“In it together” — how a mission statement has become lived reality

How do you go from a mission statement to a lived reality ?

You ask questions. You involve. You listen. You change.

You certainly don’t just throw around empty phrases of togetherness.

I can think of dozens of examples of how the Unity mission statement “in it together” has become a lived reality.

When we were planning our first ever employee survey, we used our own people as beta testers to decide which platform to choose.

That is very typical of how we do things: getting people involved at a grassroots-level, rather than following a corporate manual and making top-down decisions.”

An attitude like this ensures alignment: “we didn’t want to make the mistake of selecting a HR software that didn’t work, that didn’t feel like Unity.”

Another way that Unity is inclusive is in the transparent way that its leaders behave.

We also have an open forum where anybody can ask our CEO literally anything… and people really do ask!

The language is very direct and there is an overall sense of transparency and honesty. I have personally never seen things work quite like this in an organization before.”

In the COVID-19 era, the challenges of going remote have also provided opportunities for a new type of togetherness.

Town halls used to be run from Unity’s San Francisco offices, but they have now become a much more global event.

We noticed that there was a more inclusive way of running town halls, and now we run them remotely in such a way that everybody can feel equally involved.

This kind of thinking is embedded into the fabric of Unity and our origin story: creating a democratic platform where everybody was able to create something new.

An open dialogue and including people in decision-making means that people are not afraid to change and take courageous action when it’s needed.

“Culture is important, but it’s also important to let it change. Some startups can have a toxic and protectionist attitude to their culture, but we’re always evolving.”

But it was maybe Unity’s recent IPO listing that most clearly exemplified the “in it together” spirit.

For the first time ever in IPO listing history, many more people were able to be present for the celebratory bell ringing ceremony. Unity developed a platform that enabled everybody in the company to join in on the historical moment.

It was really special to be able to participate. Our CEO, John Riccitiello, spoke to us beforehand and gave us all time to prepare for the event.

I think it’s great that we’re not trying to be a typical Silicon Valley story and that we are doing things differently.

I feel like it really doesn’t matter what you do: we are all part of the same family.

I think our industry has definitely impacted our democratic culture. Knowledge workers don’t want to be told what to do. In fact, does anyone?