You can’t fake company culture – so how do you get a good one?

You can’t fake company culture – so how do you get a good one?

There are certain industries where talent is short these days. For example, companies are in constant battle for the best big data engineers. These guys are very rare species that call their own shots.

Logically, employers want to make their companies look like the best places to work and one of the more effective ways to do this is to let the world know that their company culture is the best.    

You can’t buy culture

Creating the illusion of a happy, open workplace isn’t difficult. Kitting out an office with neon signs and ping pong tables, the latest consoles, plasma screens and fridges full of beers is also very easy. It costs about €3,000 and an hour online.

Good culture is earned in the same way respect is gained. It can only come naturally. Building a team where everyone is capable of managing their own time and sharing ideas is tricky. Getting to the point where managers trust their team enough to put in extra hours to meet an important deadline is very difficult.

And you can’t order a good culture online. Unless you have the right culture you’ll just end up with a pool table covered in dust, and copies of EA games from 2007. How’s that for a morale boost?

It’s like the ‘shiny penny syndrome’ – setting up every newest and greatest social media platform because “that’s where the market is” only to let it go idle after a week. Guess how this makes your business look?

We see many companies spend big on over-producing a video in an attempt to either attract new recruits or boost employee morale. It won’t work and if it does, it won’t be long before those companies are found out and will find it difficult to hang on to good talent. They’re actually paying money to set themselves up for failure.

Those who trade money for employee morale lose both and deserve neither.

Authenticity is key

Wistia has always had fun at its core, its copy, its attitude, its name, even its business model was based around spontaneous fun through video. When it has a message, it announces it by posting a really simple video.

It’s ingrained in the company’s day-to-day and like everything they do, it’s funny, authentic and clearly not the result of a PR agency telling the company it needs to do video marketing.

 “Artificial cultures are instant. They’re big bangs made of mission statements, declarations and rules. They are obvious, ugly and plastic. You don’t create a culture. Culture happens. It’s the by-product of consistent behaviour.” – Jason Fried 

Find out more about building an effective employer branding strategy and how RECRUITERS can help your business.

By Andrew Sheehan

 Andrew Sheehan is the marketing manager at RECRUITERS.