TL;DR: A company culture retro—for rapidly scaling companies
📖 Context
One challenge every small and growing company will have to tackle is an ever-evolving culture.
Scaling from a 10-person team to a collective of 200+ will bring many changes, good and bad. And while rapid business growth is exciting—culture changes may not be as well embraced.
You have your old, "core" group of employees with an existing mindset—a way of working. They're probably uber productive—but meshing with a group of new employees—which comes with changes in organizational processes and mindsets—can bring up conflict (or it can also work really well!).
Thus, it's best to run a retro with your "old team" on how to ingrain the existing culture that's made your company so successful—all while embracing new ideas and challenges.
🏘️ Core team?
People who have been with you since the beginning. They don't have to be the most senior employees—but the ones who "get" the culture, embrace it, have been there since day 1—and of course, have contributed to the company's success.
🚨 Attention!
You know how planning for a new product or feature requires a team to consider both business problems and user problems?
This exercise will do the same. Except, this time—the users are you—the employees.
🦮 Instructions
Work through the board from top to bottom, one column at the same time (each section is numbered).
Set a timer of 5–7 minutes per section, with every team member adding sticky notes—jotting down their thoughts.
Once you're done, start a voting session and pick the top 3–5 topics you'd like to discuss in detail with your team.
After that, analyze the results and hand them over to P&C, management, or whoever is responsible for fostering positive organizational changes!
Be honest, answer wholeheartedly, embrace each other, and have fun reminiscing!! 💖
