About
By Cordo, built by someone who cares.
The beginning
Those who know me can attest that I am not one to sit on my laurels. At eight, I commissioned a custom Spongebob piñata because the party store's options didn't match the vision for my birthday barbeque. By ten, I was making colour-coded documents listing my top choices for summer camps and Christmas presents. At thirteen, I planned a joint birthday party at a nightclub: custom cake, personalized favors, handmade invitations, a curated playlist for the DJ, and a dress code I came up with myself.
Shortly after turning fifteen, I started working summers in a dental office. By twenty, I was running the show: insurance, scheduling, supplies, admin, and serving as personal assistant to two bosses at once. On weekends, I was working political fundraisers and galas at some of Washington D.C.'s most storied venues: the embassies of Sweden, Mexico, Italy, and Peru; several Smithsonian museums; the Library of Congress; and the U.S. Capitol.
Where I come from
I grew up just outside Washington D.C., shaped by my Latin, Caribbean, and West African roots. Almost nine years ago I moved to the Netherlands to study History, Literature, and eventually Political Science. Somewhere along the way, Utrecht stopped feeling like a destination and started feeling like home.
I've spent my life moving between cultures and languages, and I've always known how to read a room and get things done in any of them.
Who I am
I am meticulous, relentlessly organised (or else chaos ensues), and constitutionally incapable of letting a detail fall through the cracks. I am a perfectionist and deeply empathetic, sometimes to my detriment.
I speak up. I notice things. I care, genuinely, about getting it right.
Why By Cordo
By Cordo is the business I built around who I've always been and what I've always done: for family, for bosses, for the people I love. Coordinating the things that pile up. Anticipating what's needed before it's asked. Making sure everything runs quietly so the people around me don't have to think about it.
The name came from playing with the Spanish word for accord: the right word for a service built on trust and partnership. The pact is simple: an agreement to quietly take things off your plate and make your life easier.
Now I can do it for you.
None of it ever felt like work. The piñata, the colour-coded camp lists, someone's seating chart, someone else's tax paperwork. Same satisfaction every time: it was a mess and then it wasn't.
If you have a list like that sitting somewhere, I would love to see it.
And Ivar
The other half of by Cordo
Ivar builds the app, the internal tools, and the systems that keep everything organised behind the scenes.
His background is in legal tech, where his job is turning complicated rules and laws into questions people can actually answer. He studied privacy law, then worked out that he would rather build things than argue about them.
He is picky about the parts nobody ever sees, which is why your messages and files have somewhere safe to sit.
You will work with Susana. Ivar makes sure the work holds together.