Authored by: Adam Roark & Jess Cantu
Creating a culture that is adaptive to the ever-changing workplace comes with an array of challenges. How exactly do we balance the quest to establish a unique office culture, a remote culture, and a global culture? And while championing the growth of our business?
At the very root of our success is our people. We invest in five ingredients to create an organic culture: diversity of thought, initiative, authenticity, transparency in a vision, and a culture of belonging. You’ll find a deep connection to these five ingredients at Atrium, and we may even go out on a limb to say that we’ve found the secret sauce to an evolving culture. We’d love to share our recipe with you.
1. Diversity of Thought
Simply put, organizations with diverse teams perform better. At Atrium, we help our customers unlock the power of data to solve their most important challenges and couldn’t do that without leveraging the unique perspectives across our team.
We pride ourselves on a team where differences are valued, recognized, and celebrated. We commit to continually diversifying and broadening our talent pipeline while hiring the most skilled individuals to fuel our innovation and growth. We encourage our team to approach every teammate and customer with the same rigor and respect. Hear from a few of our employees on why diversity of thought is so significant in the workplace:
“Every Individual has unique skills and understanding those helps embrace the talent while allowing us to learn from them. This deeper understanding also increases the bond and gives a sense of belonging.” — Abhinav Choudhary
“When you are trying to grow and innovate both with customers and internally, it’s critical to have diverse viewpoints and backgrounds. Although we share a certain mindset at Atrium regarding what we want to accomplish, it’s the “Diversity of Thought” across our team that often drives us to a better solution.” Colin Gelfer
Through a diverse team and inclusive practices, we allow space for individualistic thoughts, which lead our team to generate innovative solutions and outcomes for our clients and better support one another in the process.
2. Initiative
Pioneering is not easy. We pride ourselves on going the extra mile in search of answers and solutions for our clients and our teammates. The best part is having a team that takes the initiative by providing opportunities for career growth and a collaborative environment.
“In my time at Atrium I have had the chance to collaborate on internal initiatives within the company and my team, but I’ve also been empowered to bring ideas, suggestions, and contributions to the table on my own. Leadership here makes the space for employees to bring new ideas, methods and tools to the table, and there are so many opportunities to ‘raise your hand”.’ The fact that my initiative is both encouraged and taken seriously is something I really value as an early-career professional.” — Galvin Olsen-Smith
Providing a melting pot for new innovations and thought leadership invites our team to come to work each day with the initiative to generate the next great idea and solution.
3. Authenticity
Being true to ourselves and our customers is the bedrock of our company. Tapping into our natural curiosity, we challenge conventional wisdom with data-driven insights. In 2021, we declared diversity and inclusion to be an area of focus for our organization. Chris Heineken, CEO and Co-Founder of Atrium, signed the CEO Pledge to ensure a trusting environment where all ideas are welcomed, and employees feel comfortable and empowered to have discussions about diversity and inclusion.
The support and focus in this area sparked the formation of an Inclusion Council that provides global participation of the many voices that represent Atrium. The Council is responsible for raising awareness and providing education, developing overarching communication strategy and providing recommendations on recruitment and retention enhancements. We’ve even launched a chat room that provides awareness on global holidays and days of significance for historically underrepresented groups. It allows our team a space to share traditions, learn from others, and ask questions.
So what is it that is so important about authenticity at work?
“Authenticity at work is important because without it, inclusion efforts are moot. Diversity can only ensure representation in your workforce, but if people don’t feel included you won’t benefit from their participation. You can have 100 different people on a team, but if you only value the input from 5 people then you have just left 95 possibilities on the table.” — Jasmine Bentley
4. Transparency in a Vision
How do we inspire a team to work beyond the next week, month, or year? Establishing a vision and being transparent about how we are working together towards that vision is crucial. That vision and transparency starts with our leadership team, and it is apparent that Atrium is cut from a different cloth when it comes to relaying the message.
“The leadership team displays their vision for Atrium by prioritizing areas like innovation, professional development, inclusivity, and company culture. There’s no doubt that employees are highly valued by the leadership team based on their willingness to accept feedback and encourage growth.” — Kristin Mangan
“From my first interactions with the company, I could see that transparency was of great importance to the leadership at Atrium. The company’s successes, challenges, goals, and expectations were regularly communicated and updated for the entire organization to see. For me, this reinforced the idea that each individual employee is responsible for the success of the company, no matter your position, role, or tenure. This shared responsibility creates an incredible sense of unity and motivates me to give my best effort.” — Nate Van Roosendaal
As a team, we care about creating unity in our ideas and visions for the future. Instilling a common purpose and the motivation behind it helps create a productive, open work environment.
5. Culture of Belonging (Anywhere and Everywhere)
Being a remote worker or working in conflicting time zones can have its own challenges, and creating an inclusive environment can require a different, dynamic approach. Catering to the needs of an onsite, regional, or even remote workforce is achievable through programs and initiatives implemented by our Culture team and Diversity and Inclusion Council.
“Atrium has worked diligently through the pandemic to ensure remote team members feel included. Company activities such as Trivia Night, book clubs, and bi-weekly all-hands meetings all contribute to a sense of belonging. Communication from leadership has been consistent throughout, which adds to the sense that we are a team. I’m sure these lessons learned about how remote teams can work effectively will be carried forward into the future, as the world of work as we knew it has changed irrevocably.” — Rebecca Seymour
“For our India team, work from home, or I would say work from anywhere, was new. We realized the power of trust and accountability from day one and that helped us a tremendous amount during the last two years of the pandemic. When you trust people with their work, and give them time to invest with family’s or other pieces of their personal life, you receive the peak of their creativity and productivity. After all, we need to understand that we are humans and not just “resources”.” – Varun Vatsa
Providing outlets to connect with team members you wouldn’t be able to interact with on a daily basis is vital to creating a sustainable culture.
Maintaining Our Team Spirit
In May, Atrium was recognized by Inc. as one of the best workplaces in 2021. We don’t take that recognition lightly, especially considering we are only a few years old. Our culture is unique and truly it’s our people that set us apart in the industry.
Atrium is always looking to grow and evolve as the needs of our team expands. Our people are incredibly intelligent and equally as humble. If you’ve spoken to our recruiters in the past, you’ll hear familiarity in the comments frequently made by our recruitment team to candidates considering a career with us. We truly believe those two qualities are the drivers of our success and have a direct impact on our team spirit.
We are excited to see what the future holds for our culture, and how our teammates, partners, and customers will positively shape and champion our growth over the next few years.
Interested in joining our team? We’re hiring! We’re always on the lookout for teammates who love solving complex business problems.
