Pros
TL;DR This is truly unlike any other job or company I’ve worked at before. Employees and customers are valued by leadership and coworkers alike. I feel challenged to do my best work, yet safe to make mistakes while learning. The products have tangible impact and our customers really appreciate the services we provide. It feels incredibly fulfilling to work here. ————————— Employee Focused: Leadership deeply cares about each employee. It is represented in our compensation, company culture, continued education, provided equipment, benefits for ourselves and families, work/life balance, regular 1-1 check-ins, transparent communication, consistent communication, vision for our products and operations… the list goes on. We are empowered and truly supported to do our best work. In addition to paid courses, industry experts are brought in and teach us new technical and professional skillets. These are department wide seminars that improve all of our design / dev chops as whole team. It’s one thing to say “we care about our team”. It is another to invest real money and time over a sustained period to make it happen. ————————— Leading With Humility: Additionally, from the owner to the department directors to the team managers, there is a consistent trait of humility and empathy. As amazing as this place is, they don’t always get it right. However, they are continually trying to improve themselves and our company, taking incredible ownership every step of the way. I’ve really come to deeply respect and trust the leadership team and my managers. ————————— We Build Each Other Up: The people that work here are both incredibly smart and incredibly approachable. Questions are welcomed and valued. It took me a while to realize that I actually wasn’t bothering people when asking for help…they truly wanted to lend a hand or perspective. I’ve grown so much in last 12 months, because of coworkers mentoring and pouring into me. Again, people really care here. ————————— Customer Care: Across departments, we are all here to create the best products for our customers. Projects are interesting and varied. Our product managers don’t just take customer requests at face value. They really consider the real problem(s) being experienced behind the request. Then we will build a solution that solves the bigger picture. It feels like we are really listening to our customer needs in this way and by extension each project, line of code and design feels more impactful. At the end of the day each person here is trying to make our church customers jobs and experience better. Since we share the same intention, it makes it easier have disagreements over an approach without it becoming personal. With our customers being the focus, it isn’t about who has the best idea, but rather trying to find the best idea. This leads to a lot of spirited and frankly fun collaboration between design, development and product. Ultimately leading to some unexpected, yet better ideas. Having moments like these are one of the things I love most about my job and the people that work here.
Cons
There aren’t a whole lot. The biggest challenge is that we are in a growth season. It is bringing to light some things in the company structure and processes that need to change when there are more people. “Growing pains” as it is often referred to. However, leadership is very aware of these “growing pains” and have been actively and transparently working through them. Things haven’t been perfect in education and there has been miscommunication. But with that there has also been a lot of ownership taken by the leadership team. And adjustments have been quickly made to rectify issues as they come up. There has a lot of communication on the progress and things have been improving. Based on what I have been experiencing, I have a lot of faith that we are going to be ok and even better as time goes on.
