Womenize! – Inspiring Stories is our weekly series featuring inspirational women from games and tech. For this edition we talked to April Bowler, CIO & CTO of H.A.G Entertainment. Read more about April in this interview:
 
Hi April! Being a person that wears many hats work-wise, which one is your favorite?

Running a business with just one other person requires that I adopt a broad range of skills. On any given day I’ll act as the graphic designer, web programmer, accountant, proposal writer, customer service representative, account manager, partnerships manager, IT analyst, event coordinator, community manager, and more. My favorite role would have to be that of creative director. I’m not the best graphic designer, but creating all of the design collateral for H.A.G has allowed me to further develop my skills. I love making sure the design is consistent between all material from content posted to our website, newsletter, social, and on stream. In addition to that, I really love being our content strategist and live stream producer.

Are there similarities between the gaming and aerospace industry when it comes to Project Management?

Yes, definitely. In both roles I have to manage budgets, timelines, stakeholder expectations,  and deliverables. In addition to that, I develop project plans and analyze lessons learned. My role with H.A.G has made me a better project manager in my day job and vice versa.

How would you describe the H.A.G. community?

H.A.G stands for hip-hop, anime, and gaming, so we are a community of diverse people that share those common interests. We are primarily active via our Facebook group “The Official Hip-Hop/Anime/Gaming Community” and as of right now we have around 50,000 members. It’s a wonderful community and I get to meet a lot of great individuals including cosplayers, independent hip-hop artists, people writing their own anime/manga series, gamers, and a whole variety of entrepreneurs.

We do a lot of activities together as an organization such as game nights, anime watch parties, trivia nights, karaoke nights, game tournaments, etc. We are excited to start back up what we call our “Throw Down Party Tour” as states begin to reopen from the COVID-19 pandemic. This was a series of live events we started in 2019 with our first stop in Houston followed by Atlanta in early 2020 before the national quarantine started. These events are a way to get the community together to celebrate these three pillars of entertainment.

We’re always seeking ways to expand and engage our community. The support given by our members has allowed H.A.G Entertainment to evolve into what it is today – a marketing and entertainment company specializing in content aggregation and curation, sponsored content, community engagement, event management, and marketing consultation.

Thank you for your time, April!

April’s links: H.A.G Entertainment │ Twitter │ LinkedIn

Womenize! – Inspiring Stories Feature by Sophie Brügmann