What the 4 mitzvot of Purim can teach us about company culture

Today is the Jewish holiday of Purim. You can read a bit about it here or for a short video watch below.

The TL;DR story is about an evil and wicked minister Haman (boo!! 😡) advises the Persian King Ahasuerus to destroy the entire Jewish nation (hmm..sounds familiar doesn’t it). In steps Mordechai and Esther our heroes of the story. Mordechai is the leader of the Jewish nation in Persia and an advisor to the king. Esther is Mordechai’s niece and the one who saves the day (yay!! 🎉)

On Purim, there are 4 mitzvot (commandments) linked to the holiday. Megillah (hearing the story of Purim), Matanot L’Evyonim (charity), Mishloach Manot (sending food to friends, neighbors, and those who need it), and the Seudah (festive meal). Don’t worry if you can’t pronounce any of these. I have trouble myself sometimes. And don’t worry if you’re scratching your head wondering how these 4 things are anchors to great company culture. We’ll pull each apart and link it to what companies should be focusing on.

If you want to read the story of Esther you can find it here.

Megillah

Maimonides codifies that hearing the Megillah twice on Purim (once at night and once the following day) is a commandment. The Megillah takes us through the whole story of King Ahasuerus’s rise to power in the largest empire the world had seen. To him killing the queen per the suggestion of Haman (boo!! 😡). Replacing her with Esther the heroine of the story. Who with her uncle Mordechai (he won the Academy Award for the best-supporting actor) save the Jewish people. Why? Because Haman lacked gratitude and was enraged that one single Jew, Mordechai, refused to bow to him and cower to his power. He convinced the King to wipe out the Jewish people across the entire empire (sounds familiar) but was saved by the hidden hand of G-d. And instead, it’s Haman and his family that are destroyed.

Megillah Esther like the rest of the Torah is less about the actual story vs the meaning and lessons to be learned behind it. We see King Ahasuerus flip-flop throughout the story. From accepting the Jewish people to giving his support to destroying them, back to loving them and saving them. In last week’s post, we went into depth about the topic of how many of the big tech companies have been flip-flopping around employee happiness and remote vs RTO.

On the other hand, we have Mordechai who from start to finish held his ground, to his morals and beliefs. He refused to take part in a months-long celebration hosted by the king that used vessels from Solomon’s temple (destroyed some 70-80 years prior). Not folding to assimilation or the idea that our home and centrality of existence were lost. Nor did he bow to Haman. One opinion says that Haman wore an idol around his neck. Thus the problem of the 3rd commandment (of 10) comes into play about idols.

Company leaders can learn the importance of mission and values from this. Having this upfront and always looking back at it. We read the Megillah every year and it’s of course always the same story. We do this to ensure its lessons are always refreshed. Companies need to constantly remember why they are in business and what their team means. Readjusting to stay aligned needs to always be front and center of how the business is run. Letting this slip can have major consequences for the company. In a 2017 study by Clear Co, 97% of respondents (employees and managers) stated that lack of alignment impacts their work. So poorer quality work means poorer company results.

It’s important that these company values are publicly accessible and regularly enforced. I’ll share what we did at InVision as a tip for at least one creative way to help keep the company mission and story front and center. Every employee received a set of cards with the principles on them (with some other company SWAG). Check out the picture below. We also used Bonusly for employee recognition (a tool I highly recommend). In Bonusly you’d be able to give real 💰 to colleagues to thank them for the awesome things they did. Included was alignment with company values. The company would run a contest every few months awarding the persons who got the most kudos for each specific company value.

Matanot L’evyonim

At the end of Megillat Esther, one of the specific acts to commemorate future Purims is giving charity. So Maimonides brings it down as a specific commandment. Though giving charity wasn’t a theme in the story of Purim it’s foundational to Judaism. Giving charity is really supporting your team with the needs they have. So this must be foundational to companies and leaders. Your job as a company leader is to support your team and their well-being. Supporting them through happy occasions and sad ones. Like, customized birthday gifts like a baby blanket with the kiddo’s name embroidered on it. Or giving indefinite leave and access to someone to speak with when something not happy happens. Supporting their mental health. You can do this by creating a culture of transparency and sharing. Offering stipends towards mental health that can be used for access to a mental health professional, a subscription to a running app & new shoes, or a meditation app. Whatever helps each employee the most. Supporting them in their career advancement. Both within the company and beyond. This can be done by creating a career map for new employees to set milestones and relevant experiences to progress in their careers. Something that is quite relevant today with many companies laying off lots of employees is to bring in Linkedin and resume coaches to fine-tune employee profiles. Of course, as a standard benefit to all employees while they work at the company. And so much more, if layoffs are looming.

Here are a couple more ideas linked to giving back. Run a campaign where employees can donate money to a list of charities if they wish. The company can back that up by matching all donations. Employees can share where they gave and the impact it’s made on themselves.

Another idea is to set a day once every quarter when everyone can volunteer with a local charity of their choice. The caveats are the employee must wear company SWAG and must share a picture of themselves volunteering internally within a Slack channel. This does a few things. Beyond the good feeling of giving back, it brings people together. Seeing how many colleagues are helping out. It also connects people with similar interests and can foster friendships based on what volunteer work was done. A double win!

Mishloach Manot

Another act specifically mentioned at the end of Megillah Esther is to send gifts to friends and food to the poor. Once again Maimonides brings this down as a commandment. The foundation for this one is to bring happiness to others. To help us get out of our own world and focus on making others happy. It can be friends, neighbors, or strangers. As we noted above, using an employee recognition app like Bonusly is a great start for getting people into the practice of sending a high five 🙏 and actual 💴 which can be turned into 🎁 During my time at InVision I was able to get an Apple Watch, AirPods, and $100s of dollars in Amazon gift cards through the money received via employee recognition. It made me feel closer to my colleagues (not the presents) but the fact they took the time to recognize something I did. It also motivated me to do the same.

Here’s another simple thing you can do which is more important today than in the last many years. Set a reasonable budget of maybe $250-$500 for each employee. Send them a personalized gift with a thank you note. Could be as simple as “We don’t share it as often as we should but we just wanted to say thank you for all your hard work and amazing efforts. ❤️ the Company”

What you send is more important than the fact you send something. People don’t want cookie-cutter gifts. They want something that’s valuable to them. I don’t have time to dive deep into how to do this (so feel free to DM me) but it has to be something they’ll enjoy. If you’re thinking employees will just be happy with a gift, think again. A 2019 Snappy Gifts report found the following

Purim Seudah

Finally, a celebrative and commemorative meal was noted at the end of the megillah. There’s so much to say about the concept of ‘breaking bread’ 🍞 together. I’ll share one great piece on the topic that discusses the impact of breaking bread on deeper collaboration, connection, and similar between people. It’s an idea that has developed great friendships, avoided wars, and so much more. Here the focus is on sitting down and getting to know others better. Learn more about who they are and it’s easy to find all the similarities vs differences. It’s no surprise that every Jewish holiday revolves around food and shared meals. Sitting with friends and inviting guests is foundational to Judaism and bringing the nation closer together. Which we very much need these days.

The same goes for companies. Whether companies focused more on work and getting better results during this crazy economic time. Or forward-thinking remote teams embracing asynchronous by default. In both cases of doing culture right or wrong, it’s important we don’t lose sight of the necessity for relationship building. I’ve moved my teams to async by default for work. But have never given up on synchronous team building and fun times. I’m always looking for new ways to bring my team together to foster a deeper connection.

There are so many ways companies can achieve this. Whether in getting the company, team, or individuals together #IRL as discussed in the first three posts (you can find them here). Replacing your bi-weekly information-sharing team meetings with playing games, doing lunch n’ learns or show n’ tells, or anything similar. You get the picture. It’s about having the team together on video and the conversation not being about work. Here’s a great piece from Bonusly detailing some of the great benefits and impacts of having fun as a team.

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