Confessions of a Harmon Brothers Employee
As my last official act as a full-time, in-office Harmon Brothers employee, I want to tell everyone the truth. The public deserves to know what it’s really like to work for Harmon Brothers.
The truth is that working for HB is… awesome.
Now, I’m the kind of person who wears a lot of hats in life (in other words, I’ve had an unusually high number of different jobs for a recent college grad). But I can honestly say that Harmon Brothers is my favorite place I’ve ever worked.
From my first day in the office, I felt like I was part of the HB family. Everyone instantly made me feel so welcome and tried to get to know me. (Like a lot of twenty-somethings) I struggle with imposter syndrome, but people went out of their way to support my efforts and make me feel like I was doing a good job.
I was the first social media manager that Harmon Brothers had ever hired, so a lot of what I was doing was building a strategy from scratch. It was definitely a learning process with plenty of bumps along the road, but, whether it was “What’s Up Wednesdays” or “HB Stories,” I felt like everyone was willing to lend a hand, or a camera, or lighting advice, or a story. People were willing to take a chunk of time out of their busy schedules doing filmmaking or finances or IT to sit down and share a personal experience over social media.
Previously, I had mainly worked at companies where the brand strategy was set in stone. There was very little wiggle room or space for new ideas or creativity. Not so with Harmon Brothers. I was encouraged to make my ideas reality, and now some of those ideas are pillars of our brand strategy.
There was one time I was helping Benton, our CEO, write a blog post and, during our discussion, it hit me that a huge number of the decisions he had made about the direction of the company were a direct response to the personal dreams and career goals of HB employees. Benton told me about how one employee had expressed interest in doing some certain type of project, or another employee wanted to try their hand at a different position. Benton and Daniel take those desires into consideration and make those personal goals company goals. The company is almost like this living organism that is constantly evolving (in part) to fulfill the dreams of the people within it.
Not only do people care about your ideas for HB, but they also care about you and support you outside of the office. A week or two after starting work at Harmon Brothers, I mentioned to a coworker that I had always wanted to create a feminist podcast. He responded by saying, “I’m not a feminist, and I’ve never done a podcast, but I’d love to help you out anyway I can!” A short time later, he helped me make that dream a reality as my producer and co-host (along with several other co-workers who supported our efforts by coming on the show as guests)!
Another amazing thing about Harmon Brothers is the astonishing amount of talent within the company. Talking to one editor, you might find that he’s also a Krav Maga instructor who moonlights as a stuntman and director of short action films…
Talking to a VFX artist, you might realize that he’s the guy who wrote and directed an incredible Star Wars fan fiction short film that shone a light on the struggles of physical disability and depression…
HB also houses some pretty funny stand-up comedians…
As a millennial, the environment of a workplace means a lot to me. In fact, Forbes recently published an article about how millennials are reshaping corporate culture because of what is most important to them — the company culture! (Sometimes, this even trumps compensation!) Since I spend the majority of my time at work, I want my workplace to feel like a home where I am valued, and I always felt that way at Harmon Brothers.
Working at Harmon Brothers is also so much fun. Whether it was smoking a raw chicken we randomly found in the fridge on our Woodwind Grill when upper management was away on a shoot (we didn’t know anything about smoking chickens, so you’ll just have to imagine the hilarious hijinks that ensued), or staying late to have full-on political debates, or even organizing a game of dungeons and dragons to be played in the office after-hours, working at HB is never dull.
Being the social media manager Harmon Brothers has been an invaluable use of my time. I’ve grown and learned as a creative, I’ve been inspired in my personal projects, I’ve been given so much encouragement, and I’m leaving with more way more confidence in myself than I had when I arrived.
So do yourself a favor and send us your resume. Apply for an internship. Get a subcontracting position. Do anything and everything you can to become part of this real life dream team.
And if you can’t make yourself part of this company, make your company culture like this. You’ll never regret it, and that’s the truth.
