Fast Growing Start-Up Shares Culture Rituals

Fast Growing Start-up Shares Their Culture Ritual

Founded in 2019, Kernel, a wealth management platform, that impressively survived the covid shit-storm and came out the other side on a large upswing has just ticked over 30 employees.

And have already announced a bunch more open roles.

Throw in the new remote slash flexi location working environments that many companies that grew up during covid, like Kernel, have embraced. And all of a sudden, the art of fostering company culture becomes really important.

The Ritual: Dean (founder) shared with us one way they do this at Kernel: the Monday morning toast.

Sessions start with the managers from each team sharing a slide and shouting out interesting happenings at the company, like a new feature launched or a social media post that took off - which keeps everyone across teams connected and encouraged.

Then they head to the Kernel wheel of fortune - where anyone celebrating a birthday week or work anniversary takes a spin - They win small prizes like coffee vouchers, movie tickets, and lunch out.

The Monday morning toast wraps up with shoutouts - anyone can submit a shoutout to recognise a team win or a team member's hard work.

To add a little spice to the toast, Kernel is now experimenting by mixing teams up so the meetings are chaired by people from different business units who can present in whichever format they like. Last weeks was a Jim Hickey-style weather report.

Our Take:

There are not many hard and fast rules to building culture; there's some stuff you shouldn't do - i.e. anything you wouldn't want a journalist to know about.

The rest is up to play and experiment. The main thing is finding stuff that works, in a rhythm and style that suits the people you work with.

Rugby Bricks Brings Zara Fa'avae On-Board To Drive Retail Push

​Rugby Bricks, the rugby content and e-commerce brand, has just signed retail agreements with major sports retailers in the USA, England and France.

To now, they relied on growing their brand on channels like Tiktok to drive e-commerce store sales. But retail is a better play for them in countries where English is a second language or shipping costs are prohibitively high for customers.

They see linking up with these retailers as their beachheads into new international markets. Which they will follow with a brand push by collaborating with local influencers.

A critical factor in driving this strategy has been bringing Zara Fa'avae onto their team.

Zara has a wealth of big-box retail experience, has worked with brands like MLB and New Era, and a network Gary Vee might even be jealous of.

Our Take:

This looks like the hiring-up principle in play.

A big factor many companies contribute to their success is continually bringing on people who are better than the incumbents in their roles. Zara is one of those people.

Rugby Bricks had Ecommerce and content covered; Zara has added the retail spoke to their wheel.

Retail, especially from 2012 till 2021, was seen as the 'old way' to do things that young upstart brands were better than. But that point of view is shifting.

As freight and paid add costs continue to rise for many, poking their notes into retail makes a lot of sense.