Whatnot Company Culture: Every Process Has a Purpose
Every day, Director of People Experience Kia Beckford is surrounded by people with passion. It’s a passion for Whatnot’s product, buyers and sellers, and a high level of care that drives the team to achieve the company’s audacious goals. All teams are challenged to innovate and think outside the box, and the people team is no exception. Beckford and her colleagues seek perspectives from other organizations to develop “the Whatnot way of doing things.” A desire to be different means there are little to no “plug-and-play” processes. “This allows us to be really creative, which isn’t always the case within HR functions,” Beckford said. That creativity has helped to build teams diverse in backgrounds and perspectives.
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At a glance
01
Parents First
Whatnot offers 16 weeks paid parental leave as well as a one-time stipend for family planning necessities like egg freezing and adoption fees.
02
No Office Needed
Employees work from anywhere thanks to a remote-first culture.
03
Billion Dollar Business
Whatnot is valued at $3.7 billion following its Series D fundraising round.
04
Be Inclusionary
Eight employee resource groups, including Women of Whatnot, Whatnot Parents, BIPOC @ Whatnot, PRIDE @ Whatnot, Whatnot Veterans, L’Chaim @ Whatnot and Immigrants @ Whatnot create inclusive experiences.
Featured employees
Moving diversity forward
The secret to success is doing the right thing
“Not only is it the right thing to do, but this is the not-so-secret sauce to thriving as a company,” Beckford said of Whatnot’s efforts to diversify its user base, seller community and employee population. To push Whatnot’s DEI efforts forward, Beckford and her team piloted DEI learning journeys for managers to help them create inclusive team environments. And this year, Whatnot is implementing DEI check-ins for processes where bias can creep in, such as performance reviews. Whatnot will also have a presence at the Grace Hopper and Afrotech conferences to diversify its recruiting efforts.
Kia Beckford
Director of People Experience
It’s important for people of all genders, backgrounds and abilities to know that they belong in tech despite what the current statistics indicate.
Looking ahead
A balanced foundation allows for effective movement
Laura Rothman
Engineering Manager
Rothman’s team operates in a typical Agile workflow. They can move quickly and with confidence thanks to consistent expectations and self-imposed checks and balances. Design libraries allow engineers to recycle components built into native platforms, and they are expected to make proactive decisions on when to use third-party resources versus custom tooling well before a pile of tech debt arises. Their Guild system, a layer of platforms for high-level decision making and product choices, allows such investigation. “Being ahead of these conversations and decisions is vital to healthy growth,” Rothman said.
Work is constantly in motion. You never feel stagnant or wonder what to do next.
Unchartered territory
A space to create something new
Whatnot employees are at the forefront of live shopping. “Whatnot is the perfect place for people who are excited to build into white space, attack new challenges with a high degree of ownership and learn from people who roll up their sleeves with you,” Wilson said. Whatnot provides the toolkits employees need to solve problems and contribute to Whatnot’s long-term success. That success looks like launching live shopping in new product categories, which enables more sellers to make a living doing what they love.
Armand Wilson
Head of GTM
I am constantly amazed at the talent we have at Whatnot and the team’s ability to put the work and our users first.
