What Does It Actually Feel Like to Love Where You Work?
Most people have worked somewhere that looked good on the outside. Nice offices. A strong brand. Decent pay. And yet, Sunday evenings still carried that familiar dread. The job was fine. The paycheck cleared. But something was missing.
That feeling is more common than it should be, and it points to something a lot of companies get wrong. Culture is not a perk. It is not a benefit package, a team offsite, or a cleverly worded set of values on a wall. It is the way people treat each other when nobody is watching. It is whether someone feels seen, respected, and genuinely glad to be part of something.
It is something our team at Ruvixx thinks about deeply, and it is exactly what our Chief Revenue Officer Steve Carroll sat down to discuss on a recent episode of the Hire Aligned Podcast with host Jacob Crockett.
When asked about what it is like being intentional about creating a place that people actually want to work at, Steve’s answer was refreshingly simple. Kindness is not soft. It is the thing that makes people want to stay, want to contribute, and want to bring their best every day.
At Ruvixx, this is not a talking point. It is something people feel from their very first interaction with the team. The bar we hold for how we treat one another is the same whether someone is a new hire or a tenured leader, whether they are based in the same city or halfway around the world.
And that last part matters more than it might seem. Ruvixx is a fully remote, globally distributed company. Our team spans countries, time zones, and cultures that could not be more different from one another. Steve talks in the episode about how he has seen firsthand that human values do not need a translator. Kindness, accountability, generosity, and curiosity are not ideas unique to any one region or culture. They are universal. No matter where you are in the world, you know what it feels like to be seen. To feel respected. To feel cared about and treated well. That experience is human, and it travels.
What that means in practice is that our team, wherever they are, shares a common sense of how we want to work together. Not because we have mandated it, but because we have hired for it, modeled it from the top, and protected it over time. A distributed team can feel remarkably close when the foundation is right.
Which brings us to hiring. Steve is candid about the fact that skills alone are not enough. You can teach a process. You can train someone on a tool. What is much harder to change is whether someone lifts the people around them or quietly drains them.
At Ruvixx, we believe this without exception. No level of talent or skill justifies the toll that a negative, toxic attitude takes on the people around that person. A team’s culture is too important, and too fragile, to compromise on. When someone’s behavior consistently undermines the people they work with, the kindest thing you can do for the whole team is to act on it.
This is something we feel every time we welcome someone new to the Ruvixx team. The people here make each other better. And that does not happen by accident. Within our organization, there are genuine ambassadors of the culture, people who have lived these values, who embody what Ruvixx stands for, and who naturally guide and encourage those who are newer to the team. They do not have a formal title for it. They just lead by example, and in doing so, they keep the culture alive and growing.
Steve also shares a story in the episode that has stayed with everyone who has heard it. It involves a valued team member, a trip to Japan, and a creative approach to making sure people actually take the rest they need. We will leave it there. It is worth hearing in his own words.
The full conversation covers a lot of ground, and it is the kind of episode that makes you reflect on your own workplace: what you love about it, what you wish were different, and what is actually possible when leadership gets the culture piece right.
Give it a listen: Building a Remote Company That Prioritizes Connection on the Hire Aligned Podcast.
Steve Carroll is the Chief Revenue Officer at Ruvixx. The Hire Aligned Podcast is hosted by Jacob Crockett and explores what it means to build teams and organizations that people are proud to be part of.