How to Build Your First Culture Guidelines

When I was Head of R&D at another startup, the autonomy I had to experiment was awesome, my team was full of unicorns, misfits, and brilliant coders that all played amazingly together, and we built exciting, important things. As I ventured onwards to start my own company, I knew I wanted to re-create that unique dynamic and I’m at the place now in my own career where I have to be really intentional about hiring great people and getting the best out of the team that I already have. Because I’ve been around enough to understand that the people make the (work)place. The people make the product. So, the big question that’s constantly circulating in my head as a CEO is, “what can I do to make all that happen?”

And perhaps you’re there too.

Picture this. You’re finally doing what you always wanted to do. You and the people around you are building this product with the same bubbling energy, the same gut feeling that this is it’s time. And you’re at the point where you have to put words to that collective effort, you have to trim away old habits and start planting new ones. In short, you have to build a culture.

If you’re in the same boat as I am,

Here’s the stuff you already knew:

• Culture eats strategy for breakfast, which means that
• It permeates every aspect of the business. That’s the reason
• I should start defining our culture early on

Here’s the stuff you don’t know (or at least, I didn’t):

• The interest rate on culture debt is higher than financial and technical debt
• No one cares about the culture deck. Well they might, initially but the real culture is in the everyday
• It’s not JUST about the PPP (parties, ping pong tables, and perks)

Why culture? Why now?

If we chew on that for a moment, that the interest rate on culture debt is higher than the other kinds of things that keep us up at night, that’s motivation enough to start building on the culture zeitgeist, now. Because fixing culture takes time — as it deals with the messiest aspects of human nature: our values, motivations, assumptions, preferences. The old adage is true here: prevention is better than cure.

In your position, you know that culture is supposedly going to make you or break you because you’ve read the widely circulated articles here, here, and read the ‘epic’ culture codes here. You know it’s the reason that talent walks in the door and the reason it walks out. Hell, you’ve experienced it yourself. It’s why you left whatever job you were at before here. If “culture” met “brand” on Tinder, it would be a swipe right every.single.time. You want to create a strong culture for the very simple reason that doing so makes work life beautiful because it makes things clear — for you, for your team, for your investors, for the people who have any kind of stake in where your/their time goes. It saves headaches later in terms of new hires and questions of fit.

It deserves the same care and concern as the product guidelines, mission statement and problem statement that you’ve articulated because culture is to business as water is to fish — everywhere, all the time, whether you’re conscious of it or not.

Bill Aulet — Culture Eats Strategy For Breakfast:

“Culture happens whether you want it to or not. It is the DNA of the company and is in large part created by the founders — not by their words so much as their actions.”

It has effects on how you manage, who you manage, the communication and decision-making structures, all of which are at the backbone of the machine you’re building as a company.

Next up: What the f *expletive is culture? and How to culture: A step-by-step guide. Check out these headlines and the rest of the post here.

Originally published at duuoo.io.