Companies’ cultures can be very different. Fun, serious, fast paced, slow paced, diverse, friendly, formal, casual, bureaucratic, provide work/life balance etc.
Have you given enough thought into what kind of environment you enjoy working in?
Does bureaucracy drive you crazy?
Do you like a fast paced environment?
Is getting dressed up for work just not your thing?
Is work/home separation important to you?
Is having fun at work a must for you?
It is your job to learn about the company’s culture and assess if it is a good fit for you.
How do you learn about a company’s culture?
- Do some research online:
- What can you learn from their website? How do they present themselves? Look at their about page and career pages. Do they talk about the employee benefits they provide? What photos do they share? Are the pictures of the executives’ casual or very formal? In the executive bios, do they call them Mr/Mrs or just use their first name?
- What do they post on social media?
- Look at the company’s and employees’ LinkedIn. What have they posted? Do they like or share each other’s posts?
- Ask questions
- Even at the initial phone interview you can start asking questions to learn about their company culture. For example, you can ask the interviewer: What do you value about the company culture? Why do they enjoy working for the company?
- Ask employees you meet in the interview process about what their day is like/ a typical work week?
- Look around on your on-site interview
- Are people smiling?
- Are they friendly?
- Do they look happy?
- What are they wearing? (Important to note for your next interview too. If you are the only one wearing a suit, consider taking your jacket off and drop the suit in the next interview)
- Do you see people working together?
- Are office doors open?
- Is the management closed off in their office?
- If you are at the office at the end of the day, look around, do people leave at 5:00?
- Visit their kitchen.
- Are there snacks in the kitchen, free coffee/tea?
- Are there people chatting over coffee?
- Are people eating lunch together?
Now that you have gathered all this information. Think carefully, is this the kind of environment you will be happy working in?