David DeSanto: commitment

Transcript context

…I was browsing around through the handbook and I looked at your core values and there's some really sweet things in there. So within the collaboration core value, there's a value of kindness, which I love. What does that look like in practice at GitLab? The values really come together in a way that I've not seen other company values come together, and I don't remember where these all are in there, but it ties into the kindness. If you're all remote, you're not necessarily seeing people in person and sometimes it's hard to read intent on a Slack message or the emotion in the message. And so we say assume positive intent, assume the person is traditionally just asking for help or is trying to be helpful. Have short toes, don't read something and think it's meant a different way. And that's where the kindness comes in as well, is that if you're treating each other with kindness and assuming positive intent, you end with a lot less of the negative headbutting you can have, especially at an asynchronous culture like GitLab. Our team, I will see my direct reports usually at least a couple minutes a week on a Zoom call, but that's not the case for everyone at GitLab. And same thing with other teams, and sometimes it's hard to assume what the person's intention actually is. And so we say, "Be kind, assume the positive intent, realize that everyone's here to help each other out." And I can tell you when people ask me what's it like working at GitLab, I always come back to the values and say we actually live them. And that starts with Sid all the way down the organization to a brand new employee straight off college. If we're doing that, then there's a lot less of that tension and headbutting that can happen in organizations, especially when we don't see each other all the time in person. Some of the other elements along the be kindness is say thanks and say sorry, and negative feedback is one-on-one.…

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