Company culture is what makes a business unique. It goes beyond company perks, like state of the art offices, free meals and unlimited holidays; and is an important contributor to employee retention, morale and satisfaction. Whilst some organisations take a relaxed approach to culture, others operate in a more traditional and structured manner.

At Arctic Shores, we embrace an entrepreneurial mindset. Our team members come from a range of backgrounds, allowing for inspiration to be drawn from previous experiences in other industries. This contributes to fresh and unconventional ideas and approaches to problem solving. In addition, flexible working empowers our team to focus on what drives them both professionally and personally, and strike the right work life balance by being able to work from home and around commitments like family or study.

Everyone at Arctic Shores is working towards the same goal: to help companies make better people decisions, and people better career decisions. From day one, this mission has been underpinned by core values that have not only guided our product but also our approach to our clients, our hiring decisions, and ultimately our culture. These 5 values are at the core of our company culture and everything we do.

First and foremost, we believe in making a positive impact. We are passionate about making the recruitment and career development process fairer for all by reducing bias and minimising adverse impact. In addition to providing solutions to enterprise clients, we work with charitable organisations Career Ready and ReGeneration that both provide students with valuable work experience opportunities. We have also been a proud sponsor of Django Girls Manchester since its inception, allowing more females to break into the world of coding.

When working with clients, partners and candidates, we are committed to doing the right thing and acting with fairness, integrity and transparency. Even when under pressure, we deliver on our commitments and maintain honest relationships with our clients. This extends to the way that we work internally and interact with our colleagues and we strive to always be open with one another and help each other out when we can.

Whether it’s working to tight deadlines, kicking off new projects or a quieter day at the office, we are very team-oriented and are great at working together. Despite our offices being miles apart in London and Manchester, and across the pond in Singapore, our teams are always communicating via Slack or Zoom (and occasionally even face to face!) and sharing knowledge on our dedicated #knowledgejam Slack channel. We also hold regular company meetings to keep everyone up-to-date with activity in other areas of the business and each team member will have regular one-to-one meetings with their manager.

Outside of the office, we also like to get together! We host regular games nights, group lunches and nights out. Each of our offices is based at a WeWork, a co-working space that creates a great work environment and brings social activities to the workplace. With free breakfast on Mondays, prosecco and beer taps, and weekly activities like themed happy hours, pub quizzes, there is plenty of opportunity for our team to have a positive work/life balance. Being based within a WeWork also allows the team to choose where they want to work (i.e. within communal spaces or quieter corners) as well as recharge their batteries with yoga and meditation sessions throughout the week.

Always striving to be at the forefront of innovation, it’s no surprise that we encourage disrupting traditional thinking! We love exploring new ideas and doing things differently. Ideas and inspiration can come from anywhere. That’s why every team member can take 1 day per month as an ‘Own Day’ to focus on a work-related project of their choosing. For example, we have had people working on new product features and client tools. This gives everyone a chance to focus on something different and take a new approach to doing things, as well as contribute to the overall company goal in a new way.

Throughout all that we do, we are always aiming high and striving for excellence. We maintain high standards across all of our products, and ensure that our clients have a positive experience working with us from the first point of contact, through to the implementation stage. This also manifests in how we make decisions - we’re great believers in evidence-based decision making and sound research. We acknowledge that everyone makes mistakes, but choose to reflect on those mistakes and take the opportunity to learn from them.

We understand the importance of organisational culture, and strive to create an environment in which our employees flourish and achieve personal and company goals. If you would like to be a part of the Arctic Shores team, you can check out our latest job roles at careers.arcticshores.com.