Marketing Developer, CharlieHR

Charlie have a super clear progression framework so you know where you sit and what you need to do to progress. Management are incredibly supportive and help pinpoint areas you need to develop in order to progress. There are performance reviews 3x a year so there's a real sense of momentum.

The people at Charlie are incredible, warm and welcoming. From mental health, career progression, managing workload — the team are thoughtful, humble and empathetic. Startups can be tough environments so it's great to join a team like this with proper support networks and processes in place.

Employee wellbeing is core at Charlie — from the £30 monthly wellness budget to management putting our reasonable adjustments policy into practice. Not to sound cliche but it is a family feel at Charlie where folks look out for each other and the team have put processes in place to support everyone.

CharlieHR has challenged me to think hard about who I want to be and where I want my career to go. They have fostered an incredible community of kind, supportive, and ambitious people from all walks of life. Their approach to their product is thoughtful and collaborative - I get the feeling that what I do really makes a difference to our customers lives.

There is always the sense that the company wants you to bring your best self to work - and that is a two-way thing. If you aren't feeling your best, then they are there to support you. Culture is everything at Charlie and they aren't ones to be caught out by talking the talk and not walking the walk.

Charlie understands it can never be perfect but over the last 18 months has made tremendous steps forward diversifying its hiring pipeline and the whole culture is better off for it. They run regular diversity, equity and inclusion sessions on a range of topics and encourage all of us, not to only bring our full selves to work, but to have the opportunity to celebrate what makes us different.

Giving and requesting feedback is at the heart of how Charlie do things. We are encouraged to challenge the way things are - often feels as though no idea is a stupid idea

At Charlie, great work and attitude is celebrated every day (e.g. Huddles, shout outs, slack channels), enabling people to learn from other's work as well

High and positive energy - lifting team members up; finding solutions and questioning how we can be better.

Charlie is by far the most supportive environment I've worked in, which has really reduced any fear of failure, and allowed me to do the best work of my career so far. I feel extremely supported by my line manager, team members, and the key internal stakeholders I work with.

Charlie offers so many ways of working flexibly it's amazing. We don't have set hours, and it's not just lip-service, apart from your set meetings, you're free to structure your day and week in whichever way works best for you. We can work from the office as much or as little as possible, and we have 30 days a year where we can work from anywhere in the world, which has let me have some amazing nomad-working experiences this year.

Charlie has quarterly progression reviews, a clear progression framework, and time set aside to develop and work on Professional Development Plans every week. This, along with top-tier line-manager support, and a £500 L&D budget, means you can grow as quickly as you aspire to.

With a career progression framework that's fit to every role and performance reviews every three months, it's easier to not feel like you're getting stuck in your role. I used to work in places where yearly reviews did not take into account most of my accomplishments (difficult to remember everything once per year), and where performance plans simply felt like a load off the manager's shoulder. At Charlie, I don't feel like progression is done for the sake of filling in some forms. There's real care and effort coming from your manager to develop your skills and make sure you can do your best work.

Despite many companies claiming open and honest communication, it sometimes feels like a cope out because, let's face it, it's hard to tell people the truth. At Charlie, people go out of their way to give a good balance between honest, respectful and detailed feedback. It can be challenging at first, but the transparency that transpires from it defines working relationships and gives you the confidence to share feedback with managers and colleagues all the same. At Charlie, you're never left in the dark whether it's about how the company is performing or how your work is done. It builds trust between the employer and the employee.

Wellbeing is such an important aspect of work that some companies sometimes overlook it, or think it has to do with simply raising awareness about it rather than supporting team members. Charlie not only gives you a well-being budget, a mental health app, but also mental health days! This is a game-changer, especially when mental health days are not just there to look pretty. As a new starter, you witness team members booking them off and the whole team supporting them. Charlie has removed the vulnerability that might stem from taking a day off by building a culture of empathy towards mental health, and that is super rare.

Working at Charlie is rewarding because I really believe in our mission: to Make Work Better. This makes my work feel meaningful and linked to a higher purpose, and is something that we really prioritise for ourselves internally too.

Charlie invests a lot of time in career progression. We have quarterly reviews, and a progression framework which means that working out where you need to grow or develop is always front of mind.

The people who work at Charlie are so supportive and smart - there's noone in the room that I wouldn't want to spend time with.

The company provides mental health sick days "personal days", access to therapy via spill, monthly wellbeing budgets & are currently trialling a 9 day fortnight.

They communicate and share all company performance / numbers on a monthly basis - nothing is obviously out of bounds and can't be questioned.

Valuing team member progression - progression plans, regular reviewed (every quarter) learning and development budgets and time for people to devote to their learning and growth.

Quarterly re-levelling reviews help ensure you get promoted promptly. There's a well-defined framework in place so you know what you need to be doing to get to the next level.

Management is on hand whenever you need them — talk through challenges, both professional and personal, and they'll endeavour to help you however they can. You're given space to learn, to manage your own time and it's totally OK to make mistakes.

There's a genuine focus on employee wellbeing — everyone genuinely cares about everyone else. You have unlimited personal days and there's no taboo around using them — they're there for when you need them, and people do use them, it's not just something we talk about.

Charlie has an incredibly strong culture - the team is super empathetic and also focussed on growth and learning. In my time at Charlie I've gotten some of the toughest feedback of my career, but I've also grown faster than ever. Charlie's progression framework, role docs, and regular 1:1s mean that expectations are set really clearly and I always know what I should be working on to progress. I also feel like I can own my own development, and I'm free to grow with Charlie's needs and to learn things for my own career goals.

Every team in Charlie understands the power and importance of diversity. Diversity makes a team greater than the sum of its parts, and allows us to build even better products as we are more able to anticipate the needs of our diverse customer base. In the last year they provided diversity training to all the leaders and managers in the business which has helped us to become even more inclusive and thoughtful.

Feedback is a foundational expectation at Charlie - everybody knows that it's their job to learn and grow, and that the best way to do that is to seek feedback from others and give feedback honestly. Charlie's also an extremely transparent business, where anyone can ask questions of the leadership team and expect an open and honest answer. We take these two ideas everywhere, including into our hiring processes - throughout our interviews you'll be asked if you have questions and you can expect to receive the same answer you would if you were a member of the team already.

A clear progression framework, transparency around the steps required to advance and a willingness from your line manager to support your professional development mean you always know what you need to do to progress. This results in many people quickly climbing the ranks.

Many companies have a mission statement, values or a public facing image promoting their product or service. However, at Charlie this is genuine and real, rather than a top down PR exercise. We really look to support small businesses, innovate on the best ways to work and support our own team.

Great flexible working options plus transparency on the processes themselves make Charlie a great place to work. Nomad working for 30 days abroad, the opportunity to be in the office as much or as little as you'd like and the genuine ability to pick your own hours means people are able to do their best work.

The transparent career progression framework works as a fair and inclusive base for everyone to work and progress towards the path they willing to take. Everyone values personal development and the daily work has been structure in way for everyone to be able to work on that. Having dedicated time, budget and management support makes Charlie not only a great place to work but a great place to grow!

Working on making work better for other people makes me feel I am contributing on many different levels, improving so many people daily experience, providing the tools to achieve a great balance between work and life. Pandemic was such a challenging period for every single of us. Realising how important our life / work balance is makes our job in Charlie more than just task but a mission!

My experience in Charlie has been great even since the hiring process. When I started working I was impressed to find out my expectations assumptions were turning true. Is great place to work because everyone's mission is to Make work better for other companies and of course we start by applying that internally first! Having a flexible work style allows me to organise my day(s) as needed. The company is constantly experimenting with improving flexible work and that give us so much energy and positive vides!

Charlie's purpose is to Make Work Better – which is unbelievably important in a world where most of us are spending the majority of waking time and energy at work, and can expect to do so for longer than any generation before us. It's something that is applied and lived at every level of the business, which was really clear during 2020 and the business priorities in response to the initial impacts of the global coronavirus pandemic.

Several of my colleagues are now doing roles which are very different to the ones they were when they first joined Charlie (product management, sales, Chief of Staff, head of Customer function). People are genuinely extended supportive opportunities to try their hand in new career paths, and with the clarity of the progression framework we've had in place for a few years now, it's apparent to everyone how learning opportunities match up with progression. The annual £500 L&D budget helps a lot – as does the Slack channel showing what people are spending it on (great for inspiration).

Feedback is at the heart of our culture at Charlie – the belief that it's important to seek and give honest, candid feedback (both favourable and unfavourable). Two of our four high-performance behaviours are focused on it: "Be Humble" and "Get Uncomfortable". It's how I've personally grown the most at Charlie; while it wasn't the thing that attracted me to Charlie in the first place, it's what's kept me here for the past five years (and more!). The investor and board updates are shared with the whole team; the leadership team acknowledge and admit to their own mistakes – and are vulnerable about the fact that for many, this is their first time in a leadership role, so feedback and forgiveness are utterly vital.

Well. I haven't been here long at all but I've truly loved it so far. Everyone is super friendly and I feel like I can be myself without having to code-switch too tough. I felt really welcomed when I joined, people just sending private slack messages and emails, or booking meetings in my calendar to get to know each other which is a bit like "oo why would you do that when I'm just a junior" but it's lovely lool

I mean I love this. 8 mandatory days a year when you should be in the office but outside of that it's not by force. I'm a morning person so I can start as early as I like and I don't have to work late when my brain switches off.

One of the reasons I wanted the job here was because after stalking CharlieHR by reading the blogs by leadership, you get such a great sense of what they're like to work with/under. They genuinely care about the employees and it shows in everything. It's really not just lip service they actually practice what they preach and having been on the inside for a hot minute now I made a good choice coming here!