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When I was just 23 I was offered a journalist’s dream job. It came as a surprise (I was poached) and I didn’t think twice – not even for a nanosecond – before I said yes.
An annoying voice in the back of my head had squeaked, “But you love your hectic, noisy, histrionic Devil Wears Prada workplace.” I’d told it to shut up. Sadly, it did.
So I left the cubicle three editors, two assistant editors and a merchandising manager had overfilled daily with high drama, lots of laughs, girl mateship (yes, bullying also), underpaid positions and some fame. And I moved into one person room the size of a tennis court with two assistants like sentinels outside its door and my fellow editors in their own tennis court-sized cells “somewhere” in the tower this massive company inhabited.
I’d also left one workplace that did edgy, forward thinking work - rather a lot of it carpe diem - for one that spoke to everywoman using formats and guidelines that had been set in stone by people sitting around a big mahogany table years (decades, perhaps) before.
I’m (so) not everywoman. And I’m not the world’s greatest stickler for rules. My new workplace’s culture wasn’t bad. It just wasn’t ‘me’. I resigned far too soon and stuffed up my career for a while.
The moral of the story is your company’s culture matters. When it stinks, or even when it stinks for you, you’ll be miserable. When you’re miserable, you’re unlikely to do great work. You might even do something worse for your career, like moving out impulsively pretty much a moment after you’ve moved in.
How the creatives in indie digital agency network, Possible, worked this out too is their secret.
What they did with the info is both fun and enlightening. It’s a slideshare called Signs Your Company Culture Stinks. Here it is:
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