That was the main question I had to each person at the company this quarter. It was a great starting point to discuss
- what makes us different?
- what makes Neoteric a great place to work?
- what we should keep doing?
- what we should stop doing?
- what we should start doing?
What I learned from those meetings is more than I could expect. Although we all love celebrating everyone’s birthday with cake and signing, sharing successes over a meal on Friday and me being a Santa Claus for Neoteric kids - this is not what makes us great.
It’s all about the balance between freedom and responsibility. Between “inappropriate jokes” and respect. Between having fun and being professional.
What we appreciate - I say we, because I get the same credit of trust from my team - is that we agree what we want to achieve but are free to choose how to get there. It goes all across the organization from the board, through BDSM (Business Development, Sales, and Marketing - no shades of Grey included) to development teams. And that works great because we have the right people in the right roles and we all look at the same direction.
And that is our culture. It results in building strong relations that go far beyond work. It leads to true friendships and constant learning. It leads to us believing that although there are jobs that pay better, have bigger projects and fancier office - we want to stick together.
It also brings no bullshit between our customer and development teams. Between our teams, departments and each other.
It builds the culture of asking for, giving and receiving feedback.
And the way to sustain it is great communication. Sharing the vision and strategy, Being open with our finance, project pipeline, goals, dreams and opportunities. It keeps us aligned.
We trust each other and we inspire this trust in our customers. It’s a great leverage when you’re putting common efforts to build great software and business.