Culture Is the Most Strategic Move a Company Can Make

Before my SYZYGY co-founder, Chris Walters, and I started our company in 2020, neither of us had aspired to be business owners. We’d always imagined ourselves as second-in-commands—people who could rally behind great leaders. But throughout our careers, we discovered those leaders didn’t exist. Eventually, we realised that if we wanted to work for someone whose vision we believed in, we’d have to become those leaders ourselves.

So we built the kind of company we’d always wanted to work for. Five years later, SYZYGY has grown to dozens of employees and clients. The foundation of that growth has been our culture—intentionally built, fiercely protected, and constantly evolving.

From the start, culture wasn’t an afterthought; it was the axis on which our vision spun. We launched in the middle of a global pandemic and a social reckoning, when business as usual no longer made sense. The moment demanded new kinds of workplaces—ones that could reflect the world people were actually living in.

Our goal was simple: create a workplace we’d want to work in, one open to as many perspectives as possible about what an ideal workplace could be. We invited our team to bring their whole selves to work—kind of like the anti-Severance.

A strong culture starts with who you hire. At SYZYGY, we look for people who genuinely care—about others, their craft, their clients, and contributing meaningfully to a shared community. Many who join us come from industries that reward self-sufficiency, but our ethos champions collaboration, openness, and empathy. We encourage people to own their mistakes without fear of judgment, because excellence depends on the safety to recover, not the fear of failure.

These principles aren’t idealistic—they’re pragmatic. When people feel supported, they stay. Low turnover saves time, money, and disruption. It builds continuity for clients and allows teams to grow internally instead of constantly churning talent. The benefits compound: institutional knowledge deepens, internal mobility increases, and recruitment becomes effortless as great people attract others like them. Culture, when genuinely invested in, multiplies—financially, operationally, and emotionally.

To build a company where people felt they belonged, we had to create an environment where no one needed to compartmentalise who they were to do their jobs. When people can bring more of themselves to work, two things happen: problems get solved faster, and the diversity of experience at the table directly strengthens both the culture and the work itself.

Sustaining that kind of culture takes continuous effort. It means planning carefully but flexibly, using resources wisely but generously, and holding yourself—and the leaders around you—accountable when it’s not cheap or easy. Many leaders start out with good intentions, only to look back years later and barely recognise their original values. For us, values were never something to declare; they were something to live. When you commit to them fully—and surround yourself with people who hold you to them—they become your lodestar through both the exhilarating and the difficult times.

Company culture isn’t a marketing statement or an HR initiative. It’s the single most powerful investment a business can make. Get it right, and the rewards exceed anything you could have planned for.