngine?

I help our users throughout the development stage with any questions they might have about our API so that they can confidently build their solution as easily as possible.

Once they have an understanding of exactly what they want to build with ShipEngine, I also help them understand how to implement the functionality of the specific ShipEngine endpoints that will provide the services their solution needs. I then help in making sure that things are running smoothly for them once they go live with their ShipEngine integration.

What does your typical work day look like? 

I start off my day by taking care of my inbox and scheduling meetings with users that will benefit from them. Depending on the day, I might have a team meeting after or I will get straight to Zoom meetings with ShipEngine users that were already scheduled for the given day.

After lunch, I have time set aside to research the harder more involved questions that our Enterprise users bring to me. Typically, my afternoons are filled with Zoom meetings as well, however, there are times where my afternoon is free so I will spend time following up with users that are already in development with their solutions to see if there is anything I can do to help them keep moving forward, or if there are any blockers preventing them from making progress. Based on the responses I get back,  I will either call them immediately, or schedule meetings for the same day or the next, whichever fits the users schedule best.

What tech do you get to work with?

Zoom, Postman, Notion, iTerm2, Spacemacs, and I bounce between the JetBrains products and Visual Studio Code when I am programming.

How do you spend your free time?

I spend most of my free time during the week hanging out with my girlfriend and our dogs. I also spend a lot of time learning and teaching myself new skills in areas I am passionate about.

My hobbies include programming, forex trading, playing fighting games (or video games in general), teaching anyone who is willing to listen to me talk their ear off on a topic I have learned about, and finding new things to do in Austin. I am originally from Houston, so there is still so much of Austin I need to experience!

Kasey Cantu, ShipEngine Implementation Project Manager

If you could have any superpower, what would it be and why

If I could have a super power it would probably be “Instant Transmission” like Goku from Dragon Ball Z. All he has to do is think of someone or some place and he can instantly teleport to that person or place, no matter the distance.

What’s one feature of ShipEngine you want more users to discover?

I would like to see more people finding our Postman walkthrough collection. It is really great at illustrating the data that ShipEngine returns with the new visualize feature in Postman. Often times with API products, it can be hard to see a demo of the API in action, and this is a wonderful way to showcase ShipEngine’s functionality and walk through the “shipment” lifecycle.

What’s a FAQ you receive from users?

The question I get most is, “How do webhooks work?”

I typically will schedule a meeting with the user to help them understand webhooks. This allows me to share my screen with them and illustrate what they are, how they work, and the different webhook options ShipEngine provides. This is where Postman comes in most handy, demonstrating various interactions with our API.

How did you get into this type of work?

I have a lot of sales experience and technical experience which came in handy when I started at ShipStation (a user of ShipEngine) on the trial sales team. From there, I moved on to the Enterprise Account Management team. ShipEngine approached me earlier this year and offered me the role as Implementation Project Manager, where I get to work with the engineering teams of ShipEngine clients to help them build their integrations and have a successful launch of their solution.

How long have you been working on ShipEngine?

I’ve been a part of the ShipEngine team for 8 months.

What did you want to be when you “grow up”?

When I was a kid, I always wanted to be a scientist or chemist. Bill Nye always made the job seem so fun! Plus, the idea of potentially having your research impact the world in a positive way has always been appealing to me.

What is one of your proudest achievements? 

To date, my greatest professional achievement is getting my role at ShipEngine and getting to work with such bright and intelligent people on a daily basis.

Kasey Cantu, Implementation Project Manager at ShipEngine photographed with dad and girlfriend

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