Focus on the Mission First

One of the many benefits to your business of taking the time to define the culture is that it makes subsequent decisions easier.

That’s the lesson business leaders can take from Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong when they’re asked to weigh in on social issues.

Armstrong shared the story on the?Tim Ferris Show. Some employees were pressuring the company to take sides on social issues and it caused a lengthy evaluation of what to do. He initially weighed in on an issue, but decided to change course.

Why? To focus on the Coinbase mission first. He shared his thinking in a?blog post:

It has become common for Silicon Valley companies to engage in a wide variety of social activism, even those unrelated to what the company does, and there are certainly employees who really want this in the company they work for. So why have we decided to take a different approach?

The reason is that while I think these efforts are well intentioned, they have the potential to destroy a lot of value at most companies, both by being a distraction, and by creating internal division.?We’ve seen what internal strife at companies like Google and Facebook can do to productivity, and there are many smaller companies who have had their own challenges here. I believe most employees don’t want to work in these divisive environments. They want to work on a winning team that is united and making progress toward an important mission. They want to be respected at work, have a welcoming environment where they can contribute, and have growth opportunities. They want the workplace to be a refuge from the division that is increasingly present in the world.

Change happens in the world only when a smart, talented, group of people come together to focus on a hard problem for a decade or more. Many companies never stand the test of time, because they decide to dabble in unrelated efforts, and distract and divide their workforce in the process. Paradoxically, by being laser focused on our mission, we will likely have an even greater impact on the world, through our products and growing customer base.

Lastly, it would go against our principles of inclusion and belonging to be more of an activist company on issues outside of our core mission. We have people with many different backgrounds and viewpoints at Coinbase, and?even if we all agree that something is a problem, we may not agree on how to actually go solve it. This is where there is a blurry line between moral statements and politics. We could use our work day debating what to do about various unrelated challenges in the world, but that would not be in service of the company or our own interests as employees and shareholders.

In his interview with Tim Ferriss , Armstrong said the company benefited from the decision:

It created a bunch of drama for a few months…But afterwards, it was better. It was like one of the best things I’ve ever done for the company, to be honest, because now we’re fully aligned. We’re making faster progress. Everybody who joins the company knows what they’re signing up for.

I’ve?written about this before. If you define your culture, it makes future decisions easier. As Armstrong can attest, it also drives alignment and decreases the expectation gap, both of which allow businesses to make faster progress.

Here’s the important takeaway for fast-growing businesses: it wasn’t that Coinbase didn’t already have a mission. They did. But rapid growth had brought lots of new employees who didn’t know the mission.

Armstrong had to refocus the company on that mission, an important task for any CEO and a task that is never completed. Part of the job description for any CEO is to also be what Patrick Lencioni calls the CRO – Chief Reminding Officer.

If you are in a fast-growing company and want to continue growing, be sure to clearly define the culture you want. If you don’t, be prepared to tolerate the one you get.