Company Principles

We’re a weird company. By choice. We’ve grown between 40-90% for the last 20 years. Straight. Literally no one comes here with experience that is relevant for that kind of sustained growth. So we have to hire, trust, support, and grow with you. With our kind of growth, you end up not having the luxury to sit around and make amazing value statements, purposes, and principles. Our culture has been described as: Feral. We might be a little proud of that. Sorry. Not Sorry. For the most part, we get excited about the feeling of helping people. Almost to an illness. Like we might question our sanity sometimes. As we’re approaching 2000 employees though, it’s become time to really zero in on what got us here and what we think will help us as our journey continues. It’s important for you to spend some time here understanding our principles, our values, our purpose, and how we work. This job will not be easy. But it will be fulfilling if you’re someone that finds value in helping others. We place a high value on do-ers. People who take ownership of their work and outcomes and can learn from their mistakes and failures. People who can break down complex problems into action plans for those around them. Please enjoy our attempt at company principles. There’s a lot of them. They’re not meant to be catchy. They’re meant to be a north star to provide guidance to push the power down as low into the company as we can get and really activate our employees to be able to drive the company where they feel it should go.

Level Up

Is This Next Level Work? Is this a Next Level Outcome? Is this a Next Level Experience? Are we providing a Next Level Job?

We help employees and our customers reach the next level and support them as far as they’d like to go. 

Pursue Unreasonably High Standards

What is the quality level of your output you want to stand for?

If you’re going to do something, have high standards. Every choice you make is a statement of what you want to be known for. 

Urgency

Are you taking action as fast as possible?

If you’re going to do something, do it now. Take action. Solve the hardest problems first thing in the morning and don’t delay.

Fix The Actual Problem

Are you trying to find the actual problem or trying to get a project done?

Often people will focus on showing output, but never accomplishing anything. It’s better to work on and fix the core problem than being right.

Freedom Not Fear

Are you adding to and creating an environment that doesn’t seek permission?

A good culture is one where people don’t have to ask for permission. We empower and trust instead of commanding and controlling. 

Healthy Tension

Are you strengthening yourself and those around you by seeking diverse opinions?

Tension is strength. Fair and balanced is weakness.

Push and Support

How have you pushed, motivated, and supported someone today? 

We don’t lead people. When you lead you cap their potential. We push people to unlock their opportunity, support them when they make bad decisions, and unlock their opportunity with nudges here and there to get back in the right direction.

We’re Scrappy

What’s the actual play and strategy to win long term? Have you found the core problem and searched for the truth? 

Our specialty is the flank move. Business is War. We’re scrappy and creative. We compete with titans with endless budgets. 

We Learn From Our Mistakes

Are you learning and changing what you do from previous outcomes?

Waiting for something to be perfect is a horrible way to go through life. We maintain fast velocity of releases and incremental improvements. We continuously improve and learn from our mistakes along the way.

Have a Plan and Vision – Then Manifest Them

Can you explain your plan and vision for your work without looking it up? If you’re doing good work, you can. If you’re leading, you can always do a passionate 5 minute talk about what you’re currently working on. If you have to think about it, you’re not leading, you’re hoping. 

Simplify Don’t Complexify

Is this the easiest product, service, and experience you’ve ever seen?

Every action you take should simplify something and reduce friction to use it or work here. Your actions should solve problems not introduce new ones. 

Independence and Resiliency

Is the work you’re doing the most resilient path forward? Does it reduce our dependencies?

We build and only buy when the laws of physics demand we buy others’ products. We pay for things we need when we have the cash, with our money, not banks or investors. 

Employees, Customers, Then Profit

What have you done today to make our employees and customers lives better?

If you truly focus on the employee and customer, you need to spend very close to zero time worrying about profit. 

This is Our Sport

Is the competitive world of business fun to you? This job is our sport. Competing in business should be tough, fulfilling, and fun. We hire A players. Not B and C players. We want smarter people than us. We want tougher competitors because we have the time to get hit in the face and learn from them how to get better. 

Play the Long Game

How does this decision help us 10 years from now?

We don’t have to make sort term decisions for short term outcomes. We have the luxury of not needing to meet a quarterly financial goal. That’s our super power. Time is on our side. Think Big. Unreasonably Big.

Why is More Important Than What

Do you understand at lead 3 levels of “Why” you are doing what you are doing? Can you take it to 5 levels? You should know why you are doing what you’re doing 100% of your time here. The REAL why. You should always question people around you why they’re doing what they’re doing. 

Focus on What Matters Most

Are you starting your day with what matters most? Are you working on what moves the needle? The hardest thing in business is to not drown in opportunity. There will always be too much to do and endless opportunities to chase. We can’t do them all. We must focus.

How does this manifest itself in the day to day working environment? We work via product groups. So if you’re on a group, it has a full stack of skills associated with it. You will have a group vision statement, strategy, tenants, and priorities. As a group you will own your product and it’s path. We work in two week sprints. We’re ok launching stuff that sucks as long as we have the urgency and freedom to fix it fast and iterate on it and make it better. We’re not ok waiting months to plan a meeting where we plan a meeting and then seek approval for a plan. We value doing.