you’re not on earbuds is there any value
me being on earbuds ah totally up to you
we just my life that’s great welcome
everybody is gonna hook Google+ Hangout
i’m super excited to have with me rich
sheridan who’s a co-founder of menlo
which is a software development company
and he’s also the author of one of my
new favorite books I’ve got it here joy
inc and let me see if i could bring it
can i bring it up here we can see like
all the other ears on here like almost
every page i’m like taking notes and
it’s all marked up and scratched up and
highlighted so i thought i got to get
rich on the show and reach so you know
i’ve been doing a series interviewing
entrepreneurs who have found one word
that kind of helps to find who they are
you know I’m believe you see on the wall
here and when I saw the book joy Inc I
had to pick it up and learn all about it
so for the for my audience who may not
be super familiar with the book or
mental can you give this a quick
introduction to yourself sure yeah I’ll
even define it in the context of our
work Bellamy um so we have created a
company here Evan that is very focused
on what we like to call the business
value of joy having selected a mission
to end human suffering in the world as
relates to technology and the way we do
it is with this team you kind of see
behind me here I can zoom around or pan
around a little bit here we have a
technology design and development team
that actually designs and develops
software for others that’s what our main
economic engine is from designing
software for other companies other
people and and then essentially building
it for them so that they can own and
operate it going forward our approach
the culture we built in order to do this
is different and that is really the
story that I’ve captured in the book
obviously you have read what appears to
be quite a bit of it I’m almost through
you know I’ve got this mark here that’s
kind of like the vitamins I’ve got maybe
fifty pages left but
devouring devouring I love it um y joy
like of all the words in the world wide
joy you know it’s funny we never talked
about joy in the early years we had
talked about ending human suffering in
the world in as a realized technology
from our beginning but then somebody had
listened to me do something kind of like
this and they sent me the simon Sinek
video and start with why yeah and they
said rich you do this and I listened to
the video and I thought now i really
don’t eventually get to why but i never
start with why and when I listened to
Simon his encouragement was start with
why and so I thought well what is our
why and I thought what do I want to tell
the world what message do I want them to
walk away with maybe in your words Evan
what one word do I want people walking
out at the door with about memo and I
went back to our mission statement and I
thought suffering that’s it I want
everybody when they think about memo to
think about suffering and I thought no
no that’s not the word and so further
down on this yellowing mission statement
there was a there was a sense it said
our goal since 2001 when we began was to
return joy to one of the most unique
endeavors mankind has ever undertaken
the invention of software and it was
like a light went off for me this was
probably about six years or so ago and I
realized that the reason I got into this
and the reason we attract the people we
do and the customers we do is because of
this laser-beam focus on creating joy
for the people we serve through the
software we design and when we
crystallized around that that why and
that one word magical things begin to
happen for us I love it can you explain
some of those magical things yes so I
mean obviously one of them ultimately
ended up in the book but the book was
kind of the next step in the journey
then we do all these tours here
in fact that would absolutely invite any
of your listeners to come visit memilih
we had over 3,000 people come through
here last year alone just a visit to see
spend anywhere from two hours to five
days I’m gonna come forget my listeners
I’m gonna come absolutely love a party
at menlo you could have a little Evan
Carmichael fan club group come in with
you but so this next group came in and
and I was going to start that day with
why and and and I was going to talk
about joy and I never started it to her
like that before so I said to him I said
welcome to memo you’ve come to this
place that is very intentionally created
a culture focused on the business value
of joy and it just stopped him dead in
their tracks they didn’t even know what
to say they were like what are you
talking about work we’re here to learn
about software designer develop why are
you talking about joy and I pointed back
to this room of people here and I said
well look at the people here pretend
half of them have joy and the other half
don’t which half what you aren’t working
on your project and they said well we
want the joyful half and I said why what
difference would it make and why would
you care and they said well they’d be
more productive they produce better
results they care more about the outcome
they produce higher quality I’m like
okay see you with me there is in fact
tangible business value to joy and just
by changing that conversation around
that one word suddenly this flood of
desire need want started flowing out of
the people that were coming here and
they wanted to learn more the tour
started tipping up the people started
staying longer my speaking engagements
got more interesting I was getting tears
sometimes when I would speak from people
who hadn’t heard a message like this
before and that’s really where suddenly
the book emerged when somebody at a
conference that you have to write a book
about this stuff and once the book hit
the tour’s started going into the
thousands per year and that’s kind of
where we’re at now we we we host about
3,000 people a year come through our
doors I love
I love it now you’ve applied joy to more
than just a marketing slogan it’s kind
of become a way of being for the
business and I you know I’m wondering
has joy always been a part of you look
personally growing up are you joyful was
it something that your parents taught
you to be like where did this thing come
from yeah you know I know I tell the
story in the book of when I first laid
hands on a computer back when I was 13
and I I used to just start there I say
hey look I typed a two-line program into
a computer and I was just a kid and I
fell in love with this idea of
developing software and then I realized
what I really thought about it that the
joy for me actually started in a
slightly earlier age than that I went
back to when I was about 10 years old
and I remember my parents bringing home
what would have been then and ikea
bookshelf to put together but of course
I kid and exist back in 1967 so they
left for dinner that night in a movie
and I was left at home and i was 10 i
could be on my own and it was this
bookshelf out in the garage and I
thought to myself I’m gonna put that
bookshelf together so I went out on the
garage in this 10 year old kid pulls out
the 50 pieces of wooden a 200 little
nuts bolts and screws and I build the
thing and then I get done and I’m
thinking well that was stupid I built it
in the garage they wanted the living so
I literally inched this thing out of the
garage down the sidewalk into the family
room up through the Atheneum the kitchen
I pushed it into place I set up my dad’s
books my mom’s knickknacks the stereo
when they walked in that night day after
the movie the music was playing my mom
teared up my dad was blown away they
were like how did you do this this is
amazing and I realized in that story
oven that’s joy serving others that the
idea of the work of our hearts our hands
on our minds to delight others with what
we did is really the heart of the
engineer this is why we do what we do
it’s not a theoretical activity it’s not
I like doing technology simply because
I like doing technology ultimately what
an engineer wants more than anything
else is for somebody later who you’re
serving with your work come back to you
and say I love what you did you made my
life better with what you did and when
you tap into that part of the heart of
an engineer you get remarkable results
from the team because too often in our
industry engineers work on projects that
never see the light of day they’re
cancelled before they ship it they do
ship they have quality problems if they
get out into the world people hate them
we call the people who we serve stupid
users than we’d like dummies books for
them this is this is anti joy right this
is you know that and so everybody starts
trading on other stuff title office pay
you know goofy fun ping-pong tables and
foosball tables no no no this is about
hard work producing great results and
serving others and that’s really where
the joint came from for me and so yes
the team calls me the the chief optimist
is that as well as the chief story color
I love it and so how do you I mean it
makes sense in the marketing side right
you have a book joy hankie doing the
tours but but it’s obvious we’re meeting
the book that you’ve just fully adopted
this as part of your culture and can you
talk about some of the things that you
do to incorporate joy for your team and
just as a part of your operations as a
business yeah um I’m going to just turn
around for sale on a sea of one element
that is actually present in the room I
met people showed you hear a joke with
the babies around send the video sorry
about that oven that’s a little weird I
know to go offline there but so um one
of the weird things you do that gets us
a lot of attention is we allow new
parents to bring their babies in to work
right we happen to have one in today
little loose
see as John Martin second child has been
here we’ve had ten menlo babies in the
last eight years we let the new moms or
dads bring the baby and all day every
day we don’t have a daycare that’s not a
big care facility the parents are
actually with the child the whole day
and the human energy that is the room is
is actually quite remarkable and so
there’s one element of recognizing we
have full lives we’re not just whenever
work lives and home lies you don’t have
work colleagues and family we have one
life we have one community that we’re
part of why do we continually try and
deny that we don’t have families we try
and pretend we can be this perfect
unencumbered individual while we’re at
work and we deal with all the other
stuff when we’re at home and so in our
view we said now let’s let’s run this
experiment so that was a typical memo
experiment eight years ago of saying
let’s just try this and see what happens
we didn’t know what would happen we
didn’t know if it would work but ten men
will baby later it’s working so there
there it is the men the baby one of the
memo babies this is John Martin and John
Lucy this is just waking up busy oh just
going to sleep Lucy’s just all asleep I
love it we doing so we haven’t had a
memo baby on a google hangout yeah there
we go that’s the first time now you
another kind of strange policy that I
know you guys have is pairing we have
partner all people up together and so I
assume you know that gentleman is paired
with somebody working on some project
can you do not just bear with his
daughter he’s paired with another
programmer you so bright that I mean
obviously uh uh first time I read unlike
what that’s really different yeah can
you talk about I mean you explained in
the book but can you give like a high
level of you why you do that and how
that contributes to joy for your team so
there’s a lot of people who don’t go
into our profession because they think
it’s going to be a very lonely isolated
profession and it
that is you think about the typical tech
company that is the sea of cubicles
darkened cubicles everybody with earbuds
interior silently clicking away on
keyboards all day long they are isolated
from other human beings they don’t want
to be bothered so leave me alone so they
come in in the off hours so nobody will
be around and yet they create problems
and they don’t have help solving those
problems they have to do it in their own
heads and their own minds and it gets
very frustrating for a long period of
time by putting two people together they
solve problems faster they take
advantage of what both people know so
they can integrate their combined
knowledge together they challenge each
other by pointing to the screen and one
types and the other is watching one
talks about what he’s thinking about the
other ones challenging them on their
thinking and this is why this is a noisy
environment here because we want people
to overhear the ideas of others in fact
in our world we ban earbuds you can’t
heavier bus while you’re working which
is very unusual for a tech firm and so
not only do they work in pairs but we
assign the pairs and we switch them
every five working days because one of
the biggest challenges in software and
it’s true in a lot of other teams as
well is a tower of knowledge problem the
one person on the team who knows
everything and nobody else knows what
they know and I can tell you for a long
time at our feels secure tower feels
safe if nobody knows what I know I’m
valuable and they can’t fire me but one
day they wake up and they realize that
towers become a prison from which it
cannot escape because they can’t go work
on new stuff they can’t leave their
power and go work in a different power
they can’t even quit their job because
the next employer will say oh you’re an
Oracle nine point one point one point
two service pack three expert that’s
awesome we need one of those hours just
quit and you don’t of course they guys I
don’t want to do that anymore I want to
learn new stuff I want to build an
Android app I want to work on iOS I I
want to work in a different feel and so
there’s a whole bunch of reasons we do
this but I think the main thing is what
Deming said wait
when all anyone asks for is a chance to
work with pride to do good work to get
good work out into the field and what we
have found is that by pairing people
together and switching the pair’s you
get much higher quality much faster you
get problems solved in a much deeper way
than you do buy individual towers
working up yeah and just to maybe
explain a little bit more for the
readers for the viewers there are you
guys are mostly a software development
company seen how you pair people up will
be two programmers to one computer right
which for most people seems like a crazy
way to operate but that’s how they do it
and the question that i had in leading
that so we’re gonna go look at it while
we’re talking okay laptop out there and
we can go look at another and you’ll
hear a bit of the noise so here’s the
drake team here and you can see others
the great look at they’re all waving at
you so here’s Eric and we’ll hear
working together no guys stop working we
want very much yeah so yeah so this is
what it looks like to can you see it am
i yeah yeah we got two people one
keyboard that’s it yep sharing the
keyboard back and forth sharing a mouse
Will’s got the keyboard and mouse right
now Erica’s is watching what he’s doing
they’re talking about it and you can
also see that they sit in very close
proximity to one another right this this
is how they choose to sit because it’s
part of the other part of joy here at
Menlo is the way the space is set up and
you can see you’re not giving you a
little bit of a panoramic view of menlo
here yeah this this space is set up by
the team there are no facilities people
there’s no permission to ask there’s no
space police to check in with the team
forms a space however they choose so the
fact that they were sitting shoulder to
shoulder tables next to one another is
their choice nobody told them they had
to do that that’s the way they prefer or
I love it now a question
had in reading about that process if you
have eric and will working together and
then work together for five days and
then you switch it up you know they
haven’t finished their task does one of
them continue like eric keeps working on
and then a new person comes in there’s
that power typically works yeah so sort
of over here on the wall or display that
you see along the wall we have all these
index cards posted and we bring projects
down into pretty tiny task to our task
for our past eight our test 16 and so on
so the odds that they’re going to finish
their tests are actually pretty high
okay just break a project down into
smaller and smaller pieces so hopefully
within the five day context they’ve
gotten a number of things done not just
one but as you say there may still be
that last pass they were working on a
Friday together and they just didn’t get
it done now the question is who’s going
to carry that on it may well be just as
you described it may be that Eric is now
paired with Ted and Eric and Ted are
going to carry it on but it’s not wholly
unusual for a chiral e new pair to pick
up the work and carry it forward from
there which seems a little
counterintuitive maybe even unproductive
but what happens in that case is the new
pair starts asking the old pair a bunch
of questions now remember they’re all
sitting close to one another so it’s not
like we have to have a meeting and get a
conference room and everything you just
say you know hey we’ll hey Eric we’re
picking up the work you did here and
we’re a little confused about this part
of it could you just swing your chairs
around explain it to us and what’s
interesting is in that exchange of
information and knowledge transfer
you’re getting a you’re getting an
improvement in quality and
maintainability of the code because if
if Ted and Scott can’t figure out the
code that Eric and we’ll put together
this week before that’s an indication
and we might have trouble supporting
that code a year from now hmm so there’s
kind of micro payments we make along the
way that feel unproductive
but the speed the quality the
maintainability going forward literally
outperforms standard software
development by an order of magnitude
very cool I’m very different I love that
you flash the wall with all the the
notes and and you explaining the book
that everything is written on an index
card you put up on the wall which again
seems very backwards for a technology
company using like paper and pen and put
it on the wall but I guess that’s also
let some more effective and more joyful
experience well the people who come to
visit see that may call us the Amish of
software development and they ask us
they say which your tech firm why don’t
you use software for this and our answer
is pretty simple we choose tools we
believe work better for humans you very
visual tactile creatures so using
handwritten index cards is is actually
really compelling for people it’s sort
of like the Montessori School has taught
us once upon a time that you know we
learn a lot through the nerving and
things and our fingertips we learn a lot
through sound through vision to site
through spatial orientation that sort of
thing so there are many many companies
that use visualization I mean the whole
lean industry tries to focus on
visualization so there’s a component of
industry that looks at us and goes yeah
of course but the software industry is
so enamored always with its little
high-tech tools that it thinks that’s
the best answer for all problems we tend
to be a little more cynical about
software and we say no we’re not going
to just assume a high-tech solution is
the best one we’re going to explore
other opportunities we’ve been doing
software development with handwritten
index cards pin pushpin to a wall for 14
years I love it and I think it takes a
lot of courage to be in the business of
software development and not default to
software as a tool when it’s not the
best tool to use we had one tour guests
you looked at me and he saw this me said
okay that confirms that I would never
use you for a software project based on
what you’ve just shown and and the
thought bubble over my head I didn’t say
because I didn’t want to be rude was
awesome yeah exactly see each other
again
you you saved both of us a lot of
trouble by making that conclusion
because if you think that’s what’s going
to make software projects go better is
because we put your project management
artifacts inside of Microsoft Project
we’re doomed from the start right they
self eliminated yep you want people to
visit your your your factory there and
see if they love it or they hate it yep
yeah we did one two three drawers a day
now awesome I want to be conscious at
the time I have two quick questions for
you I’m 1 i’m curious about some
decisions that you’ve had to make that
may have made sense you know on paper
financially logically but was against
joy and if you had a kind of an example
of that like making tough decisions
based on your your core value yeah so i
think the hardest one is when a client
relationship begins to sour because they
really don’t ultimately play well you
know i don’t know how else to describe
it but we have a very we have a very
particular way of engaging our clients
and projects here they have to
participate and if they start to treat
us like a standard I tea vendor of what
we told you what we needed we don’t know
why we need to connect with you every
five days then quite frankly we have to
let that client go and that is hard to
do because we’re running a business here
the main economic engine is servicing
our clients and if we decide we’re going
to let a client go we’re choosing lower
revenue which might mean less people
might mean less prophets it might mean
smaller paychecks for some of us and so
those are hard decisions because now
you’re you’re faced with the reality of
joy and that is that you have to make
trade-offs you don’t get to have joy
without making trade-offs in other areas
and those are always hard decisions I I
always say that you know when you put a
pile of money in front of entrepreneurs
they start salivating you know and
you know but the devil always comes Gary
in cash and so we have to we have to
guard our culture and sometimes that
means making hard decisions I guess it
also makes it easier that you have such
a well-defined culture and word that
that’s always the core that you come
back to and if you don’t have that then
it makes it a lot harder to make those
big decisions yeah the word I use around
that evan is intentional we are very
intentional about a culture and we make
it very clear that if you came to visit
and you brought some people with you and
some of them have software projects on
their mind and they think maybe I use
memel they can come in and peek and they
can see and ask a bunch of questions we
don’t even know that’s why they’re here
and they may never call us again and
we’re okay with that the people who stay
the people who get what it is we do have
probably suffered somewhere else in
their previous life and now they see the
sensibility of what we’re describing
because they’ve endured the other kind
of suffering are in the sukkah so easily
produce and they recognize that the
approach we’ve taken is has a lot of
common sense in it and they start to get
it why it maybe looks expensive on one
end but quite frankly the most expensive
way to build software is that build
software no one ever uses mmm sure it’s
a good point um last question the team
is obviously super important to you to
maintain the culture and as you grow and
you’ve been one of the fastest growing
companies in the country which is
amazing uh how do you hire for joy yes
you you jettison the the traditional two
people lying to each other interview
process that I used to use in my old
life and you trade it away for an
audition and so literally we have 30 to
40 to 50 people at a time come in for an
initial interview we call it an extreme
interview and we pair you together with
another candidate for 20 minutes and we
watch you work together we don’t ask any
questions during our interview we make
it experiential we have you work
together share a piece of paper and a
pencil and a straightforward task we
give you the weirdest instructions ever
if you are on one of those interviews we
would tell you when you’re sitting next
to this candidate who might be competing
for the same
you are Evan your job is to try and get
this the person sitting next to you a
second interview and so this is Improv
Theater you make your partner look good
if they struggle help them out if
they’re stumbling help them up and so we
are teaching our culture from the moment
of the interview we’d pair you three
different times in that initial
interview 20 minutes each and then we
send you all home that was the first
interview and then we talked about what
we saw and the people we saw that
demonstrated what we call kindergarten
skills which in our mind fits to joy you
know you they play well with others do
they share do they not hit bite or
scratch that sort of thing then we bring
you in for a full day one day contract
and you actually do real work in the
team alongside one of our people in fact
the people that were sitting over there
table it was possible one of those pair
partners was interviewing here because
that’s what interviewing looks like you
actually come in you do work we pay you
for the day you work with one person in
the morning another person in the
afternoon if that works we bring in for
a three-week trial and again you pair on
real work we pay you for that and
usually at that point we have a feeling
on both sides that it’s going to work
this is different and we don’t assume we
could ever in words explain to you how
different it is but if we put you in it
and let you experience it directly you
begin to understand does will this work
for me we don’t assume it will i love
the tradition a resume and cover letter
how much attention you pay to that how
how do you you know it is funny because
I mean I used to do all the standard
stuff when I was a manager back in my
old life okay dumb is it that we try and
assess a human being something as
complex as a human with an eight and a
half by eleven sheet of paper with words
typed on it probably derived from a
keyword search is something like monster
com right you know drama 9.3 you know
oracle nine point one point one point
two it’s like seriously is what i want
to ask you is are you a good
kindergartner and so far we we have
collected a few kindergarten report
cards
I’m guessing your mother still has your
so if you lock if you think you’ve lost
it just go ask my own show pick it up
for you go read the qualities that you
had in kindergarten because those are
probably some of the most important
qualities you will ever talk about in
your lifetime that might be that might
be next on your your job application
process include a sample from your
kindergarten I love it rich I know we
went a little over i’m really grateful
for the time today as i said i love the
book I’m dog marking every page and
taking notes and for those of you who
are watching you can go check it out
join ink on amazon and all of the major
bookstores and i’m gonna go i’m gonna
come on the tour I’m coming I got to set
a date we’re gonna do the tour I’m
excited for the follow up even if you
come bring me a book I want to see what
it is you dog-eared I love to hear what
people found interesting every single
page almost goodbye almost like there’s
man one in ten pages that’s not mark so
you’ll be doing a lot of you basically
rereading your entire book alright well
thank you for the time you guys can
trigger the book drink or or or ghus the
website menlo mental innovations com is
that it yep yes mental innovations com
all one word thanks so much that’s it
thank you rich all right Thank You Evan
me being on earbuds ah totally up to you
we just my life that’s great welcome
everybody is gonna hook Google+ Hangout
i’m super excited to have with me rich
sheridan who’s a co-founder of menlo
which is a software development company
and he’s also the author of one of my
new favorite books I’ve got it here joy
inc and let me see if i could bring it
can i bring it up here we can see like
all the other ears on here like almost
every page i’m like taking notes and
it’s all marked up and scratched up and
highlighted so i thought i got to get
rich on the show and reach so you know
i’ve been doing a series interviewing
entrepreneurs who have found one word
that kind of helps to find who they are
you know I’m believe you see on the wall
here and when I saw the book joy Inc I
had to pick it up and learn all about it
so for the for my audience who may not
be super familiar with the book or
mental can you give this a quick
introduction to yourself sure yeah I’ll
even define it in the context of our
work Bellamy um so we have created a
company here Evan that is very focused
on what we like to call the business
value of joy having selected a mission
to end human suffering in the world as
relates to technology and the way we do
it is with this team you kind of see
behind me here I can zoom around or pan
around a little bit here we have a
technology design and development team
that actually designs and develops
software for others that’s what our main
economic engine is from designing
software for other companies other
people and and then essentially building
it for them so that they can own and
operate it going forward our approach
the culture we built in order to do this
is different and that is really the
story that I’ve captured in the book
obviously you have read what appears to
be quite a bit of it I’m almost through
you know I’ve got this mark here that’s
kind of like the vitamins I’ve got maybe
fifty pages left but
devouring devouring I love it um y joy
like of all the words in the world wide
joy you know it’s funny we never talked
about joy in the early years we had
talked about ending human suffering in
the world in as a realized technology
from our beginning but then somebody had
listened to me do something kind of like
this and they sent me the simon Sinek
video and start with why yeah and they
said rich you do this and I listened to
the video and I thought now i really
don’t eventually get to why but i never
start with why and when I listened to
Simon his encouragement was start with
why and so I thought well what is our
why and I thought what do I want to tell
the world what message do I want them to
walk away with maybe in your words Evan
what one word do I want people walking
out at the door with about memo and I
went back to our mission statement and I
thought suffering that’s it I want
everybody when they think about memo to
think about suffering and I thought no
no that’s not the word and so further
down on this yellowing mission statement
there was a there was a sense it said
our goal since 2001 when we began was to
return joy to one of the most unique
endeavors mankind has ever undertaken
the invention of software and it was
like a light went off for me this was
probably about six years or so ago and I
realized that the reason I got into this
and the reason we attract the people we
do and the customers we do is because of
this laser-beam focus on creating joy
for the people we serve through the
software we design and when we
crystallized around that that why and
that one word magical things begin to
happen for us I love it can you explain
some of those magical things yes so I
mean obviously one of them ultimately
ended up in the book but the book was
kind of the next step in the journey
then we do all these tours here
in fact that would absolutely invite any
of your listeners to come visit memilih
we had over 3,000 people come through
here last year alone just a visit to see
spend anywhere from two hours to five
days I’m gonna come forget my listeners
I’m gonna come absolutely love a party
at menlo you could have a little Evan
Carmichael fan club group come in with
you but so this next group came in and
and I was going to start that day with
why and and and I was going to talk
about joy and I never started it to her
like that before so I said to him I said
welcome to memo you’ve come to this
place that is very intentionally created
a culture focused on the business value
of joy and it just stopped him dead in
their tracks they didn’t even know what
to say they were like what are you
talking about work we’re here to learn
about software designer develop why are
you talking about joy and I pointed back
to this room of people here and I said
well look at the people here pretend
half of them have joy and the other half
don’t which half what you aren’t working
on your project and they said well we
want the joyful half and I said why what
difference would it make and why would
you care and they said well they’d be
more productive they produce better
results they care more about the outcome
they produce higher quality I’m like
okay see you with me there is in fact
tangible business value to joy and just
by changing that conversation around
that one word suddenly this flood of
desire need want started flowing out of
the people that were coming here and
they wanted to learn more the tour
started tipping up the people started
staying longer my speaking engagements
got more interesting I was getting tears
sometimes when I would speak from people
who hadn’t heard a message like this
before and that’s really where suddenly
the book emerged when somebody at a
conference that you have to write a book
about this stuff and once the book hit
the tour’s started going into the
thousands per year and that’s kind of
where we’re at now we we we host about
3,000 people a year come through our
doors I love
I love it now you’ve applied joy to more
than just a marketing slogan it’s kind
of become a way of being for the
business and I you know I’m wondering
has joy always been a part of you look
personally growing up are you joyful was
it something that your parents taught
you to be like where did this thing come
from yeah you know I know I tell the
story in the book of when I first laid
hands on a computer back when I was 13
and I I used to just start there I say
hey look I typed a two-line program into
a computer and I was just a kid and I
fell in love with this idea of
developing software and then I realized
what I really thought about it that the
joy for me actually started in a
slightly earlier age than that I went
back to when I was about 10 years old
and I remember my parents bringing home
what would have been then and ikea
bookshelf to put together but of course
I kid and exist back in 1967 so they
left for dinner that night in a movie
and I was left at home and i was 10 i
could be on my own and it was this
bookshelf out in the garage and I
thought to myself I’m gonna put that
bookshelf together so I went out on the
garage in this 10 year old kid pulls out
the 50 pieces of wooden a 200 little
nuts bolts and screws and I build the
thing and then I get done and I’m
thinking well that was stupid I built it
in the garage they wanted the living so
I literally inched this thing out of the
garage down the sidewalk into the family
room up through the Atheneum the kitchen
I pushed it into place I set up my dad’s
books my mom’s knickknacks the stereo
when they walked in that night day after
the movie the music was playing my mom
teared up my dad was blown away they
were like how did you do this this is
amazing and I realized in that story
oven that’s joy serving others that the
idea of the work of our hearts our hands
on our minds to delight others with what
we did is really the heart of the
engineer this is why we do what we do
it’s not a theoretical activity it’s not
I like doing technology simply because
I like doing technology ultimately what
an engineer wants more than anything
else is for somebody later who you’re
serving with your work come back to you
and say I love what you did you made my
life better with what you did and when
you tap into that part of the heart of
an engineer you get remarkable results
from the team because too often in our
industry engineers work on projects that
never see the light of day they’re
cancelled before they ship it they do
ship they have quality problems if they
get out into the world people hate them
we call the people who we serve stupid
users than we’d like dummies books for
them this is this is anti joy right this
is you know that and so everybody starts
trading on other stuff title office pay
you know goofy fun ping-pong tables and
foosball tables no no no this is about
hard work producing great results and
serving others and that’s really where
the joint came from for me and so yes
the team calls me the the chief optimist
is that as well as the chief story color
I love it and so how do you I mean it
makes sense in the marketing side right
you have a book joy hankie doing the
tours but but it’s obvious we’re meeting
the book that you’ve just fully adopted
this as part of your culture and can you
talk about some of the things that you
do to incorporate joy for your team and
just as a part of your operations as a
business yeah um I’m going to just turn
around for sale on a sea of one element
that is actually present in the room I
met people showed you hear a joke with
the babies around send the video sorry
about that oven that’s a little weird I
know to go offline there but so um one
of the weird things you do that gets us
a lot of attention is we allow new
parents to bring their babies in to work
right we happen to have one in today
little loose
see as John Martin second child has been
here we’ve had ten menlo babies in the
last eight years we let the new moms or
dads bring the baby and all day every
day we don’t have a daycare that’s not a
big care facility the parents are
actually with the child the whole day
and the human energy that is the room is
is actually quite remarkable and so
there’s one element of recognizing we
have full lives we’re not just whenever
work lives and home lies you don’t have
work colleagues and family we have one
life we have one community that we’re
part of why do we continually try and
deny that we don’t have families we try
and pretend we can be this perfect
unencumbered individual while we’re at
work and we deal with all the other
stuff when we’re at home and so in our
view we said now let’s let’s run this
experiment so that was a typical memo
experiment eight years ago of saying
let’s just try this and see what happens
we didn’t know what would happen we
didn’t know if it would work but ten men
will baby later it’s working so there
there it is the men the baby one of the
memo babies this is John Martin and John
Lucy this is just waking up busy oh just
going to sleep Lucy’s just all asleep I
love it we doing so we haven’t had a
memo baby on a google hangout yeah there
we go that’s the first time now you
another kind of strange policy that I
know you guys have is pairing we have
partner all people up together and so I
assume you know that gentleman is paired
with somebody working on some project
can you do not just bear with his
daughter he’s paired with another
programmer you so bright that I mean
obviously uh uh first time I read unlike
what that’s really different yeah can
you talk about I mean you explained in
the book but can you give like a high
level of you why you do that and how
that contributes to joy for your team so
there’s a lot of people who don’t go
into our profession because they think
it’s going to be a very lonely isolated
profession and it
that is you think about the typical tech
company that is the sea of cubicles
darkened cubicles everybody with earbuds
interior silently clicking away on
keyboards all day long they are isolated
from other human beings they don’t want
to be bothered so leave me alone so they
come in in the off hours so nobody will
be around and yet they create problems
and they don’t have help solving those
problems they have to do it in their own
heads and their own minds and it gets
very frustrating for a long period of
time by putting two people together they
solve problems faster they take
advantage of what both people know so
they can integrate their combined
knowledge together they challenge each
other by pointing to the screen and one
types and the other is watching one
talks about what he’s thinking about the
other ones challenging them on their
thinking and this is why this is a noisy
environment here because we want people
to overhear the ideas of others in fact
in our world we ban earbuds you can’t
heavier bus while you’re working which
is very unusual for a tech firm and so
not only do they work in pairs but we
assign the pairs and we switch them
every five working days because one of
the biggest challenges in software and
it’s true in a lot of other teams as
well is a tower of knowledge problem the
one person on the team who knows
everything and nobody else knows what
they know and I can tell you for a long
time at our feels secure tower feels
safe if nobody knows what I know I’m
valuable and they can’t fire me but one
day they wake up and they realize that
towers become a prison from which it
cannot escape because they can’t go work
on new stuff they can’t leave their
power and go work in a different power
they can’t even quit their job because
the next employer will say oh you’re an
Oracle nine point one point one point
two service pack three expert that’s
awesome we need one of those hours just
quit and you don’t of course they guys I
don’t want to do that anymore I want to
learn new stuff I want to build an
Android app I want to work on iOS I I
want to work in a different feel and so
there’s a whole bunch of reasons we do
this but I think the main thing is what
Deming said wait
when all anyone asks for is a chance to
work with pride to do good work to get
good work out into the field and what we
have found is that by pairing people
together and switching the pair’s you
get much higher quality much faster you
get problems solved in a much deeper way
than you do buy individual towers
working up yeah and just to maybe
explain a little bit more for the
readers for the viewers there are you
guys are mostly a software development
company seen how you pair people up will
be two programmers to one computer right
which for most people seems like a crazy
way to operate but that’s how they do it
and the question that i had in leading
that so we’re gonna go look at it while
we’re talking okay laptop out there and
we can go look at another and you’ll
hear a bit of the noise so here’s the
drake team here and you can see others
the great look at they’re all waving at
you so here’s Eric and we’ll hear
working together no guys stop working we
want very much yeah so yeah so this is
what it looks like to can you see it am
i yeah yeah we got two people one
keyboard that’s it yep sharing the
keyboard back and forth sharing a mouse
Will’s got the keyboard and mouse right
now Erica’s is watching what he’s doing
they’re talking about it and you can
also see that they sit in very close
proximity to one another right this this
is how they choose to sit because it’s
part of the other part of joy here at
Menlo is the way the space is set up and
you can see you’re not giving you a
little bit of a panoramic view of menlo
here yeah this this space is set up by
the team there are no facilities people
there’s no permission to ask there’s no
space police to check in with the team
forms a space however they choose so the
fact that they were sitting shoulder to
shoulder tables next to one another is
their choice nobody told them they had
to do that that’s the way they prefer or
I love it now a question
had in reading about that process if you
have eric and will working together and
then work together for five days and
then you switch it up you know they
haven’t finished their task does one of
them continue like eric keeps working on
and then a new person comes in there’s
that power typically works yeah so sort
of over here on the wall or display that
you see along the wall we have all these
index cards posted and we bring projects
down into pretty tiny task to our task
for our past eight our test 16 and so on
so the odds that they’re going to finish
their tests are actually pretty high
okay just break a project down into
smaller and smaller pieces so hopefully
within the five day context they’ve
gotten a number of things done not just
one but as you say there may still be
that last pass they were working on a
Friday together and they just didn’t get
it done now the question is who’s going
to carry that on it may well be just as
you described it may be that Eric is now
paired with Ted and Eric and Ted are
going to carry it on but it’s not wholly
unusual for a chiral e new pair to pick
up the work and carry it forward from
there which seems a little
counterintuitive maybe even unproductive
but what happens in that case is the new
pair starts asking the old pair a bunch
of questions now remember they’re all
sitting close to one another so it’s not
like we have to have a meeting and get a
conference room and everything you just
say you know hey we’ll hey Eric we’re
picking up the work you did here and
we’re a little confused about this part
of it could you just swing your chairs
around explain it to us and what’s
interesting is in that exchange of
information and knowledge transfer
you’re getting a you’re getting an
improvement in quality and
maintainability of the code because if
if Ted and Scott can’t figure out the
code that Eric and we’ll put together
this week before that’s an indication
and we might have trouble supporting
that code a year from now hmm so there’s
kind of micro payments we make along the
way that feel unproductive
but the speed the quality the
maintainability going forward literally
outperforms standard software
development by an order of magnitude
very cool I’m very different I love that
you flash the wall with all the the
notes and and you explaining the book
that everything is written on an index
card you put up on the wall which again
seems very backwards for a technology
company using like paper and pen and put
it on the wall but I guess that’s also
let some more effective and more joyful
experience well the people who come to
visit see that may call us the Amish of
software development and they ask us
they say which your tech firm why don’t
you use software for this and our answer
is pretty simple we choose tools we
believe work better for humans you very
visual tactile creatures so using
handwritten index cards is is actually
really compelling for people it’s sort
of like the Montessori School has taught
us once upon a time that you know we
learn a lot through the nerving and
things and our fingertips we learn a lot
through sound through vision to site
through spatial orientation that sort of
thing so there are many many companies
that use visualization I mean the whole
lean industry tries to focus on
visualization so there’s a component of
industry that looks at us and goes yeah
of course but the software industry is
so enamored always with its little
high-tech tools that it thinks that’s
the best answer for all problems we tend
to be a little more cynical about
software and we say no we’re not going
to just assume a high-tech solution is
the best one we’re going to explore
other opportunities we’ve been doing
software development with handwritten
index cards pin pushpin to a wall for 14
years I love it and I think it takes a
lot of courage to be in the business of
software development and not default to
software as a tool when it’s not the
best tool to use we had one tour guests
you looked at me and he saw this me said
okay that confirms that I would never
use you for a software project based on
what you’ve just shown and and the
thought bubble over my head I didn’t say
because I didn’t want to be rude was
awesome yeah exactly see each other
again
you you saved both of us a lot of
trouble by making that conclusion
because if you think that’s what’s going
to make software projects go better is
because we put your project management
artifacts inside of Microsoft Project
we’re doomed from the start right they
self eliminated yep you want people to
visit your your your factory there and
see if they love it or they hate it yep
yeah we did one two three drawers a day
now awesome I want to be conscious at
the time I have two quick questions for
you I’m 1 i’m curious about some
decisions that you’ve had to make that
may have made sense you know on paper
financially logically but was against
joy and if you had a kind of an example
of that like making tough decisions
based on your your core value yeah so i
think the hardest one is when a client
relationship begins to sour because they
really don’t ultimately play well you
know i don’t know how else to describe
it but we have a very we have a very
particular way of engaging our clients
and projects here they have to
participate and if they start to treat
us like a standard I tea vendor of what
we told you what we needed we don’t know
why we need to connect with you every
five days then quite frankly we have to
let that client go and that is hard to
do because we’re running a business here
the main economic engine is servicing
our clients and if we decide we’re going
to let a client go we’re choosing lower
revenue which might mean less people
might mean less prophets it might mean
smaller paychecks for some of us and so
those are hard decisions because now
you’re you’re faced with the reality of
joy and that is that you have to make
trade-offs you don’t get to have joy
without making trade-offs in other areas
and those are always hard decisions I I
always say that you know when you put a
pile of money in front of entrepreneurs
they start salivating you know and
you know but the devil always comes Gary
in cash and so we have to we have to
guard our culture and sometimes that
means making hard decisions I guess it
also makes it easier that you have such
a well-defined culture and word that
that’s always the core that you come
back to and if you don’t have that then
it makes it a lot harder to make those
big decisions yeah the word I use around
that evan is intentional we are very
intentional about a culture and we make
it very clear that if you came to visit
and you brought some people with you and
some of them have software projects on
their mind and they think maybe I use
memel they can come in and peek and they
can see and ask a bunch of questions we
don’t even know that’s why they’re here
and they may never call us again and
we’re okay with that the people who stay
the people who get what it is we do have
probably suffered somewhere else in
their previous life and now they see the
sensibility of what we’re describing
because they’ve endured the other kind
of suffering are in the sukkah so easily
produce and they recognize that the
approach we’ve taken is has a lot of
common sense in it and they start to get
it why it maybe looks expensive on one
end but quite frankly the most expensive
way to build software is that build
software no one ever uses mmm sure it’s
a good point um last question the team
is obviously super important to you to
maintain the culture and as you grow and
you’ve been one of the fastest growing
companies in the country which is
amazing uh how do you hire for joy yes
you you jettison the the traditional two
people lying to each other interview
process that I used to use in my old
life and you trade it away for an
audition and so literally we have 30 to
40 to 50 people at a time come in for an
initial interview we call it an extreme
interview and we pair you together with
another candidate for 20 minutes and we
watch you work together we don’t ask any
questions during our interview we make
it experiential we have you work
together share a piece of paper and a
pencil and a straightforward task we
give you the weirdest instructions ever
if you are on one of those interviews we
would tell you when you’re sitting next
to this candidate who might be competing
for the same
you are Evan your job is to try and get
this the person sitting next to you a
second interview and so this is Improv
Theater you make your partner look good
if they struggle help them out if
they’re stumbling help them up and so we
are teaching our culture from the moment
of the interview we’d pair you three
different times in that initial
interview 20 minutes each and then we
send you all home that was the first
interview and then we talked about what
we saw and the people we saw that
demonstrated what we call kindergarten
skills which in our mind fits to joy you
know you they play well with others do
they share do they not hit bite or
scratch that sort of thing then we bring
you in for a full day one day contract
and you actually do real work in the
team alongside one of our people in fact
the people that were sitting over there
table it was possible one of those pair
partners was interviewing here because
that’s what interviewing looks like you
actually come in you do work we pay you
for the day you work with one person in
the morning another person in the
afternoon if that works we bring in for
a three-week trial and again you pair on
real work we pay you for that and
usually at that point we have a feeling
on both sides that it’s going to work
this is different and we don’t assume we
could ever in words explain to you how
different it is but if we put you in it
and let you experience it directly you
begin to understand does will this work
for me we don’t assume it will i love
the tradition a resume and cover letter
how much attention you pay to that how
how do you you know it is funny because
I mean I used to do all the standard
stuff when I was a manager back in my
old life okay dumb is it that we try and
assess a human being something as
complex as a human with an eight and a
half by eleven sheet of paper with words
typed on it probably derived from a
keyword search is something like monster
com right you know drama 9.3 you know
oracle nine point one point one point
two it’s like seriously is what i want
to ask you is are you a good
kindergartner and so far we we have
collected a few kindergarten report
cards
I’m guessing your mother still has your
so if you lock if you think you’ve lost
it just go ask my own show pick it up
for you go read the qualities that you
had in kindergarten because those are
probably some of the most important
qualities you will ever talk about in
your lifetime that might be that might
be next on your your job application
process include a sample from your
kindergarten I love it rich I know we
went a little over i’m really grateful
for the time today as i said i love the
book I’m dog marking every page and
taking notes and for those of you who
are watching you can go check it out
join ink on amazon and all of the major
bookstores and i’m gonna go i’m gonna
come on the tour I’m coming I got to set
a date we’re gonna do the tour I’m
excited for the follow up even if you
come bring me a book I want to see what
it is you dog-eared I love to hear what
people found interesting every single
page almost goodbye almost like there’s
man one in ten pages that’s not mark so
you’ll be doing a lot of you basically
rereading your entire book alright well
thank you for the time you guys can
trigger the book drink or or or ghus the
website menlo mental innovations com is
that it yep yes mental innovations com
all one word thanks so much that’s it
thank you rich all right Thank You Evan
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