In the latest episode of Culture de-cooded where our founder Charlie interviews some of the world’s most influential leaders – Founder of Thought Machine, Paul Taylor, reveals just how his fintech enterprise software company is transforming the banking industry, and how he prioritises culture in order to drive progress.
In this latest episode, whilst sharing his experience, Paul places emphasis on the importance of company culture, and how, accompanied by a written set of company principles, it has been the key to his success.
“Everybody here signs up with the same culture,” Paul shares, “and they don’t see it as my culture, and they see it as being owned by everybody.”
Paul developed Thought Machine’s company culture by taking inspiration from his own experience at Google. The Thought Machine culture is very meritocratic, with Paul facilitating open debate among his teams, and encouraging authority to be challenged, in combination with the idea that ‘everyone has to be a doer’. “In many meetings, we will have an open debate and somebody junior will say, Oh, well, I don’t agree with that,” he adds.
To maintain a transparent approach to company culture, Paul and the Thought Machine team are explicit about it, starting from the hiring process. For instance, Paul stated, “We had just hired a barista. We put that person through extensive tests on how to make coffee and different knowledge of cakes and confectionary and assessed their demeanour and things like that. And why wouldn’t you? Because that person interacts with nearly everybody every day.”
Like many other business leaders, Paul has also faced the uncertainties of how to grow a company while maintaining culture, he adds “I thought like many people, that culture would get diluted and that it could all become a bit ‘corporate’. But it hasn’t. My honest thought is that a good culture is owned by the people, and people replicate it and buy into it.”
Paul’s attitudes align with that of Charlie’s, who founded SaaS platform Culture15 to measure and manage company culture. Launched in 2015, Culture15 is an innovative SaaS platform that provides organisations with a rigorous platform to measure culture, and has since helped more than 50 organisations, across 65 countries, put culture back at the heart of business performance through the power of technology and data.
Determined to revolutionise the way organisations measure and manage culture, in September, Culture15 launched a new AI-powered feature, Rosetta. Designed to help organisations measure and manage culture in actionable ways. The SaaS platform has now been enhanced by the second in a trio of AI revolutions to be announced this year: Culture15’s AI summarisation feature.
To learn more about how revolutionary tech and AI are making waves in the banking industry – or simply to delve deeper into inspirational leadership lives – listen to the full episode featuring Paul Taylor on Culture de-cooded. This podcast is for innovative leaders who want to learn more about the importance of company culture putting culture back in the heart of business – all episodes are available on all major podcast streaming channels.
Culture15 is your complete toolkit for tracking culture change. CEOs and Exec Teams at world-leading organisations use Culture15 analytics to ensure success by aligning their culture with what they need to execute their strategy. If you’d like to find out how to define the culture you need, diagnose the culture you have and close the gap, talk to our team.
