How We Failed At Company Culture

(And How We Fixed It)#boldmoves16

Hello everyone...

We are NeoMam

We create content that people want to share around

the web

We are a creative agency with only one goal in mind.

We provide in-house SEO teams with media features

that help increase their search visibility.

We l❤ve our clients

Today we are here to talk about the not so shiny side

of business - our mistakes.

Our business was easy…

Until it wasn’t.

I read a book that

changed me

We met this guy

Arend Welmers

Together we started on a journey.

Scorecards

February 2015

Open book

April 2016

MiniGames

March 2015 July 2016 August 2015

Happy ever after...?

Financially things got a lot better

We survived and were starting to thrive.

But something was wrong.

And it was getting worse.

Arguments over scorecards.

Growing disinterest over company financials.

Negative change in office atmosphere.

Cliques started to form.

Back channel communication.

And then came the anonymous reviews...

We started to realise we had forgotten a thing called

“culture”

didn’t cause

our problems.

helped us to see them clearly,

and fix them.

Mistake 1:

We just let culture happen

We got stuck with a culture that didn’t align with

what we wanted.

Fix:

We spent time to identify our values and the type of company we wanted to be.

NeoMam’s Core Values

1.We just say it2.We are one team3.We don’t stop when things get

hard

We now use these values for hiring and rewarding the

team.

And continue to educate them in the same way we do

with financials.

Mistake 2:

We hired on skills not values

Bootstrapped and a naive view of

business.

“If you can do the job - you're hired.”

We ended up with too many different values and ideas of

what NeoMam was.

Fix 1:

All job applicants now fill in a core value questionnaire.

NeoMam Questionnaire

Fix 2:

All in-person interview questions are about cultural

fit.

An in-person job interview

with NeoMam

today

Mistake 3:

We hired too many people too quickly

Growing 137% in one year didn’t help.

With so many new people, culture changed every week

as new faces appeared.

Fix:

Currently we only have the resources to make one hire

every quarter.

Mistake 4:

Not spending time together as a full team

Groups of “work friends” stuck to each other.

=Many people felt left out.

Fix:

We now allocate time during work for group activities.

D&D Fridays

Brazilian jiu-jitsu

Hiking

Lunch

Mistake 5:

Not clear on what is not working

Without numbers, problems can be hard to pinpoint.

We want to move away from emotion and see how the

business is doing.

Fix:

We continually improve our scorecard so we have an

accurate picture of team and individual effort.

February 2015

September 2015

April 2016

August 2016

Today things are a lot better.

We’re sustaining our net profit

Our cash reserves keep growing

Not only financially but also culturally.

What our

team has to

say

One thing to remember:

Don’t leave culture to chance

or you will end up with one you might not like.

Questions?

☞ neomam.com✍ @dannyashton

#boldmoves16