Last month, we updated DeepBench’s mission statement & cultural values.
I am excited to share this with the world, as I believe that this will help us attract & retain high caliber individuals over the long run.
First, let us start with our mission statement.
Next, we have 6 core values:
1. Focus on users.
2. Act like an owner.
3. Seek learning.
4. Earn trust.
5. Show conviction.
6. Be ambitious.
I’m going to share some thoughts for #3 and #5 in particular to explain what makes DeepBench unique.
#3 Seek learning
As a company focused on unlocking knowledge, one fitting tradition is our Thursday “Lunch and Learn” — where we order Indian food every week and learn about a topic that a member of the team presents.
Past topics have included:
· Rock climbing
· Mongol conquests
· How a bill gets passed in the US legislature
· Life as a Mormon missionary
· Making indie films
· Cultural traditions from the town of Gloucester, MA
· Poker theory
· Ancient Greek literature
These wide-ranging topics are a reflection of our individuality. And these lunches are a way for us to bring an aspect of our personal lives to work and share it with the group. I look forward to our Lunch & Learn every week!
Part of “Seek learning” involves a culture of experimentation.
I see DeepBench as one big experiment with a strong core and many smaller experiments layered on top.
Our core business model involves finding experts on-demand for paid 1 hour phone calls. This core business generates cash and grows steadily. This is the base of everything that we do — and we are constantly looking to build upon this base and try new things.
Some of these new things are quite out of the box — like licensing our software and evolving from a pure marketplace into a hybrid SaaS / marketplace business.
Some of these experiments will work, and some things will fail and that is okay!
#5 Show conviction
Every company tries to make data-driven decisions. And in an ideal world, we have perfect access to perfect data and life is easy.
In reality, it is impossible to get complete data, and life is uncertain.
Sometimes, the cost of gathering data is higher than the cost of trying multiple things and see what works.
This reminds me of Facebook’s famous mantra: “Move fast and break things”.
And only start-ups like DeepBench can truly “Move fast and break things”. After all, the cost of making a mistake is much lower if you have 10 users vs. 10,000,000 users.
Because we must make decisions with incomplete data, there will and should always be room for debate at DeepBench.
Everyone on our team will have an opinion. Sometimes we will be aligned, sometimes we will not.
Of course we want teammates to feel comfortable and openly share their opinions.
But ultimately, only one person is accountable — and must be accountable — for the decision.
In order to make a good decision, that leader does not need to and should not strive to make everyone happy. And once the leader makes her decision, the entire team needs to commit. (See Amazon’s disagree & commit)
Again, here are DeepBench’s mission statement & cultural values in their entirety.
Thanks to key members of our team who helped drive this forward, it was truly a group effort. And if you are interested in staying up to date, please follow us on LinkedIn, Facebook, or Twitter or reach out to careers@deepbench.io!
-Yishi Zuo (CEO, DeepBench)
