Ivy Hughes has always had at least two jobs. She has ghost written books for c-level execs at major US companies. She has been a government reporter, alternative energy reporter and has freelanced for Entrepreneur and Success magazines. She has been sent all over the world to write her stories, including to Abu Dhabi where she covered the first Muslim female athlete to compete in track and field in the Olympics. Now Hughes is the Marketing Manager for Language I/O, a multilingual customer service software development company, and she’s thrilled.
“I feel like the aim of the entire company combines everything that I’m passionate about. You’ve got female ownership. You’ve got the technology element. You’ve got the language element – which is huge – and it’s also helping customers,” said Ivy. “In a startup there’s everything there that combines my interests.”
Just to make sure she’s not bored, Ivy and her partner Cody recently had twin boys, Loren and Ryder.
“I’m 35. We’ve been free and wild for many years. Then you end up with twins and you’re like AND … it’s over,” Ivy said. “But not really. We’re going to have so many adventures. I’m so excited about it. It’s just like a pause.”
A native of Fort Collins, Colorado, Ivy said she wanted to be an author from the time her mother started reading her books. She later majored in journalism at Colorado State University, minoring in political science, Spanish and business. Her first job was for the Glenwood Springs Post Independent, which held her interest for all of six months. She moved on to a job in Michigan covering the state senate for MIRS News, which is somewhat like Politico, where she stayed for three years while she simultaneously built up her freelance career. Her stint with MIRS ended when she finally lost patience with Michigan legislators.
“They couldn’t pass the budget,” Ivy said. “So they would go to dinner and have drinks. I watched senators drinking and throwing M&Ms at each other’s mouths. I was sitting there for hours. I thought, I can’t do this justice. I hate these people. So that was the end.”
Ivy started to focus on her freelance career as well as working with Issue Media Group to help them launch publications such as Capital Gains where she wrote alternative energy stories. She was simultaneously writing for Entrepreneur and Success magazines, who were sending her all over the world. Because that wasn’t enough, Ivy also started ghost writing books about this time. Eventually she was offered a full-time position with a quasi-governmental agency in England called The Trading Standards Institute.
“It was fun for the year to get their social media marketing engines turning. But it’s a quasi-governmental organization – it’s not like a startup.”
And Language I/O is very much like a startup. So when Language I/O offered her the marketing manager position, it was a perfect fit. Ivy said she loves the variety and challenge of it because social media is like a game.
“You’re always changing the formula to see what works,” Ivy said. “I really, really enjoy it. I love startups – always have. I love to see businesses just go for it. It’s an adrenaline rush.”
