How do companies support their global cultures? How, in fact, do work cultures translate across such great distances as they need to for companies that have employees spread around the globe? Culture in remote working is still a work-in-progress across the world. Here’s now six strong companies have managed to keep their inherent culture relevant for their employees across the globe.
How does your company generate culture throughout the org when your workers are spread out over multiple countries or regions?
Since it was founded in 2012, nCino has grown from a small startup in Wilmington, NC to the worldwide leader in cloud banking, with offices and employees spread across the globe. Despite our different officers, time zones, cultures and languages, we make maintaining our award-winning culture a priority through frequent company-wide gatherings (both virtual and in-person), an open-door policy and opportunities for friendly interaction. nCino’s culture is guided by six core values, which all employees and offices embrace, no matter where they are located. In our Wilmington office, employees can “Do the right thing” by participating in weekly beach clean-ups, and “Have fun” through free surfing lessons and paddleboarding. In London, our employees often “Respect each other” through team-building activities that help them get to know one another. In Australia, our teams “Make someone’s day” through fun events like exercise sessions and online cooking classes. Departmentally, nCinoites “Bring their A-Game” by building cross functional connections that help every team achieve its goals. In addition, every February our entire company comes together virtually for our annual Company Kickoff, which is an opportunity to align on goals, celebrate our successes and further solidify our culture.
What are some challenges companies face when trying to unite a global workforce into a unified culture?
We strive to offer a diverse and inclusive environment for our employees where they can feel comfortable bringing their full selves to the table, no matter where they are geographically. With offices in different time zones, countries and continents, it could be challenging at times for a company of our size to create unity and belonging between our dispersed employees. However, all of our offices ensure that employees have every opportunity to connect with their own teams and teams around the world. We’ve found that avoiding common challenges is easy when we focus on these three things-
1. Hiring the right peopleOur recruiting team is key to finding and hiring people who align with and add to our company culture and core values. Every person at nCino brings a unique variety of knowledge, skills and perspectives to the team.
2. Onboarding new hires When new hires join the nCino team, one of the first steps in their onboarding process is nCino Bootcamp. This program introduces our newest employees to the company and allows them to start actively participating in shaping our culture. Over one week, new employees have the opportunity to tour nCino Headquarters, connect with new and seasoned employees and participate in fun activities designed to increase their knowledge about nCino.
3. Providing frequent opportunities for global connectionOur employees love to connect! Whether it’s through our many Slack channels, fun volunteer activities, or quarterly employee awards, we provide many opportunities to stay connected, engaged and aligned.
Check Out nCino’s Careers Page Here!
How does your company generate culture throughout the org when your workers are spread out over multiple countries or regions?
Learning A-Z has a distinct advantage when it comes to our dispersed workforce. Our mission, “Inspire curiosity, ensure comprehension and instill the joy of learning for students,” drives our culture beyond one singular office space. With our mission at the core of everything we do, we can support employees’ goals of balancing global and local cultural needs. This balance provides the resilience and flexibility to respond to local nuances through empowering regional expertise, all because of our shared values and global mission. Through global practices, including formal communication structures and significant informal communication channels, we are able to invite all participants to a shared conversation about what Learning A-Z is trying to achieve and how they can contribute to these goals. Additionally, we ensure that all employees have multiple contacts across internal teams outside of their line manager to allow for strong connections beyond their immediate teammates.
What are some challenges companies face when trying to unite a global workforce into a unified culture?
Expanding Learning A-Z to over 170 countries worldwide did not come without its hiccups. There are three areas of business that typically present challenges when an organization attempts to unify a global workforce: economic, communications and training. Economic challenges have to do with differing market forces which can result in varying progress across an organization. Issues can also stem from inconsistent communication. It is easy for employees to feel disconnected from their colleagues if they only have access to their line manager. Open lines of communication outside of direct reporting allow for a sense of community and culture to form. Lastly, if done improperly, training can suffer if teams are unaware of cultural differences or varying communication styles. However, if you can invest in and trust your global teams to make the right decisions to support and advocate for their customers and departments, teams can enjoy all of the benefits that come from a global workforce.
Check Out Learning A-Z’s Careers Page Here!
How does your company generate culture throughout the org when your workers are spread out over multiple countries or regions?
As a remote-first company, we make every effort to foster a culture where everyone feels like they belong, no matter where they sit in the world. We’re constantly looking for new ways to celebrate our regional and cultural differences through education – one of the ways we do this is with events like our recent panel dedicated to AAPI month and a giveaway to support indigenous businesses in Australia for NAIDOC (National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee) week. While it’s important to maintain a strong global company culture, we also cultivate a strong culture at the local, regional level — ultimately, we know our teams benefit from building those relationships. For example, our company founders joined our US team twice this year for US-based offsites and the Melbourne team often hosts happy hours after work.
What are some challenges companies face when trying to unite a global workforce into a unified culture?
The majority of our team is split between Australia and the US with employees in other markets around the world (India, Ireland, Indonesia, etc). Such a distributed and global workforce can make connecting live with one another challenging. To help combat this, we promote open communication and transparency through tools like Slack and Notion, and we prioritize asynchronous communication by leveraging tools like Loom. We recognize that as a global, distributed team, work doesn’t happen at the same time for everyone, so we don’t require our team to log on and log off at specific times – we’re a fully flexible workplace.
Check Out Linktree’s Careers Page Here!
How does your company generate culture throughout the org when your workers are spread out over multiple countries or regions?
Encora promotes and celebrates a people-first, caring culture through our commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (de&i) and our ENCODE values (ENterprise, Curiosity, Ownership, Diversity, and Excellence). Respecting diversity of thought, background, and experience is essential to creating a company with a culture where employees choose to be every day. Our connectivity platforms, such as our global intranet and newsletters, keep team members connected and engaged, and our anonymous global surveys enable us to identify what is working well and what could be better to implement positive change based on honest employee feedback. These are some of the initiatives that help us foster a culture in which everyone experiences respect, acceptance, and equality; inspiring them to bring their best selves to work every day.
What are some challenges companies face when trying to unite a global workforce into a unified culture?
Encora is a diverse company with employees in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Costa Rica, Colombia, Bolivia, Peru, Brazil, India, and Asia Pacific. We speak dozens of languages, practice a wide range of traditions, celebrate many different holidays, and work across 10+ time zones. What makes our culture so strong is its inclusive nature. We believe our diversity of thought and backgrounds makes us a better company. Despite our unique attributes, what brings us together is our shared values. We are united by our focus on client impact through innovation acceleration.
How does your company generate culture throughout the org when your workers are spread out over multiple countries or regions?
“Culture is a keystone of Simplus’ existence and always has been. Our team members are dispersed throughout North America, Australia, Europe, and the Philippines. But they all came to Simplus drawn to our unique, welcoming, and cohesive culture, and that’s also how we keep the best of the best talent. Through regular regional hub activities, collaborative messaging platforms like Slack encouraged both for professional collaboration and personal connection, encouraging turning cameras on when video-conferencing through platforms like Zoom, and proactive global managers who take the time to check in and get to know their international counterparts and peers, we’ve fostered a genuinely unified culture with a global footprint.” —Shane Howard, Simplus CIO
What are some challenges companies face when trying to unite a global workforce into a unified culture?
“I’d say the biggest challenges global companies face when trying to create a unified culture fall into one of two categories: technical and personal. Before your organization can even consider the more human side of culture globally, you have to have the technical foundation that will even support such a dispersed workforce to thrive: What software is going to connect team members around the globe the best for your organization, and how are you going to secure those tools against threats in a variety of regions? Ensuring your technical foundation is strong sets you up for more seamless, natural culture growth as global remote workers connect on those platforms daily. Operationally, it helps to have standardized processes and procedures where possible that promote a cohesive work environment. It’s easier to unify culturally when the business processes are similar because people can more easily be seen as a team or professionals moving in the same direction. As far as personal challenges to uniting a global workforce, it comes down to having strong leadership that’s willing and eager to make deliberate efforts to connect on a human level with team members in every region. If you’re not intentional about it, you’ll have challenges.” —Shane Howard, Simplus CIO
Check Out Simplus’ Careers Page Here!
How does your company generate culture throughout the org when your workers are spread out over multiple countries or regions?
Regardless of where we are located, it’s our connectedness that makes LexisNexis Risk Solutions Group a great place to work. Over the past 2 years, we reimagined how we work by focusing on purpose, productivity, flexibility, and inclusive culture. We’ve adapted our company culture and employee engagement offerings to match the new rhythms that emerge whether employees are in person or remote.
What are some challenges companies face when trying to unite a global workforce into a unified culture?
With Hybrid work, we transitioned into a more distributed workforce making an area of focus, our people managers. We are aligned across all our businesses on our core values, who we are and what we want to be known for. It’s not about having a “single” culture. Managers will need to consciously adapt culture and values into how they support their teams to do their best work.
Check Out LexisNexis Risk Solutions Group’s Careers Page Here!