People Lead, Birdie

When I joined Birdie the first thing we spoke about was my goals, professional development and careers trajectory. I love the team, the mission centric way of working and the culture. We are growing very quickly and I love seeing new team members join and thrive!

We have such a flat structure, everyone is encourages to use radical candour and speak their mind. My experience has been one that highlighted our leadership valuing my opinions. We have radical transparency and I never feel out of the loop with company wide decisions.

Autonomy is very clear at Birdie, we aim to give our staff structure and support but let them be part of the decision making when it comes to deadlines, OKR's and targets. The lack of micro managing allows me to do my best work and utilise the support system of senior management when needed.

Birdie empowers me every day to make decisions and follow what I believe is best for the Birdie team. Max our CEO keeps saying that "We're all CEOs" and this principle is not just something that sits on a presentation, it's embedded in the way that we work every day, every task, every project.

At Birdie there are no HiPPOs (highest paid person's opinion), this means every team member is not only "allowed" to share their opinions we're also encouraged to actively challenge each other no matter the seniority. The principle is simple, we're hired as experts in our own fields so the company as a whole respects that position and takes our opinions in high regard.

Birdie's growth is exponential, since I joined in the summer of 2020 my team has grown 2x and the plans for next year are super ambitious but realistic. What I admire however is that we haven't lost our identity in the midst of all this, we're still true to our values and mission of improving the lives of older adults.

Within the first month in my role, I had already received positive and constructive feedback on my work from stakeholders across the organisation. I knew I was on the right track and appreciated the ideas for where I could add even more value.

Birdie is fully supportive of remote working - the London office is a friendly place, but I don't feel pressure to come in if it doesn't work for me.

Management has shown their support for and interest in both professional and personal aspects of my life. I feel they care about my wellbeing in a really balanced way.

Everything that Birdie does is focused around the value of 'We Care', this is demonstrated within the team as several positive feedback posts appear on the slack team appreciation channel every day, but also externally with our partners. Birdie's mission is to help people age confidently in their own homes and everything that we do supports this vision and the carers and care agencies that make this dream a reality.

I love working at Birdie because communication and feedback are encouraged, not just between colleagues and managers but across the company. If you have an idea or want to demonstrate something important to you there's a space for that in the weekly All Hands or through Lunch and Learns, if you think there's something that could be changed about the way you are managed you can let your manager know in the Team Barometer or just talk to them in your 1:1, and if you are struggling everywhere you look there are people available, eager to listen and help you discover the way forward.

Birdie recognises that mental health is just as important as physical health. Our wellbeing leave policy means that if you need to take a day off it doesn't matter if it's because you have the flu or because you need to take a mental health day, whatever the reason looking after yourself is encouraged. This goes much further than just policy, if someone catches you on Slack when you are meant to be on holiday you'll get a friendly reminder to switch off and enjoy your holiday or if you are having a bad day you might get some flowers or a small gift from your team to cheer you up. At Birdie everyone is always looking out for each other which makes it an amazing place to work!