Every great company finds a way to build a great culture, but it rarely happens on its own and it doesn’t happen overnight. At Claim, we make a deliberate effort to build a fun, supportive, and high-caliber culture.
It’s even more important to align on cultural principles while our team is small. Each member of the early team will play a major role in defining our culture going forward, and we’re hopeful that each new hire brings a new and complementary perspective to Claim.
Claim’s culture is a work in progress, and we think that’s a good thing. We’ll make some mistakes (individually and jointly), but we’ll learn together, and our culture will grow with us.
Our goal for this document is to shape Claim into the company we want it to be.
Navigating the Grey: While we always keep honesty and integrity front of mind, every startup team will face difficult decisions. We will hold ourselves, and each other, accountable to always choose the ethical path.
Responsibility: We want everyone to operate at the top of their abilities so we push ownership as far to the edge as we can. In practice, this means that individual team members can have significant responsibility and can make big mistakes. We’re happy with this tradeoff, and we will support each other to make decisions.
Individuality: We seek diverse perspectives and backgrounds. The best candidates may not have a traditional background, and these unique perspectives and experiences can help Claim learn and adapt faster.
Mission Before Self: We work together as a team. Sometimes we’ll disagree (and that’s healthy), but once we reach a decision, we all commit to forging ahead.
Curiosity: Things change quickly at an early stage company and we need to find new information as fast as possible. When solving a problem, we encourage each other to ask the extra “why’s” to get to the root cause.
Attract Our Future Team: We place extra effort on recruiting new teammates that multiply those around them. This is especially important for diversity — we support diverse teammates today so we can better attract more diverse teammates going forward.
Frictionless UX: We take extra time to understand our users’ needs and preferences, and we are obsessed with removing friction from the user experience.
Experimentation: We learn constantly, and we think the best way to learn is with well-defined experiments. We ensure experiments are asking good questions, are scoped in time and resources, and have built-in feedback loops.
Intentionality: When making a decision, we clearly state the intentions behind that decision and what the ideal outcome would be. Even if we can’t build the ideal outcome, understanding intentions helps us adjust, while remaining focused on our goal.
Feedback: We rely on feedback to grow, so we make sure to encourage it as much as possible. We believe the best feedback is actionable, specific, and kind.
Taking Action at 70%: We make decisions without full information. If the decision is reversible, then we’ll move forward once we reach 70% confidence. If the decision is an irreversible “one-way door,” then our goal is 90% confidence — the remaining 10% will take 10x longer, and by then the world will have changed.
Valuing Time: The most precious currency at a startup is time. We prefer quick calls and async communication, and when we need a larger meeting, we ensure it has a clear agenda that’s relevant to everyone. All else equal, we prefer the faster option.