Company culture: We think along
My name is Sander Kamstra, director and one of the founders of Payt. In growing from an attic idea to a serious organisation, I regularly encounter moments that I think affect our corporate culture. With this series of blogs, I will try to describe a situation every month that shows who we are as a company. I will give you a glimpse into life at Payt.
The case: An accountancy firm goes live with an unusual feature
We start this series with an accountancy firm that has completed the implementation of Payt under the guidance of one of our implementation consultants. This guidance is not necessarily needed, but if a customer wants to add specific functionalities, then this is important. The accounting firm’s administration is live and they are very happy with the results they have achieved so far with the software.
One evening, one of the other directors of Payt is looking at the settings of a number of new customers. Just out of interest. He noticed that a piece of software was set that is unusual for an accountancy firm. Namely, that a debtor himself can request a proposal for a payment arrangement via a request screen in his invoice portal. This was once developed for the education sector so that students themselves could indicate which payment arrangement they could comply with. But for an accountancy firm? Quite unusual.
Now, this small piece of software does not make a world of difference. But still, actively offering the possibility of proposing a payment arrangement will lead to many more payment arrangements. Is this what our customer want?
Interested in the reason behind the activation of this functionality, the respective director calls the implementation consultant to hear this reason. Because a non-conclusive story comes back, the director decides to call the customer. After all, he really wants to know the reason. Within a minute, it was clear that this functionality could be turned off again. The customer had misunderstood that, when this functionality was turned on, he himself could no longer make a payment arrangement if the situation required this. The customer was completely satisfied, although he must have wondered what it was we were so worried about.
With such a situation in hand, many organisations - and we certainly do too - forget to take the most important step. Using the example to educate stakeholders and potential stakeholders on how we handle situations like this here, at Payt. Our company culture. It helps tremendously if we all dare to share our pitfalls or mistakes. The management of a company is also far from flawless.
In the meantime, we are good enough and together we will continue to grow. I am convinced that fewer mistakes are made in such a culture and I notice that people are happy with the growth they can experience personally.
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The art is to do very special things within sectoral issues using Payt's standard cloud software, purely based on configuration - Jeroen Krosse, Managing Board
My colleagues also contribute to the pleasant, informal working atmosphere at Payt. We have a great team that collectively delivers a quality product, and that sense of togetherness is nurtured by Payt - Vincent van der Zee, Developer
