Two entrepreneurs stumbled upon a few Summit keynote recordings and the Atlassian Team Playbook. What followed was the transformation of their business. Starting with a fractured team and a product struggling to find its place in the market, they emerged as a leader in their space with a tightly aligned team that is smashing their goals. The secret to their success? Openness. Easy access to information across teams and a safe environment for admitting and learning from mistakes – principles they've even built into the software they make. Hugo co-founder Josh Lowy will share the lessons they've learned about how openness affects the bottom line, attracts the best talent, and develops a culture of success. Spoiler alert: the issue isn't what's going on outside your business – it's what goes on inside.

1. JOSH LOWY | CO-FOUNDER & CEO | HUGO.TEAM | @HUGOPRODUCT
Building a Culture of Success
On Open Principles

2. Your team is an
Octopus

3. Tentacles that
act with
independence

4. A central
brain to drive
cooperation

5. The world is too
complex
Centralized decision-making doesn’t
work in a state of information overload

6. Decentralized nervous
system
Allows for the system to push
autonomy out to the extremities

7. HUGO
WE LEARNED
THIS LESSON THE
HARD WAY

8. Problem
Hard to scale, distributed on a
one-to-one basis
Hugo journey
Team
Kept in the dark, can’t agree
on shared problems
Product
Meeting preparation
for professionals

9. Hack 1:
Automatically post meeting notes to team
Slack channels
Hack 2:
Create Trello cards from our notes to attribute
feature requests with customer profiles
Goal
Bring our team in to the room with customers,
without attending the meetings
We
Made
A Change

10. Hack 1:
Automatically post meeting notes to team
Slack channels
Hack 2:
Create Trello cards from our notes to attribute
feature requests with customer profiles
Goal
Bring the the team in to the room, without them
having to attend customer meetings
We
Made
A Change

11. Hack 1:
Automatically post meeting notes to team
Slack channels
Hack 2:
Create Trello cards from our notes to attribute
feature requests with customer profiles
Goal
Bring the the team in to the room, without them
having to attend customer meetings
We
Made
A Change

12. After
Team cohesion, rapid iteration cycles,
resources unleashed
Before
Misaligned team, slow to solve
customer needs, resource drag

13. After
Team cohesion, rapid iteration cycles,
resources unleashed
Before
Misaligned team, slow to solve
customer needs, resource drag

14. REMOTE WORK IS THE
NEW NORMAL

15. SAAS EXPLOSION IN
THE WORKPLACE

16. Codifying Open
The best idea wins, we don’t have to be
in the same place, and don’t
compromise on speed
Open at
Hugo
Tools
that talk
Eyes on,
hands off
Shared
consciousness

17. Equal communication
between people and
tools
Open at
Hugo
Tools
that talk
Shared
consciousness
Eyes on,
hands off

18. Equal communication
between people and
tools
Open at
Hugo
Tools
that talk
Shared
consciousness
Eyes on,
hands off

19. Simulate how others
think, and act on their
behalf
Open at
Hugo
Tools
that talk
Shared
consciousness
Eyes on,
hands off

20. Simulate how others
think, and act on their
behalf
Open at
Hugo
Tools
that talk
Shared
consciousness
Eyes on,
hands off

21. Simulate how others
think, and act on their
behalf
Open at
Hugo
Tools
that talk
Shared
consciousness
Eyes on,
hands off

22. Remove oversight from
the decision equation
Open at
Hugo
Tools
that talk
Shared
consciousness
Eyes on,
hands off

23. Reduced oversight
When the team is aligned, everyone is
empowered to act first and ask questions later
10% rule
We now need fewer meetings to stay in sync,
and have put a ceiling on time spent in meetings
Cross pollination
High percentage of product solutions and
marketing concepts come from the ‘wrong team’
Cool story,
but what are
the benefits?

24. Reduced oversight
When the team is aligned, everyone is
empowered to act first and ask questions later
10% rule
We now need fewer meetings to stay in sync,
and have put a ceiling on time spent in meetings
Cross pollination
High percentage of product solutions and
marketing concepts come from the ‘wrong team’
Cool story,
but what are
the benefits?

25. Reduced oversight
When the team is aligned, everyone is
empowered to act first and ask questions later
10% rule
We now need fewer meetings to stay in sync,
and have put a ceiling on time spent in meetings
Cross pollination
High percentage of product solutions and
marketing concepts come from the ‘wrong team’
Cool story,
but what are
the benefits?

26. Reduced oversight
When the team is aligned, everyone is
empowered to act first and ask questions later
10% rule
We now need fewer meetings to stay in sync,
and have put a ceiling on time spent in meetings
Cross pollination
High percentage of product solutions and
marketing concepts come from the ‘wrong team’
Cool story,
but what are
the benefits?

27. Launch
INSPIRATION MIXED WITH DESPERATION
Stumble
Yay,
customers!
HUGO 1.0
HUGO 2.0Become an Octopus
Aha!
More
tweaking
Stumble again

28. Your team is an
Octopus
#futureofwork

29. Thank you!
JOSH LOWY | CO-FOUNDER & CEO | HUGO.TEAM | @HUGOPRODUCT