Creating Company Culture (even if you're solo)
My first real corporate internship was when I was 19 years old, at a place called Hewitt Associates. At the time, Hewitt was a privately held company, headquartered in Chicago’s northern suburbs. The particular building I sat in was surrounded by wooded acreage right off I-94.
I didn’t understand it at the time, but having held many different roles or worked as an external auditor at various headquarters, I now understand that private companies do things differently than publicly traded companies. They have the benefit of not having to appease a whole slew of shareholders.
One of the ways Hewitt took this liberty was that it provided free lunch to every employee, every day. (Which was probably still fully deductible back at that time.)
When someone tells you that there’s no such thing as a free lunch, tell them that Hewitt Associates had FREE LUNCH. And it was good.
But here was the unique part…
First, because it was free, most employees would eat the company-provided lunch in the cafeteria. Which also meant that inevitably, someone in my department would stand up around 11:45am and announce “Hey, I’m getting hungry. Anyone want to go down to eat?”
Which then meant, the rest of the department would agree, stand up, and walk down to the cafeteria together like a third-grade class. Everyone would get their lunch tray of food and find a table to sit together. I don’t remember anyone talking about work during those lunchtimes, just personal life small talk.
In retrospect, sitting together, eating lunch, and talking about your personal life isn’t that unique, but I thought this was…
Every day after everyone finished their lunch, the entire group would put away their lunch trays, exit a side door and take a half mile walk through the wooded acres, continuing their conversation, then re-enter the building through the front entrance before going back to their desks. Every day. And I mean everyone. If you didn’t walk, people would side-eye you.
Also, on Fridays, the company provided Good Humor ice cream bars, so on Fridays you would bring your ice cream on the walk.
There were no signs or company policy about eating or walking together. There wasn’t even an announcement about the ice cream. Everyone just knew. That’s just how things were at Hewitt. That was the culture.
I know now that this was a slowly developed company culture that was unique to Hewitt alone. I never saw the free-lunch, group-ice-cream-walk combo at any other company ever again.
That’s the thing about company cultures…they’re often a silent, slow burn that just “is”.
I think it goes without saying that company cultures can also go the opposite direction -working late, lunch at your desk, and putting in weekend hours.
Company culture can be anything.
>>>>
You are building a company - even if it’s a company of 1 (or 2 or 3) and even if you’re only working part-time.
You still get to create a company culture regardless of your size or capacity. The best part of all? You’re a private company with no shareholders to appease.
So what do you want your company culture to look like?
Post-lunch walks?
Ice cream Fridays?
No meeting Mondays?
Pro bono work Wednesdays?
Volunteering in your community once a month?
Donating 5% of all profits to your local animal shelter?
If you’re going through all the effort of starting an accounting firm and working for yourself (which is not an easy task), I’d recommend also taking the benefit of making that company culture exactly what you want.
Cheers,
Erica
PS - I’ll be speaking at Gusto Showcase in SF next week. It’s free and you’re invited > https://gusto.com/product/showcase/live?idgm=5a7vpzhi
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