WalkMe

WalkMe

San Francisco, CA

www.walkme.com

Grade: A

Summary: Fast growth, importance placed on philanthropy, promotion from within, open office floor plan, strong employee focus.

Intro: The reason WalkMe is so attractive to candidates, boils down to two things – our product and culture. We have a product that candidates and employees really believe in. Candidates have told us on phone calls that WalkMe is a product they can really see themselves getting behind. For technologies that want to straddle the business/consumer divide, the first reaction on seeing the technology should be a strong sense of relief and the thought that "finally someone has solved a problem that has been sucking energy out of my day". When you have a product that sells itself, combined with an amazing culture where the people you work with are friends and not just colleagues, it makes it that much easier for candidates to choose our company over others. And this isn’t just corporate HR mumbo jumbo, it’s evidenced in reviews on websites (such as GlassDoor), the extremely high rate of internal referrals, and our employee retention rates.

Impact statements:  The reason WalkMe is so attractive to candidates, boils down to two things – our product and culture. We have a product that candidates and employees really believe in. Candidates have told us on phone calls that WalkMe is a product they can really see themselves getting behind. We always try to promote from within before seeking outside hires, we’ve advanced through offering relocations, and professional mentorship for new managers so that they can enjoy a smooth transition into their new role. Due to our amazing employee base being naturally philanthropic, we participate in 1-2 volunteering events a quarter, organized unofficially. Once a quarter, all new hires from the past 3 months are given a survey that rates their onboarding process and overall satisfaction with joining WalkMe. Team members who do an exceptional job get recognized in a variety of ways, including shout-outs at weekly happy hours or at large company events, recognition in company-wide emails and the internal employee weekly digest. Some even get nominated for national or worldwide industry awards. The most important aspect of our office is that it’s an extremely open/horizontal floor plan and there are no traditional offices for anyone. Anyone can walk up to any colleague any time of day, which is amazing and really makes everyone feel like peers which contributes to open communication. You can catch one of the best views of SF on our balcony and everyone is free to decorate their desks however they like. The whole office is VERY bright, from the bright green and blue checkered carpet, to the neon green, orange, pink and blue columns. Tech culture stereotypes can be both good and bad. Yes, we work hard and yes, we are growing extremely fast, so a constant fear at these types of startups is that culture will change as the company expands. This isn’t something we have to worry about here at WalkMe though. Dan, our CEO, puts a huge emphasis on our culture staying the same and everyone being more than just colleagues, but friends and family in the workplace.

Compensation:

A lot of factors go into determining compensation, but if we had to choose three, it would be based off a candidate’s demonstrated past performance, the scope of their responsibilities, and the potential for growth within the company.

Advancement Opportunities:

We always try to promote from within before seeking outside hires, we’ve advanced through offering relocations, and professional mentorship for new managers so that they can enjoy a smooth transition into their new role. We also make sure to communicate this mobility and all those opportunities.

Training opportunities:

We’ve offered language classes to our employees in order for them to better communicate across regions. WalkMe has also subsidized tuition for employees taking on new roles, coaching sessions for managers and management training courses.

We are also now in the midst of implementing soft skill training courses for all employees, including: presentation skills, time management, intercultural integration.

Medical benefits:

Once a new hire joins WalkMe, they are able to customize their medical benefits and choose their own plans, based on personal preferences. We also stock the kitchen based on employee dietary needs, for example, gluten free food.

In addition, we have balance balls and standing desks for whomever requests.

Special accommodations:

We don’t only make special accommodations for top hires, WalkMe is as accommodating as it can be when it comes to work and personal lives. We’ve had employees who experienced significant life changes and as a result, moved to a different city. To accommodate and keep them in the WalkMe family, satellite offices were opened up in the cities they now call home.

Community service/charitable causes:

Due to our amazing employee base being naturally philanthropic, we participate in 1-2 volunteering events a quarter, organized unofficially. For example, in the past employees have sent out invitations for volunteer causes such as:

Cause	Action
“Curry without Worry”	An impressive amount of employees showed up and volunteered
Helping the elderly	Everyone pooled together their efforts to make over 100 Valentines Cards for the elderly.
Clothing and food drive	Employees donated canned goods and warm clothing no longer in use for those in need
Homeless	0ver 50 people from our EMEAM office donated bags of cloths to shelters.
Schools	We donate our used laptops to primary school kids in developing areas

Measuring satisfaction:

Surveys and reviews: Once a quarter, all new hires from the past 3 months are given a survey that rates their onboarding process and overall satisfaction with joining WalkMe. Thereafter, each team has quarterly reviews, structured differently, depending on the team you’re on.

Focus groups:

These are held on general satisfaction with the office, team members and bosses.

Creative meeting places:

Some creative places teams across WalkMe have held meetings would be:

Coffee shops

The kitchen

Bars

A cabin in Tahoe

The balcony we have (with an amazing view of San Francisco)

Our couches

The theatre

The park

Perks:

Lunch and dinner are catered daily with a large menu to choose from, and our kitchen is fully stocked for people that want to prepare their own breakfast/dinner.

Employees are reimbursed for their gym membership at Equinox.

We have a music room employees can jam in.

Fun:

We have a wide variety of activities for employees to get involved in throughout the day – planking, meditation, dogs running around the office, triathlon training and TRX classes after work, popcorn machines, FIFA, Super Smash, jam sessions and even picnics.

Collaboration tools:

Currently, most of the office collaborates using G-chat, Salesforce chat and Google Docs. In addition, some teams currently use Slack and Asana to improve smaller team communication and collaborations.

How corporate vision is communicated:

Everyone in the office gets an update on the current status of the company, what changes are being made, and how we’re moving forward, at weekly happy hours, departmental meetings, and we even have product info sessions once in awhile so that employees are up to date on new versions and product features.

Empowering employees:

Every team member feels like they are among peers – at any point, we can pull aside managers and voice any changes we wish to make. The most common way changes are enacted are through the weekly one on ones with direct managers – at these weekly one on ones, team members can bring up anything they wish to be changed or anything else they’re concerned about. Delegation is also not based on hierarchy, but rather the idea that everyone is working towards the same goal.

This happens in various ways, but generally, employees can make the decision to stay later and get more work done, help out struggling fellow team members, or hold offsites at to be more productive. Next week we are holding an internal hackathon to help improve the product and contribute fresh and creative ideas/solutions. The winner gets a trip for 2 to Europe!

Team members who do an exceptional job get recognized in a variety of ways, including shout-outs at weekly happy hours or at large company events, recognition in company-wide emails and the internal employee weekly digest. Some even get nominated for national or worldwide industry awards.

The most important aspect of our office is that it’s an extremely open/horizontal floor plan and there are no traditional offices for anyone. Anyone can walk up to any colleague any time of day, which is amazing and really makes everyone feel like peers which contributes to open communication. You can catch one of the best views of SF on our balcony and everyone is free to decorate their desks however they like. The whole office is VERY bright, from the bright green and blue checkered carpet, to the neon green, orange, pink and blue columns.

Aside from the weekly one-on-ones with team managers, our CEO also has an “open door” policy where anyone can schedule time in his calendar or pull him aside for anything they wish to see changed. Here is a funny anecdote: Recently, our CEO joined a Customer success Manager on a call last minute, to try and help solve an issue. Afterwards, the employee gave feedback to the CEO that he had been unprepared for the meeting and it had shown on the call. The CEO, while surprised, told the story at the following weekly company meeting and gave the employee a round of applause for being bold enough to speak the truth, and said everyone should put our customers and business first, and if that means going as far as telling the CEO he needs to be more prepared, they should do so.

Ensuring well-being:

We have pretty flexible working hours that depend on the team and hiring managers. Everyone is always extremely understanding of personal issues or events that may come up, so sometimes we can work extra hours here or there to make up for any hours we might have missed.

Schedules: Officially, team members cannot make their own schedules – if they need to deviate from the schedules set by their hiring managers, they work together on finding a mutually agreed upon arrangement.

Vacation/PTO:

We offer very generous holiday/PTO/sick day options to all employees.

Flexible work hours and understanding of personal lives, whether the employee is a student and needs to leave early for class or a parent that needs to be at their children's’ school/event.

Telecommuting and working from home are also options for those who need

Equinox gym membership

Midday plank break

Gluten free food options

Fully stocked-kitchen

Free lunch and dinners

Midday meditation sessions twice a week

Kids allowed at the office

Teamwork:

There was a change to the way our weekly happy hours work recently that reflects how dynamically we work. Up until recently, our CEO ran our weekly happy hours, but now each department rotates as the ones in charge of the itinerary and updates. A quarterly fun committee was also established where one person from every department gets together and meets to plan an event for the entire office.

Diversity:

We have never approached our hiring process with diversity in mind, rather our diverse employee base has been the byproduct of our senior leaders, who are all varied in their ethnic background. We do not approach the hiring process with any single ethnic or religious profile in mind. We look at our candidates in a very blind fashion, and offer roles to the best candidates regardless of their ethnicity, gender or religion.

Longevity:

All departments have existed for the past 4+ years, with the exception of our ‘renewals’ team, which is in charge of major renewal updates, additional to our customer engineering team, which is responsible for product customizations for the customer.

Closing company statements: Tech culture stereotypes can be both good and bad. Yes, we work hard and yes, we are growing extremely fast, so a constant fear at these types of startups is that culture will change as the company expands. This isn’t something we have to worry about here at WalkMe though. Dan, our CEO, puts a huge emphasis on our culture staying the same and everyone being more than just colleagues, but friends and family in the workplace. In fact, he even wrote an article about how start-ups can maintain company culture while experiencing periods of rapid expansion. We always ensure that each hire is a good cultural fit and don’t hire solely based on necessity or “on the paper” qualifications. We strive to create an environment in which each person is willing to work/develop relationships with each other in the office.

Back to the entire list of TMCnet 2016 Tech Culture Award winners.