A startup’s mission defines what the organization is, why it exists and what goal it’s working toward. A powerful mission has the power to attract talent aligned with its goals — people who genuinely care about the company’s cause. And when mission and culture converge, magic happens.
IEX is America’s newest stock exchange. Built from the ground up to protect investors and companies alike, IEX is on a mission to eliminate the unfair advantages that exist in today’s stock market. Internally, IEX is made up of a cross-section of experts from both in and outside the financial services industry, and the company’s goal of influencing the broader economy is reflected in its knowledgeable and curious employee culture. We spoke more with IEX Head of Talent Management Brannon Skillem to learn more about how IEX’s product allows employees to perform fulfilling work.
In what ways do employees at IEX carry out the company's mission?
All the work IEX team members do every day contributes to the company’s mission to build a fair, simple and transparent stock exchange. Each individual role — from opening the exchange every day to building new features to interacting with our Members and managing complex regulatory and compliance functions — contributes to our effort to build a better stock exchange for investors and companies.
What are some of the major ways your product manifests itself in your company's internal culture?
The simplicity, fairness and transparency that underpin our exchange are also the cornerstones of our culture. Those values form the foundation of how we design the exchange, the way we interact with our members, and how we conduct ourselves internally and externally.
What's the most rewarding part of working as part of the team behind IEX's platform?
That’s an easy question. It’s inspiring to come in everyday knowing you’re part of the team working to build a financial system that works for investors, companies, and the billions of people who depend on integrity of the market for their own savings, livelihoods and futures.
Meetup is a social platform that connects people with similar interests to relevant events near them. As a company focused on cultivating relationships in a fun setting, it’s no surprise that Meetup’s internal culture includes a ton of events. We spoke with UI Engineering Manager Steve Wozniak (not that one) to find out more about how employees are avid Meetup users in their own right.
In what ways do employees at Meetup carry out the company's mission?
Meetup exists to bring people together. We believe there is genuine power in real community, so we want to empower people to make real connections in the real world.
Probably the biggest way we carry out our mission is by actually attending Meetups, organizing Meetups and speaking at Meetups. We are regular Meetup users. Several of our employees organize Meetup groups in NYC, from exercise groups like the Dashing Whippets and NYCADV, to LGBTQ groups like Lesbians Who Brunch and The Thoughtful Gay Man Meetup. And of course, our CEO Scott Heiferman co-founded the NY Tech Meetup. It’s been running since 2004 and is the largest Meetup group in the world.
Another great part about Meetup is the monthly Meetup Crawl, where a group of Meetup employees will spend an evening together traveling around NYC to pop in and visit local Meetup groups. It’s a great way to see the result of our work in action — we get to check out a wide variety of Meetup groups across the city, meet our users, and learn more about the impact we make on their lives.
What are some of the major ways your product manifests itself in your company's internal culture?
Well in a literal sense, we do have Meetup groups internally at Meetup. We have internal Meetup groups centered around work, like for Meetup Engineering and Managers at Meetup. We also have optional Meetup HQ groups for fancy lunches, wine club, cheese club, salad club, and so on. We like food. Food is good.
We also foster a strong set of cultural values at Meetup HQ that are centered around how we can make Meetup better for everyone. Here they are, in a conveniently alphabetical order: Always be going for maximum impact on lives, be brave and bold, change the company, debate and decide, empower everyone, futurize and Meetup!
What's the most rewarding part of working as part of the team behind Meetup's platform?
The most rewarding part for me comes out through another one of our company events — “Meetups @ Meetup.” Every few months, we invite Meetup group organizers to the office to participate in a Q&A panel. Our last event featured LGBTQ Meetups in celebration of Pride Month — this included Queer Tech NYC, the 20 Something LGBT Meetup and The SLAP Collective. Other past favorites of mine were meeting organizers from the NYC Tiny House Build and the Happiness Adventure NYC Meetup.
These organizers share stories of how they became involved with Meetup, what motivated them to start organizing their group, and how their lives have been impacted by it. Sometimes these stories can be pretty emotional, but it’s also a reminder that our work can enable powerful moments in the lives of Meetup users.
Photos via featured companies.
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