A few weeks ago, I wrote about how (for the 1st time in our company’s history) we’ve written down our company values, guiding principles, and goals.
Our values are mostly about how all of the people here behave, treat each other, and our customers – it’s a great filter to make sure that folks we’re going to hire fit in during the hiring process. And, it’s a good way to ensure that the way we think about the big picture is pretty consistent.
Our guiding principals are how we evaluate (almost?) every decision – deciding what new feature to work on, or whether we should add to the team. These principles are much more about the company and the long-term health of Moraware.
What are our guiding principles?
Increase revenue. Moraware has been growing at a steady pace, and we intend to keep growing. Having more revenue gives us more opportunities. We can add more awesome folks to our team, have more robust infrastructure, and build more features and products.
Increase revenue/employee. Even though we’ve been growing steadily, we’re not willing to go crazy with the size of our team. People make up the bulk of our expenses, and if we hire in an effort just to grow revenue, we’ll quickly grow our way into losing money.
Increase profit. Yeah, I said it. Profit isn’t a dirty word. We survived through the really lean times of the housing crash because we had a cushion, and even though the economy has been okay lately, I hope we’re prepared for future catastrophes. It’s also true that all of us want to make more money for our personal financial goals.
Increase quality of life. We’re not willing to sacrifice quality of life for the financial goals. That goes for the quality of life of our owners, employees, and customers. We’ve taken a long-term view of the business, and if everyday of working with us or for Moraware is a grind… we’ll that’s not very good long-term thinking.
When all of those things are going up, we know we’re succeeding. Occasionally, one will stay steady or even go down. And, as long as it’s intentional, that’s okay. For example – every time add to the team, our revenue/employee will go down temporarily. And if there’s something critical going on with a release or servers, we may decide to have crappy quality of life for a while.
Just like our company values, these principles are a work in progress. But, in order for everyone at Moraware to make consistent decisions, we need to have the same information. And knowing the principles that govern our business really helps the decision-making process.
Want to know more? At Moraware, we make software for countertop fabricators. CounterGo is countertop drawing, layout, and estimating software. JobTracker is scheduling software that helps you eliminate the time you waste looking for job folders. RemnantSwap is a free place to buy and sell granite remnants with fabricators near you.
