In the first days of Gini, just like every other first-time founder, we the co-founders were admiring exceptional entrepreneurs who had built outstanding companies. The success stories which touched us most were not the IPO and fast-exit cases, however.<\/p>\n
Companies that made a ton of money, grew exponentially or were mastering the execution game with e-commerce copycats were interesting\u200a\u2014\u200abut didn\u2019t blow us away. What really amazed us were the few companies that created environments where people are truly happy. Places where people treated each other with an incredible amount of love. Entrepreneurs that had built successful businesses while putting people, not revenue first\u200a\u2014\u200aand where the atmosphere resembled a group of close friends on a trip together rather than a serious workplace.<\/p>\n
When reading about businesses where the whole company including their kitchen chef ate together at a long table every noon, it deeply resonated with us. We were intrigued by businesses that paid education and healthcare for their employees\u2019 families. And we were amazed by an organization that even bought an island and built a luxurious holiday resort for its people to spend free vacations. Caring so much about creating an amazing workplace touched us. And it didn\u2019t seem complicated\u200a\u2014\u200agiven sufficient revenues and cash at hand.<\/p>\n
What remained a mystery, however, was how to create an environment where people are not just happy during breaks\u200a\u2014\u200abut whilst working. How to install a culture where people truly love working together with their team mates. Where everyone is intrinsically motivated, deeply cares for their colleagues and the success of the whole team. Where the job doesn\u2019t feel like a way to follow a personal career ladder\u200a\u2014\u200abut an exciting mission one can be part of.<\/p>\n
While we knew what kind of culture we aspired to build, we didn\u2019t have a clue how hard it would be to get there.<\/p>\n
A few years later, we had reached the status of a typical startup. At about forty employees, we had burnt the first venture capital millions and the pressure to hit our goals increased steadily. We invested a significant amount of time into trying to improve our culture and asked diverse \u201cexperts\u201d and seasoned management coaches for support. Because survival of the business was often at stake, we listened to conventional management theory\u200a\u2014\u200aand came up with plenty of mechanisms to control and steer our people.<\/p>\n
We installed proper hierarchies and hired senior leaders, had frequent one-on-one meetings with our \u201cdirect reports\u201d, controlled all budget decisions and made sure to listen carefully to our employees\u200a\u2014\u200abefore making the calls ourselves.<\/p>\n
On the other hand \u2014 and because we had the vision in mind to have not just an effective, but also a fun culture \u2014 we added ingredients to build a startup team spirit. We offered regular Q&A sessions where anybody could ask the founders whatever sensitive topic came to their mind (the \u201chow many months do we have until we\u2019re broke\u201d was probably an all-time favorite). We used agile methodologies in product development and did bi-weekly retros to learn from our failures and get better. We did three day offsites in the mountains with plenty of teambuilding exercises to compensate for the fast growth. And of course, we offered perks we thought would guarantee a great culture \u2014 a huge office with a fancy lounge, a dedicated foosball table & games room, movie nights, weekly team cooking etc.<\/p>\n
And yet, besides all the work on the culture, the result was miles away from what we had in mind. Communication was slow and backlogs were growing huge. The speed at which the company moved forward resembled a large tanker rather than a race boat. Our employees\u2019 commitment was mediocre\u200a\u2014\u200aand happiness, once our biggest driver, absent.<\/p>\n
Fortunately, we knew the very source of the problem: More and more often, we were frustrated with our employees\u2019 lack of motivation. If only they had the right attitude, everything else would fall into place. And to get there, our mentors already gave us the answer\u200a\u2014\u200awe\u2019d have to tighten the strings. We\u2019d have to stop being overly kind and get rid of the perks. We\u2019d need to get more serious. We\u2019d need to give less freedom. We\u2019d need to become better leaders.<\/p>\n
While we knew that a \u201ctougher\u201d leadership style was not in line with our personal values, we didn\u2019t know any other way of building an effective company. And since everybody we asked reassured us it was the way to go, it seemed like the only choice. Until we learnt it wasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n
I had heard about companies with very unique cultures, using approaches that contradicted most of what classical management theory teaches (e.g. W.L. Gore, the Gore-Tex company, famous for not having any hierarchies at all). However, I always considered them to be rare exceptions\u200a\u2014\u200aand didn\u2019t get to understand how they made their organizational model work for them.<\/p>\n
Until one day, we stumbled over a blog post<\/a> of Tony Hsieh, founder of Zappos.com and author of \u201eDelivering Happiness<\/a>\u201c. His business was already famous for excellent customer service and an outstanding culture when he made a radical move \u2014 transforming the 1.500 employee company to follow principles of self-organization and getting rid of all management functions. The way he described the inherent downsides of traditional management and the contradiction with his ultimate goal of creating happy employees resonated deeply with me. So deeply that I instantly jumped to his strongly recommended video<\/a> to learn more about self-organization \u2014 and quickly went on to read the book \u201eReinventing Organizations<\/a>\u201c, and absorb everything about it. There it was, the role model we had been looking for so long \u2014 the culture of our dreams was indeed compatible with building a fast-moving and highly effective company. Happy employees and high ambitions do not need to contradict each other. It just affords a radically different approach to thinking about people \u2014 one that was much more in line with our mindset.<\/p>\n The journey started with clarifying our values and making them core to the company\u2019s daily life. It led us to becoming more and more transparent, removing hierarchical pyramids, transforming functional silos (sales team, mobile development team etc.) into small and cross-functional cells and decentralizing decision-making. It allowed us to define a new way of working, where trust and transparency are the default (see ourGini handbook<\/a> for a detailed description how we do it).<\/p>\n It shaped a culture we have long aspired to have \u2014 and created a foundation we continue building on. And best of all, now everyone is actively involved in improving the culture \u2014 from freshly joined to seasoned Ginis and introvert to extrovert.<\/p>\n At the very core stood the belief that a company should create happy people\u200a\u2014\u200aand with them, it can accomplish huge goals. Not the other way around. <\/p>\n .\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 .\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 .<\/p>\n <\/p>\nA long way to the “right” culture<\/h2>\n
\nThis blog aims to give insights into our organizational transformation at Gini \u2014 and hopefully help others to take shortcuts in building a culture of their choice.<\/p>\n