PacBio [NASDAQ: PACB]

Alvin Hom

Organizational Growth Architect

One of the enduring things that makes PacBio unique is a culture that very intentionally prioritizes the value of teamwork. In my 16 years of recruiting for PacBio many things have changed at our company, in our industry, and in our world, but our hyperfocus on recruiting people who care about one another and want to work together to create a culture where we can be curious and delight our customers, has never changed.

As companies grow, many struggle to maintain their culture while scaling their organizations. Others make a deliberate choice to hire individuals perceived to be star performers despite poor culture fit. As our organization grew from 20 employees to 800, we needed to change our hiring priorities many times, in doing so, however, we never wavered from our goal of hiring people whose values aligned with our culture.

Here are my three cardinal recruiting rules to maintaining culture amid growth and change.

1. Hire for the long-term

As an early startup, companies must attract people with an entrepreneurial “can-do” spirit who are literally willing to do anything necessary to help the business grow and succeed – whether that’s developing a new chemistry, or sweeping the floor. As companies grow, jobs become more specialized.

Hiring for the long-term means finding people who are aligned with the company’s values who can do the job needed today, but also grow with the company. The best hire is not always the person who checks the most boxes on the job description, sometimes it’s the person who checks enough of the boxes but has the capacity to do much more, and execute well.

2. Find people who treat their job as their business

I grew up in an entrepreneurial family. My dad ran a small printing business, and that is where I witnessed his customer-relationship management firsthand.

He might not have been the cheapest option for his customers, but when times were tough, his customers stayed with him because of the unmatched customer service he offered.

I’ve always treated my own role as a business, seeking to build relationships and delight my internal customers. But overseeing a talent acquisition function, I’ve come to recognize that this skill is critical in virtually every job in an organization. Whether you are hiring an R&D leader, or a manufacturing specialist, a person who treats their job as their business is always going to go the extra mile to get the job done well as compared to someone who sees their job as transactional. This type of person is well-aligned with our corporate culture, which values people with a bias to action and a focus on execution.

3. Prioritize caring

There’s no perfect company or perfect job candidate. In a competitive job market, companies often engage in corporate one-upmanship to try to appear perfect to their ideal job candidate. No company has the resources to offer every perk or employee benefit. What’s more important is offering potential employees a competitive package alongside a role and a corporate community that will value them. Being a company that cares about the people we hire, the products we build, and the way we treat our customers goes a lot further than having a headquarters with a built-in treehouse.

Our company is focused on advancing our mission of enabling the promise of genomics to better human health, we can do that because of a culture where working together and caring about one another is part of the fabric of achieving our goals.