Company Culture Talks #1 — Versum
How to build company culture in organisations that experience rapid growth — An interview with Sebastian Maśka — CEO at Versum
With this interview I’m beginning a new cycle on my blog: Company Culture Talks will consist of the articles and conversations about the core of the companies — culture, leaders’ mindset, challenges, solving problems and emotional intelligence in the teams. Today my guest is Sebastian Maśka CEO at Versum — a SaaS automation platform for SPA and salon management — turned into an international company with over 140 employees.
In the last article on Medium you wrote: “Today, our team consists of 140 people and in the next few years, we want to at least double the number. Versum is growing rapidly, but the approach to managing people remains the same.” — Company culture might be one of the biggest challenges for most organisations that experience a rapid growth, especially in the tech industry. How do you manage to maintain yours with your team scattered around the world?
It’s definitely more challenging now than it was with a team of ten or even a hundred employees. It used to be much easier to remember everyone’s name, but I still manage to pull it off somehow. I expect that with the growing number of team members who work remotely, it will be even more difficult in the future. But we do believe it’s possible to maintain our company culture and create the conditions in which employees can develop.
Managing dispersed teams is another challenge for us, but definitely an interesting one. We do our best to learn about the cultures of our employees and consider it crucial to respect them.
What helps adapt to the changes that we experience is looking for new ways of communication that are suitable for big teams scattered in different places and integrating them with our company operations. For example, one element that I personally care about is that everyone has a camera on when taking part in meetings online. I think video calls shorten the distance and help understand the other person’s emotions.
Small things like that often matter the most and create an environment in which everyone feels understood and respected, and that’s essential for us. In the future, with an even greater number of employees I’d like our company culture to be preserved in each of our offices, taking into account the culture of a given country. If we succeed in that respect, I believe that effective communication will allow to build a strong and successful team, despite the challenges.
You’ve mentioned the changes that the company undergoes with a growing number of new employees. But you’ve also said that changes are often caused by regular employees. How do you manage your employees’ feedback?
We always encourage our employees to be upfront about their opinions. We don’t encourage pure criticism, but we do appreciate when people are not afraid to tell their supervisors or teammates about problems they face on a daily basis.
Open communication is the only way to create a stimulating work environment and our regular employees know that we fully support it. When a problem comes up, it’s important to talk it over, understand different points of view and find a solution together.
It’s particularly important when it comes to the teams that work directly with our customers. We take great care that they feel encouraged to raise problems they are aware of and that other teams take account of their suggestions. But we also value the feedback we get from new employees — they have a fresh perspective and a varied experience and so they can sometimes notice things that our long-term employees don’t pay attention to, because they’re used to the status quo. Even if something works well, we can always try to improve it and that’s why new employees’ opinions are so valuable for us.
In almost any company it’s hard to avoid issues caused by ego conflicts. Also, rewarding some people means that others might feel neglected. How do you overcome problems like that?
What helps us to avoid conflicts in the first place are the rules we follow in our recruitment process. We never hire someone only because of their expertise, but we take care that the person fits well with the team. The comfort of work of our employees is very important to us and when we see that a new employee could hold down the whole team we’d rather take our time to find someone who will fit in with the team’s dynamics. It’s not only the skills that matter, personality is equally important.
There are two things that help prevent ego conflicts. First of all, everyone should have opportunities for constant development and that’s why I always encourage people to leave their comfort zone. Secondly, we do our best to create conditions in which employees can notice and appreciate the efforts of their colleagues. If the two elements are taken care of, the level of employee satisfaction is much higher and so it’s much easier to avoid problems of this kind.
Part of your team is placed in Latin America. Considering the distance, the business habits and values in Brazil or Mexico must be at least slightly different. How do you take care of cultural diversity?
Entering a new market is always an interesting challenge, but to develop on a foreign market, we need to take the cultural specifics into account. Business cultures might be very different depending on the country and it’s important not to ignore the differences but try to understand them and adapt to them to some extent. That’s why we appreciate the help of the team members who are either native to the countries in which we operate or at least have lived in those countries. They are extremely helpful in getting to know the business culture and the customs of a given country. It’s also helpful if the people we hire overseas have some multicultural experience and are also aware of the cultural differences that might come up.
Talking about diversity — from my observation Versum is heterogeneous on many levels: we’ve mentioned cultural aspects, but there are aspects such as age, gender and qualifications, too.
That’s true, but we apply the same rules to all the contexts and try to focus on the benefits of the differences rather than avoid diversity.
Factors like age or gender are not relevant from the point of view of a teamwork — what really matters is that everyone is kind and open to others and that’s what we’re really sensitive about. At work, we’re all one team with one goal, regardless of the differences. So if we want the collaboration to be effective, we have to make sure that everyone feels accepted and encouraged to voice their opinions.
Another thing is that our internal diversity reflects the diversity of our clients, so what may seem to be a difficulty is actually really helpful in understanding their needs.
R: Last time we talked, you said that investors have to understand you would not break certain rules at the expense of growth. This might be a great piece of advice for young startups trying to get financing from Venture Capitals. Could you elaborate on that? Why do you think it’s not worth bending the rules?
In the long run, it’s not possible to run a business against your own rules, so in the process of raising funds, it’s very important to be honest about the vision you have and the goals you’ve set for the company. It’s the only way to avoid potential misunderstandings in the future. Being clear and honest about your ideas will help find investors who share your vision and won’t require reshaping it or changing your approach. That’s why it’s crucial to have clear internal rules, which are then easy to communicate externally. Ethical, honest approach always pays off and it’s also true in this case.
R: I wouldn’t be myself if I didn’t ask about your definition of success as a leader.
I think that a successful leader never lets the position they have dominate their relations with the team.
Above all, it’s important to be a human being first, and only then — a leader.
Otherwise it’s not possible to earn employees’ trust which is so crucial for every business. Being able to build a team which is independent and able to work towards the company’s business goals even if not constantly supervised is my definition of a successful leadership.
