The Formula to Company Culture

How tragic is it to have a job that you commute to every single day with the sole purpose of getting to the next paycheck? At some point or another, we’ve all been there. We let our priorities become unbalanced and have somehow after months found ourselves just running through the motions. Your happiness and self-fulfillment is the top priority. No one can live off of coffee and energy drinks forever. Believe it or not, there is a formula to happiness that if practiced by a company will lead to ultimate success in all avenues. That formula is (WC=Team > Individual) otherwise known as company culture. 

At Worx we've come to the conclusion that we have to do things differently. Company culture is the direct influence on how smoothly the ship is sailing. Effects derived from poor company culture are often missed deadlines, negative employee body language, tension, lack of ambition and static routine. If a company is not happy, it will reflect in many aspects of the workplace, unfortunately and most crucially the clients. Your company culture IS your brand. 

Now, culture is not something that just happens overnight. Culture is something that happens naturally. Every person is born and raised with a set of unique beliefs, taboos and values. It governs the ways in which a person thinks and acts. For a company to be successful, there has to be a blending, an assimilation of individual into team. Embrace the differences and utilize multiple perspectives into one positive driving force.
Our company culture is kept alive and breathing because we make a conscious effort to keep it at the forefront. Here are some things that we practice day-to-day: 

The Worx Family Manifesto

Share Core Values:
When the members in a company shares core values everything runs in complete cohesiveness. The objective remains constant and everyone strives to achieve the same mission. Productivity is greater and value is placed on the end goal.  

Knowing Your Purpose:
Don't just work for the paycheck; do something that you genuinely love. Everyone should feel a sense of purpose to the team and to each other. Our mission is our client’s success.

Make Time For Quality Time:
It is so important to take your working relationships beyond the desk. Do things that will give your employees the opportunity to interact and let their personalities free. Team building exercises such as 5Ks, mud runs, adventure parks and volunteer events within your field or community are a great way of giving everyone the chance to let down a few walls and learn about each other.

Celebrate Achievements:
People want to be part of an organization that they can be proud of. No one wants to feel like what they are doing isn't enough or is insignificant. Take a moment to celebrate each other's as well as the team's accomplishments even if they are small steps. Go out to dinner for meeting your monthly goals and congratulate someone on their new home. Celebrate team accomplishments and acknowledge the personal ones as well. Positivity is fuel. 

Understand Each Other's Strengths and Weaknesses:
At Worx we have taken multiple strength and weakness tests as well as have noted them in work situations. We know what each other excel in and where we struggle. We know each other's pet peeves and what makes us uncomfortable. By diving deeper into each other's personalities, we can create a work culture in which everyone produces their best work. 

Meet Often:
Communication is key to a good work environment. It is imperative to not just hear, but also listen to each other. This is a great practice to get comfortable with everyone on the team as well as to learn a wealth of information about how a member works, their stress level threshold, their brilliant ideas, and how they can best be utilized to showcase their skills while elevating the company. 

Eliminate Hierarchical BS:
Of course, there is a chain of command, but this is never used as a weapon to designate where the power is. It is crucial to recognize that each person has a significance and reason for being there. When a member feels that they have worth in a company, the positivity is almost contagious and the level of respect soars astronomically. A team should be one congruent moving gear that if one cog is missing, the operation fails. At Worx, everyone is an essential part of what makes Worx, work. There is a level of mutual respect, trust and appreciation that is displayed to one another. When a company works together through controversy and success, the outcome is powerful.

Throw Peanuts:
Not every day is a good day no matter how hard we try. Don't let someone harvest frustration. Take time to grab coffee, have a lunch meeting out of the office or throw stress peanuts at each other if necessary (adorable plushy stress relievers in the shape of peanuts, courtesy of our wonderful client, Food Safety Training Solutions, INC.) Whatever method works best. 

Cultivate The Future:
A strong company culture helps to cultivate your future team. The vibes you put out attract folks with the same positivity and values who are seeking such an atmosphere. Your work culture is also a marketing tool and can be used to bring together like-minded individuals to help grow your company's future. 

Once a company keeps in mind the balance between team and individual, a different atmosphere will noticeably take shape. Daily practices become integrated and fluid with the motions of everyday life. We are not a Utopian society that is in perfect harmony with perfect results and perfect lives. But we have created a culture that fits– a defined destination of who we are now, and who we aspire to be.

Banning The B Word

I can’t today.

I don’t have time.

I won’t make it…

I recently heard a wise man challenge me and my associates to ensure that we do not mistake busyness for productivity. In our Worx culture, we live to live less busy. To ensure that our answer for, “how are you?” is not busy. It’s a passive way of replying “I don’t have time for you; everything else is a priority before you.”

That’s when I realized words that once held the power of positive action, we’ve turned into negative connotations via one tiny stroke in the air. With this mark, we create contractions. I call them four-letter words.

As I was recently browsing on one of the greatest time wasters (and I say I’m too busy?) a post across the great Atlantic Ocean caught my attention:

“Time is a created thing. To say ‘I don’t have time,’ is like saying, ‘I don’t want to.'”  

-Lao Tzu

When I was younger, my brothers tried to convince me “they” [the government] were going to change time. Either they would add a day or elongate the days by hours. How would it affect us as humans? It would change our school schedule. In the negative. I almost believed them.

However, looking back I think how many times I hear myself and adults wish for more hours in a day. Because we don’t have time. Because we are too stressed. Because we are too busy.

So we can’t, we don’t and we won’t.

However, since working at Worx, I learned two invaluable practices:

Make the moments count: We must learn time isn’t about us; it’s about others. Everyone is allotted 24 hours a day no matter where his or her hour hand is. It’s not about borrowing, giving, taking, wishing away, looking back or speeding up time. It’s about sharing time.

Make the conversations intentional: Ban the apathetic four-letter words. Including the “B” word, busy. Be presumptuous. Someone at some point will be asking you, "how are you?" Prepare your answer. Assume that someone will ask for a favor or invite you to be part of his or her inner circle. Be imaginative and find a way to abstain from those pesky go-to contraction words.

Because you do have time. You just have to decide if you want to or don’t want to.

Are you going to let that tiny stroke in the air steal your action? Are you going to do or don’t?

One Size Does Not Fit All

Does anyone else roll their eyes when they see something that claims “One-Size-Fits-All” or “One-Size-Fits-Most?” Making that claim makes the exceptions feel even more excluded. While it may work for some products or companies, don’t assume it’s best for your business and industry.

By defining your niche, you are creating a sense of focus. Do one thing great. Don’t try to be “okay” at everything. Creating a niche and understanding it won’t limit your business or exclude people, but instead will serve you and your clients best. By providing tailored products and services that are a perfect match qualifies them for your business and qualifies your business for their solution.

Do you have aligning budgets and deliverables?

Every budget, business, product and service is unique. Not everyone has the same amount to invest. If you try to bend your estimate to fit their budget, you are undervaluing your services in the beginning. You might end up feeling resentful during the project and lead to feelings of being taken advantage of or feeling underappreciated.

Be real, be honest and have back-up plans. Create realistic expectations for everyone involved so that there are no surprise bills or delays.

Do your personalities and work styles work well together?

Depending on the situation, the time spent together and frequency of communication can really make this aspect a deal-breaker. Perhaps someone else in your business is better suited for certain clients/projects. The more you know, the better you can create the best experience possible.

If it’s not meant to be, don’t force it. Otherwise you’re hurting both yourself and the client.

Do you both value and expect the same results?

Do you both expect the same end result? Do you have a defined way to measure that result? Whether it’s how the clothing fits or how much the sales will increase, it’s important to discuss goals, action plans and proposed results.

You can’t please everyone. Everyone is unique; some people hate Walmart, some love Walmart. By creating clear expectations and defining your niche, you’re sure to have happier and more qualified customers.

Say It Write

It’s probably happened to all of you

You’re listening to the radio. You hear his or her voice. You begin, subconsciously, creating a visual of how this person looks. Soon, their entire physique is at the command of your imagination.

And depending upon your mental prowess, you have created a background story for them. Occupation. Family. Race, height, weight, eye color. All based on the sound quality of their voice. Every nuance is yet another clue into the depth of his or her alleged character.

And then you Google them. Or meet them. 

Such a disconnect - before your very eyes all your hard work… crack goes the proverbial Humpty Dumpty. It’s not a disappointment to humanity; it’s a disappointment to your imagination. It’s inconsistency.

You spent considerable energy and care into creating a beautiful Faberge egg of a persona. A body to match that resonating voice.

And one glance at that picture? All the king’s photoshoppers and ventriloquists couldn’t put it back together again.

But a copywriter? Maybe.

You see, a copywriter is sort of like a literature PR person. We work from the opposite end. WE take the person that you see. The hypothetical person you Googled and we help create emotional text that matches their physique; all the visual elements that you encounter face-to-face.

Every component one sees will match in everything they see, hear and read.

We give them their own form of syntax that matches the windows to their soul.

Everyone has something to say just not everyone knows how to say it. 

Therefore, it’s far too easy to have it spelled out in such a way that disconnects from a personal and professional brand.

A copywriter begins with the basics. We explore the rudimentary essentials of grammar:

• Type: Technical, Business, Conversational

• Tense: Past, Present, Future

• Voice: First, Second, Third

• Style: Expository, Persuasive, Descriptive, Narrative

And then we help you create your own unique identity. We allow individuals to experience his or her own exclusive tone, full of emotion. We capture the essence of people and generate content as an extension of their personality. We market you. We take what your brand really is and embolden it online and in print with impactful words. We translate what others cannot convey. You have thoughts; We are there to voice them.

So the next time someone sees you, hears you, reads your work  - whether all those works are combined or are separated -  the goal of everything you do is to represent yourself. For people to say, “That’s so (insert name here).”

The Gist of The Matter

We may not have met in person. We may not have shook hands – and if we ever do, I like a good firm, handshake. If we haven’t high-five'd, I like them just like that. High. No low fives and definitely no you’re-too-slow-fives that the youths of America jokingly initiate. 

However, we have met here before. Therefore, I think it’s a safe platform that I can bypass the weather and go straight into a heart-to-heart (or fist-bump to fist-bump if you prefer) discussion and delve into a not-so-secret secret. Ready?

I like to paint. I like to create beautiful imagery. Sometimes I use pens. Sometimes I use pencils. But in circumstances such as this, I depend on a keyboard and upon the connectivity between two screens.

You see, I like to paint pictures for people where the medium is words, not acrylics or watercolors.

But after pouring my attention, my spine and sometimes my water over the keyboard to develop every detail into bringing to life the pepperonis of a pizza shop, restoring the chipped paint of a dilapidated warehouse, or helping fill the cavity of a toddler’s on his first visit to the dentist, I need a break.

I need to lift my head slowly (so as to avoid whiplash), and for all those in with any physiological background, I do indeed crack my knuckles at this juncture.

When I come up to breathe from this self-induced, word-constricting comma, when I look up from my own Wonderland, I acknowledge April’s thunderstorms and the thunderclouds. I see the leafless trees, the muddy walkways, and I see the soggy grounds. Also, all of this has a major impact on my soles; the soles of my shoes. Subsequently this impacts my wallet.

Because I am a realist.

Here’s the gist of the matter:

Suppose I shove away from my desk on my wheeled chair when work ends and head out on a gray, stormy day.

Then, like an incompetent baker who can’t crack eggs, the clouds break open and the water sloshes on me. And what appears to be only me. Even though this isn’t really true. I am wet, but onward I walk.

Ahead a gentleman is getting in his car, shaking out his umbrella as he begins to collapse it and back into his sedan. (How does the general population accomplish that feat so elegantly? So inconspicuously?)

As I approach closer, he calls out, “Hey, I don’t need this anymore! I’m obviously heading out. You can have this-”

“Oh thanks, but I couldn’t. Are you sur-”

“…for 20 bucks. Even.”

“Oh, um, I only have $15 on me.”

“I’ll take it.”

Sold.

And that my friends is the gist of the matter.

• As a realist, I acknowledge that this person is taking advantage of an opportune moment. It’s very economically advantageous of him.

• An optimist individual might give him the benefit of the doubt thinking this person is attempting to make some much-needed money for his family, even pulling out the emergency $50 from his or her wallet.

• A pessimist doesn’t buy the umbrella because he or she assumes it doesn’t work. Actually, a pessimist may never have left the office because, “Chicken Little: The sky is falling!”

The gist of the matter is we’re going to encounter rainy days. (Quite literally, now that it is April!) The clouds will crack open from above us. There will be puddles. So eventually we will have to go through them.

It’s how we go through them that matters most.

The gist of the matter is we’re going to get muddy. It’s a fact. But even mud is good for our skin, right?