INSIDE SITEMATE
On Sitemate's Values, Culture and DNA
Preface
In order to explain Sitemate’s values, culture and how I’m now approaching the building of the company, we first need to go back in time - to when Sitemate had no documented values, and the culture was at best a few quirky behaviours and habits.
Early on, around 2018, Sam and I were pushed by one of our first believers and angel investors; Eric, to focus on documenting the company’s values.
We tried to do it, and it felt frictional - it just wasn’t clicking, so I stopped it.
Instead, I decided; we’re just going to focus on building our foundational team, we’re just going to do what feels right, and we’re going to let our values evolve organically.
In other words, contrary to what founders are often recommended to do - I delayed documenting Sitemate’s values, for quite a while.
The next three years was akin to operating in a constant ‘pressure cooker’ - between battling an initially unstable product, the covid-19 pandemic hitting, and running out of cash.
However, what felt like a curse at the time, turned out to be a blessing; this environment was the catalyst for Sitemate’s true DNA to start to shine through, and in turn - Sitemate’s values were forged.
It turned out that Sitemate’s values existed long before they were named and brought to life with custom icons/emojis, and upon reflection - both of us were right.
Eric was right in the sense that clarity and conviction around Sitemate’s values would be critical to the company’s success.
I was right in the sense that it shouldn’t be forced, and that sometimes - you just need time to see what your company’s values truly are.
Culture as a Breathing Mechanism
I think of culture as a measure of the operating performance of any given company's operations when under duress; akin to the breathing mechanism of a human.
When it's working well, like oxygen flowing through our blood when we are at resting heart rate - it just flows with each breath, you don't even notice that you're doing it.
It allows you to walk, it allows you to run, and the easier it is for your lungs to pump oxygen - the more oxygen you then have flowing through your blood, which means better endurance, to see the distance, to scale the high peaks.
On the flip side - when it's not working, it gets all up in your face, you notice it in every breath, huffing and puffing, gasping, it slows you down - you can't run and sometimes you can't even walk.
And, if it evaporates completely, internal bodily chaos ensues, and eventually, if you go long enough without it - you die.
So, if the strength of a company’s culture is the same as the strength of one’s lungs and breathing mechanism - the question then becomes, how do you build it? how do you make it stronger?
Well, no surprises here - similar to one needing to exercise in order to become fit - it takes hard work.
It will probably be uncomfortable, you will (should) work up a sweat, and you might strain a muscle on the way and need to rest and recover.
Discovering the Values
As we approached around 30-40 people, it started to become apparent that (1) we really did need to start to document the values that made Sitemate unique, but also (2) by now we had something going and a lot to work with.
My starting point for the exercise came from a snippet of a YouTube video where Scott Farquhar, former Co-CEO of Atlassian, spoke about the topic of company values - and he said;
Your company values should not be basic human values, meaning they should not be things like like trust, integrity or kindness.
The reason is that these values should be table-stakes, they should be required to simply get in the door.
Your company values should be things that make it very clear what kinds of things are valued at your company, and what kinds of things will drive success within the team.
The reason is that this helps everyone determine if someone who is already a great human, is going to be a good fit for your company.
The question then becomes, how do we create a set of values that helps determine if someone who is already a great person, will be a great fit at Sitemate?
(And yes, as I’ve now just admitted - unfortunately this superb framing of company values wasn’t my idea - I just stole it from Scott!)
On Sitemate’s Values
Sam and I agreed on a few critical requirements as Sitemate’s values were being introduced - we wanted each value to;
- Be unique in its name.
- Be inherently actionable.
- Have a link back to the built world, and that of our customer’s operations.
The process of starting to document our values was quite ad hoc - I remember starting a bunch of slack conversations with various members of the team, and asking what people felt made Sitemate unique, and what really stood out to them compared to their previous work experiences.
Everything Engineered
Everything engineered, intentional, planned and systematic.
The first of these slack conversations was with Sonia from our Vancouver office, who had just started at Sitemate.
Sonia was also new to Customer Success at the time, and given that she had some prior experience with the built world, as well as tech, I thought it would be interesting to get her take on what she had noticed as being unique to Sitemate since joining.
So I asked her, “What have you noticed as being unique to Sitemate so far? What stands out?”
She started mentioning a few things, we were going back and forth… and then she said; “structure, process, like engineered almost - like everything is engineered, well thought through…”
Then I just said; “Everything engineered” - her face lit up, a quintessential ‘light bulb’ moment.
So what does everything engineered mean?
It means that things are done with intent, things are planned, things are well thought through.
It does not mean that everything needs to be perfected, before they are progressed - there is still such a thing as over-engineering!
Everything engineered means applying the appropriate level of process, given the scope of the problem to solve - that could be a small process improvement, which is then monitored, and engineered further, if demand suggests it should be.
It means defaulting to systems thinking, instead of relying on memory or hope, which are inherently unreliable.
Getting the balance right with everything engineered is one of the most difficult parts of joining Sitemate - some people have fallen into the trap of working in the dark for too long, over-engineering things, only to then have their deliverable fall through, because they didn’t iterate fast enough.
High Vis
A high visibility, transparent and open environment.
Transparency was a clear theme in all of the early discussions that I had, and if you’ve joined Sitemate - it is likely one of the first things that you noticed.
In fact, many people notice it before they even join - during the recruitment and application process.
Visibility and transparency can be applied to so many areas of Sitemate, from the content in our allhands, our recruitment process, compensation band information, team discussions and collaboration, as well as our operating principles.
Transparency and visibility is a sensitive topic, and depending on what environment people have come from previously - it can create a lot of friction.
I’ve noticed either directly, or indirectly through discussions across the team, that some people struggle when they join Sitemate, with things such as using team channels in an open way, instead they default almost every question to Direct Messages (DMs), or defer to discussing in meetings/calls.
It’s become clear that this stems from two things; either fear or habit;
- For fear, it can sometimes be due to inherently lower confidence, or due to scars from previous working environments where exposing yourself created risk around your role due to a lack of psychological safety.
- For habit, it’s often due to methods and practices that have become ingrained from prior working environments.
There is one particular environment, which is medium-high risk of creating significant friction, if someone joins Sitemate after coming from it - and there’s no name for it (that I know of), but I would describe it as “meeting heavy, talk heavy”, meaning in this environment - most things are done and decided in meetings, and decided by talking, instead of doing.
Operating high vis means that (where/when appropriate) you default to working in visibility; collaborating early, showing early progress, even if it’s not perfect, seeking feedback early, instead of risking wasting time going too far down the wrong path, and leaving yourself without enough time to course correct.
Much of the above is also reflected in this blog post; On How Sitemate Communicates.
Operating high vis comes naturally to some, and can be difficult for others - my hope is that with this section of this blog, it will help managers, leaders and individuals, identify when there may be an adjustment required, so that it can be worked through.
Survey Accuracy (RIP)
Survey accuracy was drafted as an attempt to represent Sitemate’s focus on attention to detail, and things being done accurately.
Out of the four original Sitemate values, it was not adopted nearly as well as the other three.
Since it didn’t stick, we decided to sunset it - we went back to the drawing board, and started again.
This led to Quality Certified.
Quality Certified
Do it well, with attention to detail and accuracy, or don’t do it at all.
Quality Certified encompassed what Survey Accuracy was trying to do all along - it means that things should be done well, or they should not be done at all.
Outside of just functional requirements, quality standards can at times be difficult to describe, as they’re often subjective, and one’s standards are often shaped by others that you’ve been around, or worked around previously.
Our products are ambitious, they are attempting to do things that have not been done before - this is by definition not easy, and hence requires higher than normal standards.
I will un-apologetically say that I, and in turn Sitemate, have a frustratingly high level of attention to detail.
If it bugs you at times, good; that is the intent - to raise the bar, which can often only be done with some friction.
Further context on the topic;
Getting the balance right between Quality Certified and Fast Tracked can be difficult, and it’s a common misconception that they are competing.
Of course, at times, they are - you often need to spend slightly longer to do something well.
The way to balance this is to make the highest quality, yet smallest valuable increment, of aligned progress, at any given time.
The reason it’s difficult to achieve, and what trips most people up when they join Sitemate, is that they either miss the “aligned progress” piece, and take something in the wrong direction due to lack of clarity in thinking, or, they miss the “smallest valuable increment” piece, and over-engineer something / blow out the scope, instead of chunking it up.
Fast Tracked
Fast, incremental, and constant delivery of change.
Speed is effectively the only advantage startups and scale ups have over larger incumbents, hence, if we are not moving quickly, we are not creating an unfair advantage for ourselves.
However, like quality, one’s grading of how quickly something moves is often somewhat subjective, and also again often formed by their past experiences.
For example, for some people, doing a certain task within a week might seem ‘fast’, for others, doing it in a day, others, a couple of hours, and for some - they will just do it right then and there, the minimum valuable increment, on the spot.
Like most things, there is a judgment muscle that needs to be developed, in order to understand what fast tracked means.
Fast tracked is not about rushing to the finish line and skipping a bunch of steps.
Fast tracked means that you need to take or complete the next incremental value adding step or iteration, as quickly as possible.
A great example here, of Gayuru demonstrating the true meaning of fast tracked, when fast tracked was first launched;
Handle With Care
Handle with thought and care, decisions are considered and consciously delivered.
We never planned to have a fifth value - it came up unexpectedly, at least to me.
It had been nearly 18 months since Sitemate’s values were launched, and overall things were going well, or at least I felt like they were.
After spending the bulk of 2024 based primarily in Vancouver and working across North America to establish our GTM foundation in the region, I landed in Vietnam for our annual offsite - a few days early with the planning committee.
After catching up with a number of folks on the team ahead of the main event - it started to become apparent that whilst things were going well, something wasn’t quite right.
Some of the values had almost become overpowered, and it seemed as though they had been applied in a way that had caused damage in some cases - Fast Tracked and High Vis being the prime suspects.
Once I’d had some time to process it, I realized that I needed to alter Sitemate’s DNA - our values needed to change, and given that our values are the primary determining factor in all hiring, promotion and termination decisions - this was not a decision that was taken lightly.
We needed a balancing force - we needed a fifth value.
Below are some screenshots from the 2024 Offsite Kick Off Slides in Vietnam, where handle with care was introduced.
What handle with care means for Sitemate is;
Yes everything being engineered is important
Yes everything being great quality is important
Yes moving quickly is important
Yes transparency and candidness is important
None of that changes
And...
Yes we are still going to follow the same communication patterns
But if giving feedback publicly, will do more harm than good
Then it can be discussed privately
And...
If tough changes need to be made, e.g. a new structure
Then we can take a minute to talk through things with those involved, before implementing
And...
Yes, we’re still going to operate like a pro sports team, and not a family
But we will be better at lifting each other up
And...
Yes all of the values are important for people in management and leadership roles
But when making hiring/promotion decisions, handle with care is cleared first
And lastly...
Managers and leaders don’t have to be 100% across all four values
But being strong on Handle With Care is a must
In turn, and to close out this section - what handle with care does not mean for Sitemate is;
- We don’t wear rose colored glasses and pretend that everything is ok all of the time.
- Individuals can’t do whatever they want, and that there’s no standards.
- Things won’t be handled at all, and that tough conversations won’t be had.
Rain, Hail or Shine
Doing what needs to be done, and showing up for yourself, your team, and customers.
Similarly to our fifth value, we never planned to have a sixth.
In some ways, it feels like rain, hail or shine has been the value that we’ve had all along, like it was the first value.
Showing up was what brought Sitemate into existence - during our early years, things weren’t going very well.
We’d had a few early customers, but it wasn’t quite sticking - until, we met with Ward Civil.
Ward had been on a pilot with us for a few months, and mid-pilot, we completely migrated them from our first prototype, to what went on to become Dashpivot.
We showed enough for Ward to move onto an annual subscription, although turns out - we didn’t quite know why at the time.
About half way through their first year of working with us, we shot a case study - it was at this point, we found out why they came on board - as Adrian from the Ward team recalled;
“They rocked up in work boots.
We’d simply never seen it before from a software company.
It felt like they understood us, like they were really here to listen and learn.”
As documented in the Sitemate Manifesto; Multiplying The Engineering Power Of The Built World — The Sitemate Manifesto - Sitemate’s customers span across the built world, they work in all kinds of conditions, they work in the cold, in the heat, in the sun, in the dark.
Rain, hail or shine is a tie back to this reality - if we can’t show up for each other as a team when it’s necessary to do so, whether that be physically, or digitally, then we’ve got no hope in showing up for them.
Operating In-line With Sitemate’s Values
Our values aren’t just words on a wall - they’re living and breathing inside of every bit of work that we do.
Wherever you’re collaborating across Slack, Confluence, Jira or Front, you should use our custom value emojis to call out great examples in real-time, and you will likely see them at least once during every working day.
Whenever you see someone planning intentionally, shipping at a level that raises the quality bar, fast tracking something, or being fully transparent - drop the matching emoji in a thread or comment:
:value-everything-engineered: for well-thought-out plans or processes
:value-quality-certified: when something is very well, which should be our norm
:value-fast-tracked: for quick, incremental, valuable progress
:value-high-vis: for openness, transparency and visibility
:value-handle-with-care: for when it’s necessary
:value-rain-hail-or-shine: to highlight openness and visibility
You can also call it out when it’s missing; if something doesn’t live up to our standards, use the not-inverse variant of the values;
:not-$value:
E.g. :not-quality-certified:
For truly standout contributions; projects executed flawlessly, innovations that transform how we work, use ultra-variant of the values;
:value-ultra-$value:
E.g. :value-ultra-quality-certified:
If you’re ever unsure how a value applies, or which emoji fits, reach out to your immediate team or manager - they will be able to guide you.
Closing Note
Ultimately, with all of these things - what I am trying to do is create a particular type of working environment, one that rewards deep thought, speed to action, quality and visibility.
In other working environments - it is common for this to be the case;
The loud make noise, and the noise gets heard.
At Sitemate, I am trying to create a direct contrast to the above - a direct contrast to the highly political, big ego, big talk instead of act, type environments.
I am trying to create an environment where this is the case;
The best do great work, and the great work gets seen.
At Sitemate - you don’t need to put on a show and dance, you just need to be yourself, and do great work.
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