In March, Valve – the company that gave us Half-Life, Team Fortress, Counter-Strike, Portal, and Steam – finished its “Handbook for New Employees”. Yesterday, the PDF version was leaked (published?) onto the interwebs. I just finished reading it in its entirety, from the title page to the glossary, and it’s jaw-droppingly amazing.
Some highlights:
- Valve’s internal company structure is completely flat. There is no hierarchy. There’s no management at all! (Mind you, they currently employ around 300 people, and their revenue is estimated at more than 1 billion USD.) There are no appointed team leaders, product managers, or anything like it. Cave Johnson would not agree.
- All desks have wheels. If you’d like to relocate, unplug your computer, push your desk to the desired location, and plug it in again. That’s it. They even have a page on their intranet that lets you look up where your colleagues are currently plugged in. If they’re not working from home, that is.
- Compensation is determined by your peers and their assessment of your skill level, output, group contribution, and product contribution. How cool is that? Just think about it: If you’re a mean, selfish bastard, you automatically get paid less! I still need to bend my head around this one.
To summarize, Valve’s corporate philosophy is absolutely inspiring. There’s a lot that other companies could learn from them, and in my opinion, sooner would be better.
And now, please go and read Valve’s employee handbook. You won’t regret it.
