The trick to brewing tasty beer? A bit of science, plenty of experience—and no small amount of gut instinct. At New Belgium Brewing, the country’s eighth-largest brewery and third-largest craft brewery, beer-making requires another key ingredient: a company culture that values learning and development so employees feel invested in day-to-day operations and the company’s vibrant, hop-head community.
A Company of “Carnies”
New Belgium started more than 20 years ago as a husband-and-wife team who brewed beer to their liking in a basement. Today, the Fort Collins, CO-based company counts approximately 500 employees and has been recognized as an industry leader in lists such as the Wall Street Journal’s “Best Small Businesses” and Outside magazine’s “Best Places to Work.”
Coworkers—New Belgium doesn’t call them employees—are self-described “carnies,” referencing the close bond shared among traveling carnival workers, and they’re all owners of the company. Through an employee stock-ownership plan, everyone has a stake in the business. New Belgium’s profit-sharing program lets employees receive pieces of the company’s pie once they’ve been on the job for one year.
A big proponent of total transparency, New Belgium also shares all of its financial information with employees so they can see directly how their work affects business. The result of this tight-knit, transparent dynamic is a culture CEO Kim Jordan describes as “highly involved.”
Innovators as “Intrapreneurs”
New Belgium values employee ownership, while its employees value the opportunity to learn more about the beer-brewing business. Many of them are home brewers and are passionate about increasing their beer industry knowledge. The result is a company of “intrapreneurs”—an increasingly common term for employees who, according to the Intrapreneur Index, “can develop and implement innovative solutions, thereby adding surprising value to some or all of the organization’s stakeholders.”
New Belgians have skin in the game, and they’re eager to learn the ins and outs of everything from financials to sourcing barley. They understand that by investing in learning, they’re investing in themselves and in their teams.
Self-Directed Learning and Accountability
Many employees move through different roles and teams at New Belgium. From day one, everyone is encouraged to take a self-directed, individualized approach to learning and development. Company managers have discovered that this level of empowerment makes employees more eager to learn and to master the ins and outs of the company and industry. Today, they ask for—and receive—courses on everything from basic finance to an overview of the brewing industry to lessons on how to make beer.
In the company’s salad days, employees could easily swap ideas and learn from other teams. A company deliveryman could stop and chat with the head brewer about making beer and possibly go on to join the brewmaster’s team.
That can still happen, but those casual encounters are less common as the company has grown. New Belgium is now opening up its second brewery in Asheville, NC, and hiring more national sales representatives to scale the business. But managers are ever-vigilant about balancing the type of serendipitous, self-directed learning that’s always existed with the demands of managing a big, geographically dispersed company. The company knows it’s at a crossroads of sorts: While growth is good, it wants to scale its unique culture and support coworkers in their personal learning.
“We do want people to have self-accountability for their own development and give them the tools in order to do that,” says Andrea Dimatteo, Learning and Development manager at New Belgium.
Technology as Connector
New Belgium wants to keep a familial approach to onboarding, development, and management—no matter how much it grows. “We have more than 500 people here now. How do we keep little neighborhoods of 500 people still connected, still vibrant, still excited, and never make people a number?” Dimatteo asks.
The brewery uses Cornerstone Learning to build virtual communities that let employees outside of Fort Collins have a human connection to their coworkers at the “Mothership” (a.k.a., headquarters).
“Our challenge is to create communities and learning opportunities that are accessible nationwide,” says Jennifer Briggs, New Belgium’s HR director. “With Cornerstone, we can connect people through community building and learning opportunities and put coworkers in charge of their own learning. This is very empowering.”
From Gut Instincts to Data-Driven Actions
Another vital component of scaling New Belgium’s approach to learning and development is transitioning from gut-based decision-making to data-driven choices. The company is using Cornerstone to track—and analyze—employee progress.
“Data is just data unless it helps you make a decision or helps provide direction or helps you chart a vision,” Briggs says. “Cornerstone will help by providing performance and human data, and the manager will be able to look at it and say, ‘This is the story of my team, and this is how I can take my team to the next level based on what they know.’”
The insights into what’s worked so far will shape the direction of the new Asheville brewery. A few traditions that will bridge the distance? Bikes for every coworker’s one-year anniversary, a commitment to local sustainability initiatives, and a spirited culture. “We make beer for a living,” CEO Jordan says. “If we can’t have fun, that means we have some real challenges as human beings.”
Kirsten Maas Helvey has an extensive background in the implementation of hosted and internal enterprise software applications. Helvey is responsible for overseeing all aspects of the client experience with Cornerstone OnDemand. She provides project management experience, as well as process improvement expertise, and is responsible for effectively implementing and integrating Cornerstone OnDemand’s Talent Management Suite using best-of-breed methodology developed from client best practices. Helvey has used her expertise to develop and grow Cornerstone’s global Consulting Services organization. Helvey came to Cornerstone OnDemand from PricewaterhouseCoopers and IBM Business Consulting Services, where she was a member of the Supply Chain Operations Strategy Group. She has extensive experience providing operational expertise to Fortune 500 companies for large-scale, complex, re-engineering and cost reduction initiatives using enabling technologies. Helvey holds a BA in English Literature from Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, NY. She is a member of Women in Technology International (WITI) and the American Business Women’s Association (ABWA).
