Building the best high tech company to work for by Kent Alstad @kentalstad #devsum13

Speaker deck: http://devsum.se/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Kent-Alstad-The-Best-Company-to-Work-For.pdf

Happy people tend to be more productive people.

In the 100 best companies to work for, we find highly profitable companies, such as Google. Why is it, that happy companies produce better results?

Happy people get more engaged. Employees who feel engaged, tend to do better jobs and are more willing to put in the extra hours.

Another thing about engagement, is retention. People are less likely to leave a company that they are engaged in. For consultant companies, this is important, since you don't want your consultant to leave you for your customer. In a product company, engagement can be the difference between a successful product, or no product at all.

The thing is, that engagement also renders more profitability. The companies at the top of the best workplaces to work for, actually make more money than the average company.

It's okay to be happy at work. Happy employees are more creative. They come home happy, figures things out and comes back even happier. Try to attain and keep a playful attitude.

Autonomy - control of your work

Responsibility - setting goals and being accountable

Recognition - for achieving meaningful results

Development - of my skills, knowledge and capability

Just recognition itself, changes your behaviour - changes the way your work. Give your colleagues feedback. Doesn't matter if it's positive or negative - feedback is of paramount importance.

Benefits

- Engagement

- Retention

- Productivity

- Commitment

- Motivation

- Creativity

Another benefit, is that happy people tend to talk up the company they work for, attracting other professionals.

Start with why - making money is not a good enough reason. We started Strangeloop because we wanted to stop wasting people's time. Faster is better. We want to make the web usable on all devices. We believe that a faster web, is a better web. That's our vision. That's our why.

Don't do anything you don't agree with or if you don't understand why you are doing it. "You told me to do it", is not acceptable. That's not a good reason why something failed. If you force people to understand why you're doing something, you're helping them to build engagement.

Curiosity is important. Experiment. Be engaged.

Transparency to me, is the main ingredient of management. Be very honest. If you're asking your employees to ask why, you'd better be ready to give them a real, honest, answer. If you don't know the answer, let them know. It's not a crime to be wrong, it's not a crime to not know. Have open and meaningful discussions. Explain why. If you can't answer a question because of a NDA, tell them that you can't answer because you're under a NDA. If you can't explain clearly what you are doing, you don't actually know what you are doing.

At one point, we had to lay off half our workforce. At that time, it was really hard to be honest. To explain why we laid off this person, instead of that person. But it was important. They people who stayed, had an understanding of why they were still there.

Kent continues with a couple of war stories that has to be heard in person. I found him highly inspirational. Bring him to your company.

5 minutes of fun - before every meeting, Strangeloop initiated 5 minutes of fun. Simple things like rock-paper-scissors, flip a coin. Especially if your meeting after lunch, a little activity before a meeting makes a lot of difference.

Family first. Being a father and a mother is always more important than programming. All company events, welcomes the family. Bring your kids! Bring your husband!

Mean Mr. Mustard.

- Corrosive attitudes have a more effect than smart people

- Smart people are inspired by smart people

-- If you have people with corrosive attitudes, you have to deal with it. They have to change, or they have to go. You will do better without them.

Don't reward your employees with money. Reward their family with a weekend get away. Do something that appreciate the families' suffering.

Reviews: You can be general about positive feedback, but have to be very specific with negative feedback. Preparation is essential - I spend about two weeks. Do it like you mean it.

Enthusiasm

Transparency

Passion