Entry into a great orchestra is tough; it takes years of isolated preparation, practice, and obsession. But once inside, the members focus on helping each other perform their best so that the group as a whole can succeed at making wonderful music.
Like an orchestra, everyone at Harmonic masters their own craft but plays for the group outcome. This means we adapt to changes that benefit the wholeâeven when it comes at our own expense.
Philharmonic Orchestra
Impact over optics
If we find ourselves creating a deck, implementing a feature, or fighting a fire purely because âmy manager wants itâ something has gone wrong. Either the team hasnât done a good enough job communicating how the work drives value to our end users, or weâve fallen into a trap that led us to prioritize work that isnât optimizing for value to users. Â Situations like this should alarm us, and itâs on us to act quickly to ensure we get clarity of understanding on how our work drives value to users and optimize for impact over optics.
Given every team memberâs top focus should be to have a positive impact on customers, we minimize title hierarchy. The presence of a title hierarchy with ever-more-laudable labels introduces internally-focused motivation to work and present oneself in a way that optimizes for âthe next titleâ and can create an unhealthy environment of deference.
We give team members descriptive titles to clearly indicate their role. Being a people manager is not rewarded or revered any more highly than being an excellent individual contributor; for clarity, we simply add âleadâ to a title if the role includes people management. This means unlike some companies where pay bands are associated with particular levels/titles, our pay bands are very large. Two âsoftware engineersâ might have very different pay depending on the market rate for similar rolesâ scope and impact. We pay top of market for every role, and even higher for folks with sustained, proven impact that exceeds the expectations for their role. HiPPO = âhighest paid personâs opinion.â Guess what a group of hippos is called? A bloat. We want to avoid bloat.
Our values
The way we work is hard. It demands constant reflection, an uncomfortable degree of ownership, and a relentless drive to deliver the best experience possible to our customers. Itâs not for everyone, but maybe itâs for you?
đ Philharmonic value #1
Be customer obsessed
Everything we do flows backwards from the value for our customer. They are why we, as a company, exist. We trust that if we make them successful, weâll be successful.
In action
We strive to maximize the information flow from customers â engineering.
When we build new things, we ask ourselves: how many customers does this impact, how important is it to them, and how long will it take us? We strive to ship whatever matters most to them, fastest.
We value impact over optics and eschew any value system that might impact or cloud our ability to prioritize customer impact. Weâre skeptics of process theatre and title inflation.
We strive to differentiate ourselves in our customer-facing roles. We are laser-focused on understanding their objectives, whether we can solve them, and how. When we canât help solve them, we are clear and upfront with them about that.
The tradeoff
We would rather lose deals than acquire unhappy customers that donât stick with us. At times, this will impede a push at the end of the quarter; over the long term, itâs how you build a great business.
We will do tedious work where needed to bring our customers value; no work is beneath us.
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đŻ Philharmonic value #2
Get shit done
We hold ourselves to a high standard. We own all of our actions and contributions to the organization. We believe small talented teams, with savvy and grit, can move mountains. We take setbacks in stride, always focusing on the actions we can take to push things forward. And when we ship big things and hit milestones, we take some time to savor what weâve accomplished and celebrate the contribution.
In action
We trust each other: Bias towards action is linked directly to trust. We must default to trusting each otherâs judgment to make the right call. We value the cycle of: act â fail or succeed â learn â improve â act.
We strive to assign directly responsible individuals (DRIs) to all of the items that need to be done. DRIs are based on who is closest to the context, and can deliver results, not based on authority in the organization.
Where DRIs fall short, we require our indirectly responsible individuals (IRIs) who are dependent on their work to chip in, whether holding them accountable or picking up the slack.
The tradeoff
With our desire for speed, we will make more mistakes. We think mistakes are ok, provided we identify them quickly and adjust quickly.
We stretch people with ownership. Youâll be asked to do things here that youâve not done before, and it will frequently not be clear how you should be doing them.
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đ Philharmonic value #3
Continuously improve
As individuals and a company, our goal is to be better every day. Weâre always looking for that extra edge, something we can do better. We encourage pushback from our teammates, when weâre missing something in our thinking or approach. And weâre deeply appreciative if they can help guide us on doing anything better. We care less about who we are today and more about who we have the potential to become.
In action
We look for people who will have an incredible personal growth curve here, and who will help our organization grow too.
Weâre ok giving stretch roles where there might be a choppy start if we think somebody has the commitment to become amazing.
When we slip up, we encourage people to completely forgive themselves, once theyâve figured out how to make less of the mistake in the future. And we expect all to extend the same charity to others.
Critiques of ideas or output are not critiques of the person, and we strive to not be attached to our ideas, or the things weâve created. Â A benefit of this is we are comfortable reshaping our beliefs and throwing away our ideas; we work hard to combat sunk cost fallacy.
The tradeoff
Growth is hard work - we tend to learn more from our failures than our successes, and spending time thinking about what we could have done better can be uncomfortable. But we learn to be comfortable with discomfort and find as you get used to it, the challenge is fun and rewarding.
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Impact over optics
If we find ourselves creating a deck, implementing a feature, or fighting a fire purely because âmy manager wants itâ something has gone wrong. Either the team hasnât done a good enough job communicating how the work drives value to our end users, or weâve fallen into a trap that led us to prioritize work that isnât optimizing for value to users. Â Situations like this should alarm us, and itâs on us to act quickly to ensure we get clarity of understanding on how our work drives value to users and optimize for impact over optics.
Given every team memberâs top focus should be to have a positive impact on customers, we minimize title hierarchy. The presence of a title hierarchy with ever-more-laudable labels introduces internally-focused motivation to work and present oneself in a way that optimizes for âthe next titleâ and can create an unhealthy environment of deference.
We give team members descriptive titles to clearly indicate their role. Being a people manager is not rewarded or revered any more highly than being an excellent individual contributor; for clarity, we simply add âleadâ to a title if the role includes people management. This means unlike some companies where pay bands are associated with particular levels/titles, our pay bands are very large. Two âsoftware engineersâ might have very different pay depending on the market rate for similar rolesâ scope and impact. We pay top of market for every role, and even higher for folks with sustained, proven impact that exceeds the expectations for their role. HiPPO = âhighest paid personâs opinion.â Guess what a group of hippos is called? A bloat. We want to avoid bloat.
How we work
Bias towards action
When we notice gaps, issues or opportunities for improvement, we take action to force progress. We are not hindered by indecision and imperfect solutions, and we are wary of tendencies for premature optimization. We donât fall victim to diffusion of responsibility, and we donât silo ourselves based on predefined scopes. When we see issues that need solving, we take responsibility for those issues lest they go unnoticed by someone else and we miss potential improvements.
Solving the root cause
When a problem arises, we dig deeper to uncover the root cause rather than just treating surface level symptoms. A problem superficially solved is likely to reappear and cause problems for a team member in the future. Taking the time to solve problems at the source has compounding benefits for everyone.
Take extreme ownership
We donât micromanage; we seek to maximize alignment and autonomy so teams and individuals have the freedom and creative space to solve the problems that unlock value for our users. Our management ethos is Context over Control: give people the information they need to make the best decisions without ever dictating what to do. If teammates make mistakes or poor decisions, we donât reactively add constraints to prevent similar issues in the future, but instead we work with our teammates to ensure theyâre set up to act with good judgment going forward. If a teammate exercises poor judgment consistently or egregiously, they are likely not a good fit for the team and will be let go so that we can maintain a loose process and a liberal working environment for everyone else.
Feedback culture
One of the greatest gifts we can give each other is honest feedback. Everyone should understand that it is their mission to help all the people around them be the best versions of themselves and deliver the best possible product for our customers. This means being honest, thoughtful, and supportive by sharing feedback with each other.
Candor is key and must always be done with:
trust (continually invest in building this)
positive intent
and a path to improvement
Continuous improvement
No matter how well weâre executing, we will always find room for improvement. Â After celebrating our wins, we consider how we could have done even better. We set ambitious goals, and each new high becomes our status quo. This drive for continuous improvement should not mean that we sprint at unsustainable paces, but rather it speaks to our motivation for continued growth and development.
Harmonic is on mission to make the startup universe discoverable. Today, harmonic.ai is used by teams like Brex, Greylock, Index, a16z, MongoDB, Notion, and Bloomberg to connect startups with the capital and resources that they need to drive growth. Our team is backed by top-tier investors like Craft, Sozo, Floodgate, SOMA, Teamworthy, AVG and many others.
We believe a diverse and inclusive culture is fundamental to create a space of belonging and safety for all. If youâre driven, curious, optimistic, and passionate about mastering your craft, we invite you to reach out!
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