Gemma McCall, CEO at Culture Shift
Gemma McCall, CEO and co-founder of Culture Shift, introduces us to the Manchester office…
“We’re lucky to have welcomed many new Culture Shifters to our team in recent months and as our team grows, our space needed to grow with us. The new Culture Shift HQ is just the space we needed in order to collaborate and bring real change to organisational culture.”
Where is it?
86 Princess St, Manchester, M1 6NG
How big is it?
Our share of the fourth floor is just over 3,000 square feet and includes two large meeting rooms, two smaller soundproofed pods and a soundproofed filming and podcast room (watch this space). In addition to this, we also have break out areas with soundproofed phone booths, open meeting booths and casual seating. We have a large separate kitchen with our beloved Sage coffee machine, and then a smaller tea station in the main office space with a Zip HydroTap.
Throughout the office, we’ve incorporated our brand colours to bring the space to life. We have plants in every corner, ambient mood lighting and plenty of natural light! We wanted to make sure the new space reflected our values as a diverse team and enabled us to work efficiently in a way that is inclusive of everyone and their preferred ways of working.
What happens there?
At Culture Shift, we exist to lead positive change in organisational culture. Every Culture Shifter shares a strong belief that everyone should have a positive experience in their place of work and study.
We have a hybrid approach to work, but there’s always a good mix of people in the office! However, when the whole team is in, we really make the most of it with collaborative brainstorms and ideation sessions which help to shape and grow the business.
As a business, we have ambitious growth plans so it’s important that the whole team is on the same page to ensure we’re setting ourselves up for success. To do this, our executive team like to get together for what we call a ‘Future Shaping’ day every quarter. This is our time to reflect on the successes of the previous quarter and select our three overarching goals for the next.
Anyone who is also part of a growing tech start-up will know the pace you have to move at in order to meet the demands of the sector. We are constantly evolving and adapting to be the best we can be and our new office has given us the space we need to do just this.
What sort of work goes on?
No day two days are ever the same at Culture Shift. Typically, we like to collaborate and brainstorm as a team on how we can reach even more organisations and educational institutions to help change their organisational culture with our real-time, reporting platform.
If we’re not innovating new ideas, we’re implementing our marketing strategies (we recently relaunched our YouTube channel!), or our highly skilled developers are developing our platform to ensure it is the best it can possibly be.
We also use our office to meet with potential new clients. There’s no better way for a new client or business to get to know you than inviting them into where the magic happens!
Of course, no office is complete without regular socials and catch ups across the team. Only recently did we host Time to Talk Day, where we had a “drop in” for anyone who wanted to take a break from work to come and chat about anything they wanted.
Why is the workplace appropriate?
For a growing scale up team, we felt it was important to have a physical space that helps to build our culture, promote collaboration and support cross functional relationships within our teams – and of course encourage us to socialise together!
We wanted an office that breaks stereotypical corporate norms as this is the best reflection of our creative background. We wanted to be able to offer a range of working options which is why we’ve opted for open plan desks, as well as soundproofed rooms and phone booths for those who need some quiet time to concentrate.
Who works there?
On our busiest days we have over 30 Culture Shifters at 86 Princess Street, but the beauty of our new space is that it allows our team to grow and develop. Our diverse team is made up of so many creative individuals, all of whom share our company values in activating positive change in organisational culture. In the last few months, we have welcomed two new members to our senior team.
Jules Curtin joined us as vice president of sales and Naomi Davidson has been appointed our new head of success. We can’t wait to see how our team grows and develops throughout our time at 86 Princess Street!
