Meet Hector Santiago | Director of Operations

We had the good fortune of connecting with Hector Santiago and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Hector, what do you think makes you most happy? Why?
A good challenge, seeing a project come to life from conception to success. The reason why is because life is about cycles, beginnings and endings. If we learn to close one cycle and start another, we’ll always be creative, full of passion and success. The danger is to fall into and endless cycle and not knowing when to close the process and start a new one.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
I was the Visual Director for a big national retailer for more than 15 years. My career as a visual creative started back in Puerto Rico when I got out of college and slowly made my way into the New York headquarters as the Director of Visual Merchandising and Store design of the company. It wasn’t easy, specially because with a lot of work and dedication I was able to grow relatively fast but that created the challenge of proving myself at a very young age. I was able to be accepted by letting my work speak for myself, being humble and open to learn from people with more experience than me. I think my biggest lessons are humbleness, perseverance and self believe. Humbleness to be able to learn from others, from mistakes and from victories. Perseverance, because by doing things over and over they keep getting better and you earn the experience to be the best. And self believe, because before anyone believes in you, you have to believe in yourself in order to be strong and recognize your value. I would like the world to know about me that it’s ok to end a cycle, to start over, to change. That it’s ok to challenge yourself to be happy in another place or country. That life is about being excited with what you do. When things get easy, it’s boring, you start lacking and it’s not for you anymore. My story is about growth and once at the very top, I decided to end it and start all over in order to be excited and full of passion again.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Even though the headquarters are in Colorado at the moment I’m based in Medellín, Colombia creating new and exciting things for Certified Studios. I hope that next time I go back I get to see and experience all the cool spots the city of Denver has to offer.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
My boss and mentor Nando Mondragon.

Website: certifiedcrown.com

Instagram: crown_crtfd

Image Credits
All clothing by Certified Crown