It’s hard to be unique in 2022.
The modern era of social media and constant connection has made it easier than ever to share diverse perspectives or revolutionary workplace ideas. It’s also allowed for the rapid adoption and implementation of those same ideas, diminishing their value as soon as they’ve been discovered.
Cold brew kegs in the break room or in-office happy hours were once the cultural topics du jour as tech startups gained attention for their modern offerings. But after the Instagram feeds and company suggestion boxes had been filled with similar variations, leaders needed to take a more thoughtful approach and dig deeper. Some questions: What truly defines office culture? Does it contribute to a company’s universal mission? How can leadership ensure that more employee voices heard?
Answering these questions sometimes required leaders to implement fresh methods like mentorship programs or resource groups. And sometimes, the answer was as simple as finding new ways to support co-workers as a sign of mutual respect.
“Our company culture is not something that is written in big ink on a conference room wall,” said Lejla Sudar, vice president of customer experience and product at Tovala. “It is simply an authentic way of operating. Our entire Menu team woke up early on a weekend to surprise colleagues running in the Chicago Marathon and cheer them on from the sidelines.”
That’s why Built In Chicago rounded up seven companies striving to stand out from the rest of the pack. Whether it’s through their cultural offerings, innovative project plans or both, the attention of the Windy City’s tech scene has been caught. Ready to take the leap into a truly unique role? Every company just so happens to be hiring.
MVMNT is a freight tech startup that delivers end-to-end solutions for shippers and carriers to make scheduling freight easier.
What’s one thing that makes your company culture unique or special?
I feel completely confident that my voice is heard here, and that my ideas are seriously considered. I’m a big-picture thinker and tend to see risks and opportunities outside of my role. Everyone on the team is a strong listener, especially our CEO, and team discourse is a lively mix of honest opinions, hard facts and good humor.
We recently ironed out our company values as a group, and I was able to show my team that one core value we all prioritize that drives our purpose is treating humans with compassion and respect — customers and employees alike. I also got fact checked about the key differences between innovation and adaptability, which I used to think were much more intertwined than I now do.
I feel completely confident that my voice is heard here, and that my ideas are seriously considered.”
What’s the coolest project you’ve worked on recently, and what did you enjoy most about it?
Working on a user-focused freight management platform, our flagship product, has been a fulfilling and challenging experience: partially for the complexity it captures from decades of manual freight industry operations, and partially because the founders of the company were direct witnesses to the vital need it serves.
Being able to work closely with informed, invested stakeholders enables us to tackle systemic problems in American logistics with our product. These problems include supply chain transparency, infrastructure modernization for small companies, increasing the capacity of drivers available to shippers which increases operational efficiency, and decreasing empty load rates which is a significant environmental boon. Having strong direction toward the right problems allows me to leverage my professional knowledge to its fullest and work with true agility, rather than having to spend brainpower reworking something on an executive guess.
Tovala is a foodtech company that offers both smart ovens and meals to cook in them.
What’s one thing that makes your company culture unique or special?
Our company culture is not something that is written in big ink on a conference room wall. It is not something that we have to speak about at every all-hands meeting. It is simply an authentic way of operating that echoes the following five company values with actions big and small across the team, every day.
Tovala’s 5 Company Values
- Team: “Our entire Menu team woke up early on a weekend to surprise colleagues running in the Chicago Marathon.”
- Growth Mindset: “We celebrate failures and publish learnings to the entire organization.”
- Respecting Teammates: “HQ employees will frequently go to our meal facilities to help fellow teammates on the front line.”
- Leading Full Lives: “Taking a mandatory self-care day on your birthday is an expectation of all employees.”
- Progress Over Perfection: “We thrive on testing, learning and pushing the boundaries of what we can do for our customers.”
What’s one company resource, program or benefit that has really enhanced your experience as an employee?
Last year, we launched our Tovala Test Kitchen, a new program in which we send meal innovations and prototypes to a select subset of customers. They are the first to try new meals, provide feedback and help us shape each experience to be the best that it can be prior to launching it on the menu for all customers to enjoy.
Having this direct line of communication to our most engaged customers has been an incredible way to provide our primary stakeholders a seat at the table for R&D and innovation. This helps build something that they will not only like, but also love, and have the opportunity to shape with us together.
8th Light is a software consultancy that serves a wide range of organizations, from startups to Fortune 500 companies.
What’s one thing that makes your company culture unique or special?
Learning new things, teaching them to others and honing our craft are deeply held values at 8th Light, and we honor them with time and money. We believe everyone has something new to learn and something interesting to share, no matter their background or experience.
Our apprenticeship program is one example. We bring together diverse groups of talented people and teach our craft through one-on-one mentorship. This might sound like a relationship where apprentices learn from mentors, but it really goes in all directions: peer-to-peer, apprentice-to-mentor, one-to-many and many-to-one. With every new class, we all grow together.
Beyond the apprenticeship, we support our learning culture with a dedicated, self-directed time and money budget for learning and development. Last year, I used mine to dive deep on Ethereum smart contract programming by participating in a few hackathons, attending a conference and taking time to build open source side projects. This year, I’m sharing back what I learned by teaching a series of internal workshops. Our culture of continuous, reciprocal learning is a really special thing.
We believe everyone has something new to learn and something interesting to share, no matter their background or experience.”
What’s the coolest project you’ve worked on recently, and what did you enjoy most about it?
We created a Notion-inspired notebook app called Doxx, built on top of IPFS, Ceramic Network and Ethereum. I enjoyed exploring these emerging “web3” tools, and I was especially interested in the challenge of creating a responsive, real-time app backed by decentralized storage. Getting hands on with these tools and building something is the best way to cut through the hype.
I did this project as part of a hackathon, using some time from my learning budget last year. Hackathons can be hit or miss, but the best ones are intense tests of 8th Light’s way of building software. When time is short, it’s critical to design iteratively, build rapidly, deploy frequently and do it all with confidence. I’ve had a lot of fun working with other colleagues at 8th Light on a few of these projects lately — they are a great way to put your skills to the test and learn together.
Wolverine Trading operates a portfolio of companies specializing in prop trading, asset management, order execution services and tech solutions.
What’s one thing that makes your company culture unique or special?
Wolverine has what we call “expiration parties.” This happens the third Friday of every month when options contracts expire. Historically, this has been a very stressful and busy day for traders. A small group would traditionally go out after work, but this has now evolved into a major company event. Every month we rent out a different restaurant or bar in downtown Chicago and the entire company gets together to socialize. Each employee is allowed to bring a guest and it’s open bar with free food all night. We all look forward to expirations! We are on a hiatus due to Covid-19, but can’t wait to return.
We staff eight culinary trained chefs, including a pastry chef who has experience at top restaurants in Chicago.”
What’s one company resource, program or benefit that has really enhanced your experience as an employee?
One of our most unique benefits is our amazing in-house kitchen. Wolverine has built a state-of-the-art kitchen right in our office space. We staff eight culinary trained chefs, including a pastry chef who has experience at top restaurants in Chicago. Our chefs work endlessly to create unique, innovative and often healthy menu items.
Some fan favorite meals are mac and cheese, chicken shawarma, a taco salad bar, quinoa bowls and plenty more. We have a huge fresh salad bar with homemade soups so there are always healthy and light meal options. Tons of snack options with cold brew coffee and kombucha on tap provide us with energy all day. Best of all, everything in our kitchen is completely free.
Logiwa is an integrated WMS and fulfillment system that makes it easy to run a digital warehouse.
What’s one thing that makes your company culture unique or special?
I think the fact that we have an ideal mix of diversity in our team is pretty unique! It’s like we took the best parts from different cultures and created our own special dynamic, which is different from other companies in a positive way. It’s really interesting how well we fit together and learn from each other. While we come from different backgrounds, everyone is genuinely excited about what they do and it affects the overall motivation.
I had some super busy weeks this past summer, and I still loved going to work in the morning because I noticed everyone else was working hard alongside me and we were happy about how fast we were growing. There is always a positive atmosphere at work; we get things done and have fun at the same time. I always feel supported by my managers and co-workers, we all work together for the same goal and the teamwork culture is amazing.
It’s so rewarding to be able to see the physical results of your work and know that your customers are happy in the end.”
What’s the coolest project you’ve worked on recently, and what did you enjoy most about it?
I had the chance to visit one of the warehouses that I implemented, which was a great experience because I saw everything we worked on for weeks being used in real life. It was really nice to see that our solutions improved their processes and they were excited about the change. After working from home and so many Zoom calls, meeting the people I had been working with for the past few weeks was great. It’s so cool and rewarding to be able to see the physical results of your work and know that your customers are happy in the end.
Fintech company Halo allows clients to invest in structured notes, a more protective form of investing.
What’s one thing that makes your company culture unique or special?
Working at a startup can be a unique experience for people who want to influence multiple aspects of their project. At a big company, design roles are often separated into UX designer, UX researcher and UI designer. I’ve always been interested in solving for the big picture, and having to choose just one focus feels limiting.
Working at Halo, I have a breadth of ownership over my work. I get to flex all my skills and make strategic product design decisions. It’s so important to me to have that level of creative control and autonomy. I love that we have a culture that allows motivated people to be trailblazers.
I get to flex all my skills and make strategic product design decisions.”
What’s the coolest project you’ve worked on recently, and what did you enjoy most about it?
I’m lucky enough to be the lead designer for a new line of business at Halo. It’s so exciting to start from an idea and — through research and design iterations — eventually bring the product to life. I revel in the ambiguity!
Beyond just the excitement of building something brand new, I love the emphasis we’re putting on empowering our users to make sound financial decisions. Structured notes are a complex investment product and most Americans have never heard of them. Finding a way to bridge this knowledge gap with our users is challenging but so rewarding when we create those “aha!” moments.
Supernova is a digital wealth management lending software that’s designed to democratize access to flexible liquidity solutions.
What’s one thing that makes your company culture unique or special?
Supernova actually combines a flat management structure with a culture of innovation. No matter your position within the organization, you can bring ideas to the table and have them evaluated and often implemented. We have a weekly session where you present ideas for the platform to a full panel of product and program team members for evaluation and solutioning. It’s empowering to know that your voice and ideas as an employee are valued and listened to.
No matter your position within the organization, you can bring ideas to the table and have them evaluated and often implemented.”
What’s the coolest project you’ve worked on recently, and what did you enjoy most about it?
I recently worked to implement a large program on our platform which would provide securities-backed lending capabilities to thousands of advisors and their clients. Seeing the program start from an idea just a few months ago and watching it take root and expand has been incredibly fulfilling. It was also a very holistic project, touching every part of our organization from front-end development to data production and operations or loan servicing. I love to see the cross-team synergy at our company activated by a project that I had the privilege of leading.
