How do you create culture in a virtual first organization?

Going Virtual--What's easy and What's Hard

In October, Dropbox announced that it would become a virtual first company. That means that even post pandemic, 80% to 90% of our time will be spent working from home. In person time will be reserved for collaboration--for example, I would come to the office for a day long offsite with my team, but I would not come for a regular 1:1 meeting with my manager.

Although we are not the first company to do this, it will be a major transition for us. But not in the way you would think. Many tech companies have been able to "get work done" during the pandemic, adjusting relatively seamlessly and safely (unlike the front line workers who have put their lives at risk to keep us healthy and maintain supply chains--a separate story but important to acknowledge). What many of us haven't figured out yet is how to create culture in virtual first.

I have been fortunate to be a part of a group tasked with creating community and culture in a virtual first environment at Dropbox. Like most people, we researched what other companies had done, and also used our group to share experiences and generate ideas. After we began our work, I found that we had skipped a crucial step. We needed to define what culture means.

Culture ≠ Perks

I combed through many, many articles on company cultures--they share great examples and discuss the impact of culture, but very few outline a clear, simple definition that translates into action. At the same time, as we were asking our own employees about Dropbox culture, they mentioned our Tuck Shop (our wonderful dining area) , Employee Resource Group events, company parties and other outings and experiences. We realized very quickly that Dropboxers were equating culture with perks. And for our Community & Culture Team's work, making a distinction between the two was going to be important. After some healthy back and forth, we settled on the following defintion.

Dropbox Culture is the mindset, beliefs and behaviors that we each bring to work every day.

This has a three key elements.

• Culture includes everyone--People sometimes describe culture as a fine mist in the aire, but it is something that we each have a role in creating at every moment. Leaders may have a larger influence on it, but we all contribute to it each day in how we show up. And in virtual first where a larger proportion of our time interacting with others is spent at the team level, each individual's impact on culture is that much greater.
• Mindset + Behavior--Many of us reference the actions of employees as creating culture. And that is certainly how it manifests--but we also default to behaviors since they are what is easiest for us to document. At the same time, we have to recognize that mindset drives our behaviors, and if we are creating culture, focusing on what people do is not enough. We need to impact what people think and feel.
• Perks are not a proxy for culture--Perks certainly play a role in keeping companies attractive to talent. But perks are no substitute for our interactions with one another. Almost all of us have had roles where we stayed with a company because of the relationships with our co-workers, even though we could have a larger salary or better benefits with a competitor. That is culture at work.

Ritual, Connection and Strategy

Working with our global Community and Culture group of over 60 people across all business units, we found that there were three key themes that we need to address in creating a virtual first culture:

Ritual--Since we will not have the benefit of an office building and the different customs like breakfast, lunch, happy hours , etc, we need to re-create rituals for people. During the pandemic, having certainty is more important than ever, but afterward it will be essential for people to feel that they are a part of the same organization. Whatever events, meetings, trainings, etc. that take place, having them occur on a regular rhythm to allow people to plan creates an important anchor--ritual is the vehicle for that anchor.

Human Connection--Over and over again, we heard from Dropboxers that they missed not only their in person team interactions, but the serendipitous run-ins that they would have with someone new in the Tuck Shop or hallway. To do that in a virtual environment will be different--we will all need to be deliberate about creating new relationships, and will use new vehicles and tools. But even with new technology, it is our mindset about it that needs to change. Connections won't happen by accident--we have to be proactive, which will be a new but needed muscle for introverts.

Reinforce Company Strategy--How we reinforce strategy is vital for keeping people aligned . The usual flow of information that we get from "office osmosis" is no longer available, so making key company metrics easy to consume and available will help employees understand how they are contributing to the overall mission of the organization. It may seem like an obvious step, it can be more challenging that you might think, particularly for companies that are already very transparent.

Culture in Action

Based on these themes we are just beginning to put culture building virtual first practices in place in 2021. As we execute on them, we will share what we are doing and how it is working, and hopefully learn from some of you who are doing the same. This one of the most challenging problems that I've had to solve for in my professional career (which is why I am thankful to take this on with a great set of colleagues), but also one of the most invigorating. It is at the edge of the intersection between humans and technology, and a challenge that we collectively have an interest in overcoming.