My good friend Torben Gendorf agreed to be the first person in a series of mini interviews of web and email marketing professionals I’m going to host in this blog.
Torben is a former colleague and currently works for Evernote! He’s also a pilot. A REAL pilot that can take a plane, take off and land in a real airport, not in Playstation. This is nothing short of awesome, isn’t it?
Thank you Torben for taking the time to answer these questions.
First question cannot be other than what’s your favourite email app.
Mailbox. I feel like, I tried them all. But this is my winner. Dropbox integration, Mac and iPhone and swipe for any possible action. My current workflow is to spend minimal time on email, so all those quick swipe actions work for me.
A paid app that you feel you just wasted your money.
There was certainly apps, that I loved the concept of but never really ended up using them. One of them is Reporter, which asks you a couple of times a day, what you are doing, who are you with and how you feel to create a report over a long period of time, to see how you generally feel. I never really got into it and dismissed the request to ‘report’. Still, its a beautifully designed app and I would never want to rain on the developers parade. I am happy to pay a few bucks for an app, even if it turns out – it’s not for me. This way, the developer might be able to continue and develop an app, that eventually turns out to be perfect for me.
Can you share with us the home screen of your iPhone?
Here it is… I believe it’s pretty standard. Obviously my world and life revolves around Evernote. As i am pretty bad at remembering stuff, this app contains my whole life. Also I get to test some cool (and not so cool) features way before release.
You call the Zurich Evernote Office the #bestofficeever. Care to share some more details?
Evernote has several offices around the world and they would all easily qualify as #bestofficeever. A relaxed attitude with lots of talented people in an unforced environment makes it easy to come up with great ideas and passion for your work. And daily free lunches and booze as well as other perks, helps as well :).
We try to replicate the feel of the main HQ in the Silicon Valley, of course on a smaller scale. This is what the Evernote HQ looks like.
Best gadget you bought in the past year.
This has to be the Olloclip for me. I love the iPhone camera, however it is just missing lenses to make me leave my regular camera at home. The Olloclip covers those bases: A fisheye, wide angle and macro lens – all in a nice clip that can be easily attached to the iPhone or worn around your neck on a lanyard if not in use. A must buy if you are serious about iPhone photography.
You love flying. Do you keep a log of flights?
Yes, I love flying indeed. Piloting the plane or as a passenger alike. Technically, everything everyones hates about flying – i love. I have been keeping a log of my flights as a passenger on paper from when I was 10 years old. In the late 90’ s I moved this to a german website, flightmemory.com – where I still log my flights today.
For flight, where I am the pilot, I keep a regular old style logbook. This is a requirement by the authorities to confirm that required numbers of hours are flown, to keep your Pilots License valid.
And the final question. Do you have any advice for your 18yo self?
There are many, but the most important one – I have been figuring out over the last few years is to start saving/ investing for retirement. I wish, I would started that with my first job, to gradually save and invest for the future. The more time there is, the bigger your nest egg will grow.
I learned about a UPS employee, that never earned more than $14000 a year, retired in the 90’s, yet managed to accumulate wealth of $70 Million, just to give $36 Million to different charities. That just sounds awesome to me. Here is the article. So, if you are 20 right now, go start a retirement account and put some money in – every month…. and thank me in fifty years :).
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Torben, thanks again for your time and safe travels!