Company Culture: The culture at iClick (asi/62124) – the only industry supplier to appear on every Best Places to Work list – is based on two pillars, says CEO Jeff Hall: The mission of making distributors’ lives easier, and the transparency and cooperation required to that make that happen. “Our people know their job is to take care of customers, and we trust them to do it well,” says Hall. “We also encourage them to be transparent and voice their concerns, particularly regarding COVID, and we listen.” To keep his hybrid group engaged, Hall supports regular virtual happy hours and has an all-hands meeting every Friday over Slack to discuss how the week went and customer feedback. It’s working: Employees scored the company particularly well on the Best Places to Work survey for knowing how their work relates to the supplier’s goals and priorities.

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Appearances on Best Places to Work

The company also offers a unique perk to mark five-year work anniversaries: Employees receive a three-week sabbatical, separate from PTO. “They go to Europe, or refurbish their home, or just work in the yard,” says Hall. “And we encourage them to take it all at one time so they come back refreshed.”

COVID Changes: More than half of employees have come back to the office a couple days a week on a volunteer basis, while the rest work remote. Several times COVID foiled plans to bring everyone back full-time. Soon, the executive team will make a decision on the future of their facility. “Nine months ago, I would’ve said we’re absolutely all coming back full-time, eventually,” Hall says. “Now we’re not sure. Our lease runs out at the end of 2022, so we may downsize and make in-person work voluntary, and just have a space for meetings.”

Parting Tip: When it comes to hiring, talent is one thing, says Hall, but bringing people on who fit in the company culture is just as – if not more – important. Hall says he remembers a noteworthy stat from a business article he read several years ago: 90% of the time people are let go from a job, it’s due to interpersonal reasons rather than performance. That made sense, says Hall: Manage interpersonal concerns and you can reduce turnover. “People need to treat each other and clients with respect,” says Hall. “It only takes one negative person to spoil the pot, but being negative doesn’t solve the problem. If there’s ever an issue, we have tough but honest conversations.”