Every few months, our teams pause their day-to-day work and take part in a Zerion tradition - “The Glow Up”. Our Glow Up is a two-day hackathon where anyone can pitch an idea, form a group (or work alone) and build a prototype.
At the end of the two days, people present their projects to the wider team. Some are small polish improvements, others are bold rethinks of core parts of the product. Many of these ideas make their way into our product backlog, shaping the future of what we build and Zerion itself.
It’s a favourite time for many as it is great fun, and the demos are a perfect way of celebrating the innovation we have on our team. But also it’s become something that is part of our culture and is closely aligned with our values as a company.
We value people who can solve problems and bring ideas to the table. When we are interviewing, this is one of the key attributes we look out for is being able to challenge the status quo by suggesting new ideas. Product mindset in not just our engineers, but in every Zer on the team is encouraged.
The Glow Up is a core part of what makes the Zerion team the strong unit that it is. I wanted to break down how this small tradition maps to our values and share some of the examples of recent projects we have brought to life throughout this time.
It’s All on Chain
Glow Up demos are shared with the whole company. That visibility and opportunity to show your innovation to the wider team creates excitement, sparks inspiration, and mirrors the culture of openness we want in everything we build. Sure, it takes confidence to show off your creations to the whole of Zerion. But this gives people a chance to develop their demoing and speaking abilities, a super important skillset for everyone to master.
Seek Alpha
Two days might not sound like much, but it pushes us to move quickly and bring ideas to life. It’s short enough that no solution is going to be perfect, and that is ok. Challenging the status quo and finding something that is valuable that can be built within two days forces participants to think outside of the box. Glow Up projects are proof that big value can come from small, focused bursts of creativity.
Be Invested
Glow Up works when people throw themselves into it and build based on their own frustrations or wish list for the product. This requires a deep understanding of the product at Zerion and how your skillsets can improve it. Many of us who work at Zerion have been using the product heavily throughout its lifecycle and this really enables the team to make valuable improvements.
Self-Custodial Humans
Anyone can take an idea and run with it. Glow Up empowers individuals to take ownership of their ideas and see a project through from concept to demo. It’s autonomy in action. Showing that with trust and accountability, great things happen fast. This is the kind of culture we want to encourage all year round, not just for the Glow Up days.
Don’t Be a Maxi
Not every idea makes it into beyond the Glow Up, and that is ok. We vote for winners but the Glow Up celebrates exploration for its own sake. It reminds us to stay open-minded, to enjoy the process of discovery, and not to get too attached to a single solution or path.
To give you an idea for the types of projects that we are building, here were the two winners from the last Glow Up event:
Command Menu By Andrey Zertsalov
Taking the highly competitive award for “best feature”, Andrey (frontend engineer) built a working command menu for the Zerion web app. Dubbed “Zaycast”, it gives users access to a whole range of commands whilst just using their keyboard:
- Navigation and quick actions
- Quick sending and trading
- Asset and wallet search
- Quick math with prices
The command menu in Zerion web app
Zerion Quick Buy By Sergey Chudarin
Taking both the Best Participant and Best Viber categories, Sergey (Product Designer) vibe coded “Zerion Quick Buy”, a browser extension that adds specific Zerion functionality to web3 pages. It provides quick access to token swaps as well as a whole range of other information.
Full project specs and code can be found on Github.
To Sum Up
Glow Ups help to embody Zerion’s values and regularly brings out creativity from the whole team. Every time, we’re amazed how much can be done in 2 days.
If the idea of Glow Ups and our values resonate with you, we encourage you to check out Zerion’s careers page. We always look for talent, so even if we don’t have any open positions feel free to get in touch with me on LinkedIn or X.