Earlier this week I had a conversation with an experienced candidate for our management team. We had an interesting discussion about his achievements so far, and his vision. And then, I asked if he had any questions for me. I was surprised that his first question to me was about the turnover rate for developers in SharedBook R&D.
This is an easy question. We have a fabulous turnover here in R&D, much better than the industry standard. So many people, who join SharedBook, come back to me years later, saying that this is the place they have worked for the most amount of time in their entire careers! In fact we have a distinguished “club” of people who have been working in SharedBook for the longest time in their careers (a club which I joined just a few months ago after being here for five yearsJ).
But then it got me thinking: is it that easy of a question? What makes developers leave? What makes them stay? Essentially, as a manager I keep thinking that as much as we get from our employees, we also have to give back. And I am not talking about just money here. People have to feel that what they do matters. People have to feel that we care about their personal development, their professional growth in the company. People have to work well together as team, a well-bonded team. These are all key values here in SharedBook that we care a great deal about. And this is a good opportunity to recommend once again my favorite book, Peopleware, which I already mentioned a while ago. But I was still puzzled by this …
Later on this week, we got together and celebrated Ze’ev’s birthday (once again, Happy Birthday Ze’ev). Ze’ev was telling the team that he now has more than 5 years in the company as well. And that what has kept him here that long is that it is fun to come to work every morning.
And suddenly I got the answer I was looking for: indeed working here is fun. It can be a true rollercoaster, with ups and downs, crazy adrenalin, and long hours. But at the end of the day, the simple truth is that it is fun! J
Comments