Ask an Inkblot: Yi Liu, Implementation Manager

Yi surfing in Santa Cruz, Calif.

Where are you from?

All over–China, Rhode Island, Texas, Delaware, Massachusetts, and California.

Why did you join Inkling?

I joined Inkling for the product and the people. While in grad school, Matt [Inkling Founder and CEO] gave a lunchtime talk about this new textbook app that his company had launched. He showed us a biology textbook with a 3D molecule and I remember thinking, “This is going to change the way people learn forever.” My colleagues at Inkling are the smartest, most humble and passionate people I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with. I learn something new from them every day.

What do you do?

I work with clients to understand their digital content development needs, train them on how to use Habitat, our collaborative content creation environment, and work cross-functionally with our product and engineering teams to turn our clients’ visions into reality.

Inkling Habitat’s comments feature

What has been your proudest moment at Inkling?

My proudest moment was launching two digital medical libraries ExpertConsult (expertconsult.inklingelemdev.wpengine.com) and Student Consult (studentconsult.inklingelemdev.wpengine.com) for Elsevier, one of the largest publishers in the world. We brought 800+ medical titles onto the Inkling platform and designed two white-labeled sites from scratch in under 9 months.

Student Consult for Elsevier

What do you do in your spare time?

I’m a huge fan of astronomy. I took a class in college called “Navigation by the Stars” and ended up working as an engineer at a satellite company for my first job. One of my favorite places is the Mauna Kea Observatory on the Big Island of Hawaii.

Satellite LCROSS that Yi worked on

What’s your favorite book?

Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond. It offers a comprehensive look across geography, technology, ecology, and anthropology on why some societies became more advanced than others in history–a fascinating read.

What do you love about working at Inkling?

The people: they’ll go out of their way to help you with a problem, stay up till 5am to launch a new product, ask you tough questions about your strategy, and then grab a drink and dance on a party bus with you the very next day.