Mikayla O’Connor (left) and Jinshi Lu (right) recently joined the MatBoss team.
MatBoss, wrestling’s premier videostats app, announces two new hires to support the growth of the company. Mikayla O’Connor has been hired as a customer success associate, while Jinshi Lu has joined the MatBoss team as a software developer.
Mikayla O’Connor
As a customer success associate, Mikayla helps customers complete the onboarding steps, as well as answers questions about the app and its functionality.
Mikayla, who hails from Kasson, Minnesota, comes to MatBoss after serving as an account manager for a team equipment and apparel sales company. She graduated from the University of Minnesota with an undergraduate degree in sport management and is currently working on her master’s in sport management. Mikayla was introduced to wrestling at the age of 9 when her brothers first started in youth wrestling. She served as a team manager for the University of Minnesota’s wrestling team.
“Aside from the perks of getting to travel a little bit and visit new cities, the most memorable experience for me as a manager of the Gopher wrestling team was watching the guys on the team that became my friends, grow as wrestlers,” said Mikayla. “I would see where they would start and just be happy if they won a couple matches a season and then seeing how their hard work really paid off and punched them a ticket to NCAAs at the end of the season.”
When she is not working or in school, Mikayla can probably be found on a volleyball court either playing or coaching. She also enjoys spending time at the lake, boating, fishing or anything in between.
Mikayla believes every wrestling program can benefit from using MatBoss.
“Coming from the perspective of being with a program before and during MatBoss, I think every program should use MatBoss,” said Mikayla. “This app made my life much easier as I had to do much less manual work. It also made the coaches’ and the athletes’ life easier as they could get access to the stats and video as soon as it was uploaded, and could really watch it more efficiently.”
Jinshi Lu
In her role as a software developer for MatBoss, Jinshi writes code for the website and focuses on the Android version of the app, which will be available in the future.
Before being hired as a full-time employee, Jinshi served as a part-time intern at MatBoss while she was a student at the University of Minnesota. She received her bachelor’s degree from Minnesota this past May with a major in computer science and minor in statistics.
Jinshi, a native of Shanghai, China, knew she wanted to be a software developer early on in her freshman year of college. What she enjoys most about being a software developer is “the joy of creating something that can be used by many and solving real-world problems with technology.”
According to Jinshi, “The tech world is changing fast and there are endless new things to learn.”
Jinshi enjoys reading books, watching movies and eating good food. Some topics that interest her are design, history, arts, and the vast range of human experiences.
10 quick questions for Mikayla and Jinshi …
1. Coffee or tea?
Mikayla: Coffee … iced white caramel mocha
Jinshi: Neither … I only drink water
2. Do you have any pets?
Mikayla: Not yet. 🙁
Jinshi: I have a pet budgie (called parakeets in the United States)
3. What’s your favorite movie or TV show ever?
Mikayla: Friends
Jinshi: My favorite movie is Fargo and favorite TV show is Black Books
4. What’s on your iPod (or cell phone playlist) right now?
Mikayla: Ed Sheeran, Chris Brown, and a lot of country
Jinshi: Arctic Monkeys.
5. iPhone or Android?
Mikayla: Apple everything
Jinshi: iPhone
6. Morning person or a night owl?
Mikayla: Night owl for sure
Jinshi: Night owl that strives to be a morning person but fails most of the time
7. Favorite city you have ever visited?
Mikayla: Nashville, Tennessee
Jinshi: I love the city I grew up in, Shanghai, but if that doesn’t count, New York City
8. Is a hot dog a sandwich?
Mikayla: Absolutely not … a hot dog is a hot dog
Jinshi: No
9. Ice cream or cake?
Mikayla: Ice cream
Jinshi: Ice cream
10. Mountains or beach?
Mikayla: Both?
Jinshi: Mountains