Risk & Business Magazine Knight Archer Insurance Magazine Fall 2017 | Page 15

TEAM CULTURE
“Technology will merely amplify whatever habits you already have.”
of the company. When an issue arises
internally or with a client’s task, we
follow a “Five Whys” method where
you state the problem on a form we’ve
created, than ask yourself “Why?” and
again four more times until you arrive at
a solution. It’s incredibly powerful and
empowering.
Technology will merely amplify
whatever habits you already have. If you
have good habits, technology can help
magnify your results and if you have
bad habits, technology will usually just
get you to the wrong place faster. We
use technology effectively to further
the impact of our human powered team
culture. These are some of the tools
we’ve used to get our people charged up.
SLACK
Many of your know Slack and probably
use it to communicate with your teams.
We adopted Slack as THE means of
internal, written communication.
Emails were never exchanged between
team members, which meant that public
discussions included everyone and were
kept efficient through the designation
of topical channels. It democratized our
interactions and kept our flat hierarchy…
flat. The first Slack integration we ever
used was GIPHY, which allows you
to type a phrase like “you go girl” and
an “appropriate” animated GIF would
post in the channel. It made people
comfortable, it made them laugh, it got
their focus.
ZOOM
Zoom.us has been our video
conferencing platform of choice since
we started and we began weekly
huddles with the whole team almost
immediately. Being able to have live
video chat really helped us get to know
each other and connect in a way that you
couldn’t through text based messages
alone. If a team member couldn’t make
the live huddle, the recording was made
available so they could watch it later and
respond at their convenience.
ROGER/FIKA
These two apps were indispensable. One of
Ari’s personal constraints was that he has
four children and at the time we started
the company, was only working three days
per week so he could be with them the
rest of the time . Roger made it so that we
could still get things done. As a “walkie
talkie” app, one of us could record a two
minute brainstorming session to send to
the other and hours later, when we had a
few minutes, we could listen, digest it, and
respond. Eventually we would use Roger to
send messages to groups and even hosted
some asynchronous meetings with it.
The team behind Roger would eventually
release Fika, a video version of Roger
that added the ability to share images or
webpage while talking. Not only did this
add clarity to any messages we would
exchange, it made it really easy to make
impromptu, video announcements to the
whole team. That made us very accessible
to the team so we could support them and
they could work with us rather than for us.
OFFICEVIBE
This Slack bot would survey the team
each week with questions like “How likely
would you be to recommend working for
Leverage?” or “How supported do you
feel in your work?” The resulting survey
told us that we were doing really well
but there were three areas that needed
improvement. First, the team felt like they
were getting good praise and recognition
but the feedback wasn’t specific enough.
Second, they felt a disconnect with their
teammates. Finally, there was a lack of
alignment with our core values.
GROWBOT
This Slack bot allows team members to
give “props” to other team members and
it keeps score of how many points you
had earned. Now we started getting very
specific as to why someone was being
recognized for good work. In addition we
give weekly bonuses to the best performing
teammate and until this point we would
just read off the names. Now we spend
some time explaining exactly why a
particular person earned the bonus.
DONUT
Another Slack bot that pings two random
members of the team every Monday and
basically suggests a coffee date so they can
get to know each other. Now that could
mean an actual get together for coffee if
geography allowed for that, or a quick one
on one video chat.
MANIFESTO
This was one of the most challenging. The
surveys said there was a lack of alignment
with the core values of the company and
the truth was that we didn’t have any
defined on paper. It didn’t take long to get
the inspiration to write a document that
lays out the exact culture we have and want
to maintain at Leverage. This serves as a
way of setting the bar for new hires and
providing guidance to our veterans. +
Ari Meisel’s story starts in 2006, when
some unexpected news derailed his
booming real estate career: Crohn’s
Disease: A highly-debilitating digestive
ailment, Crohn’s barred Ari from leading a
normal life. He lost weight, energy, and the
ability to work with regularity — in fact,
there were times he could only work for 60
minutes a day.
With a blossoming business to run, Ari
knew an hour per day was unacceptable.
Against the advice of doctors and loved-
ones, Ari embarked upon an extraordinarily
painful journey to cure what medical
textbooks consider an incurable disease.
Through excruciating amounts of trial
and error, Ari not only regained control of
his life but beat this seemingly unbeatable
disease — and is now symptom-free.
Less Doing, More Living and Leverage
Virtual Assistants are the result of Ari’s
amazing journey back to health, happiness,
and well-being.
Ari lives in New York City, where he
spends every ounce of free time with his
loving wife, Anna, and four fantastic kids
— Benjamin, Lu