By Elaine Wu, Product Marketing Intern, Summer 2008

Hello everyone! I’m Elaine Wu, a product marketing intern finishing up my last week here at SuccessFactors. Over the past two months, I have gotten to experience life as a SuccessFactors employee, and let me tell you–I’ve had an absolutely amazing time. This has been my first office job and I still can’t believe how lucky I am to have worked with such fun and hard-working people. I really hope that all SuccessFactors employees realize how great it is to be working here full-time! For my HappyFactors post, I wanted to highlight some of the many things I learned about this unique company during my time here…

It’s Not Easy being Green, but SuccessFactors is proving how easy it is!

Every UC Berkeley student knows about the lovely group of tree-sitters living atop our oak trees. Rain or shine, you can always find the squatters up in the trees. They have truly made the trees their home, setting up boards for beds and a system of pulleys to bring up food. Although I am not quite willing to forego my comfortable bed for the branch of a tree, I have been touched by the passion of the tree sitters. I believe that every little step someone can take to help the environment is something worth doing.

Kermit the Frog may not have thought that it was easy being green, but SuccessFactors has proven that it is. Our SaaS software does so much more than save our customers money on software maintenance and operation. The computerized performance reviews eliminate thousands of paper-based reviews each year. With every new customer we attain, we are doing our part to save trees.

SuccessFactors does even more for the environment–by supporting employees who wish to work from home, we are preventing unnecessary pollution too! It is great to know that our company supports our efforts to save gas and commute time when we just need a day at home to get work done. And of course working from home would not be possible without our company’s open communication and collaboration with other employees in the office or living overseas. This brings me to my next point:

SuccessFactors meets The Beatles: Come Together, With a Little Help from my Friends, We can Work it Out

SuccessFactors thrives on synergy. Working together with our fellow employees is essential to deliver the best products to our customers. Our open office, cubicle-free environment makes it ideal for team members to work with each other on a project or just get a fresh perspective on an idea. I have also found that it is much easier to stay motivated and concentrate on my work when I notice how hard everyone around me is working. Not only has this open environment kept me more motivated throughout the day, it also gave me a small break when I needed one. Sitting in a high-traffic area of the office has been entertaining! Sometimes I would just listen to all the conversations going on around me. It’s actually quite fascinating to hear how an engineer solved an issue or how a sales representative completed a sale. The random anecdotes and accomplishments I have heard every day keeps me excited about this company. Someone is always doing something worthwhile.

Kaizen-ian Rhapsody

Kaizen (“constant improvement”) is not just something that I heard about on my first day during orientation. It is something that is achieved every single day here. To continuously improve, everyone must question their work. How can I work more efficiently? How can I make our product useful? How can I satisfy our customers? How can I increase worldwide productivity?

I am proud to say that I’ve also experienced the power of Kaizen. I’ve been working on the Customer Community this summer, and it is the one place where both SuccessFactors employees and SuccessFactors customers can learn and grow together. Every Community member wants to make the Community beneficial. Our employees Kaizen the Community to keep our customers updated on all changes in the product as well as address any of the customers’ feedback and concerns. We also encourage our customers to continuously Kaizen by giving them many opportunities to learn and contribute to our product. Customers listen to OneVoice calls hosted by Product Managers, share product ideas in the IdeaFactory, get questions answered in the Discussion Forums, learn from the many training materials online and connect with other SuccessFactors customers through the Community Directory.

Being able to collaborate with our customers to create a product that we are all proud of has been the most satisfying experience. Work really becomes easy and fun when you know that your customers are helping you help them.

Fun, Fun, Fun

Happy workers can bring insurmountable success to any company. Everyone at SuccessFactors lets their creativity inspire the work that they are doing. The Product Marketing workspace area has recently been decorated with an inspiration wall. What inspires you, SuccessFactors?

It’s been so fun to cover the walls with items and pictures that can fire up our imaginations or just make us happy and motivated to work. I brought all the fortunes from fortune cookies that I’ve collected for the past 15 years. I hope that you can find one which inspires you to work harder and achieve any goal. It’s these little things that can make working in this office fun. (Another recent example—check out the photo from a recent team-building outing to race go-karts!)

SuccessFactors succeeds because it realizes that its workers are its most important asset— without happy workers, the company cannot succeed. Well, SuccessFactors has won me over. I have really been inspired by the company’s values as well as all the people I’ve met here. It’s been a great summer! I really hope that every SuccessFactors employee can appreciate the wonderful place where they work as much as I have. How sweet it is (to be loved by my company and to have worked at SuccessFactors!)

By Hilary Terrell, Associate Product Marketing Manager

Nothing beats a great group of motivated, friendly summer interns to liven up the office. This summer we had an exceptional group, including two Berkeley students who worked with the Product Marketing team, and a recent California State University, Fullerton, grad who works with the SMB Marketing team.

I sat down with Jason, the SMB Marketing intern, recently and got his thoughts on his internship experience thus far, and his perspective on SuccessFactors after being here for just two months. Fresh insight!

Hilary: So what attracted you to this internship and to SuccessFactors?

Jason: Well, being fresh out of school, I didn’t know about SuccessFactors until someone pointed them out to me. I did some homework on who they were and what it is they do. In my head I group a company as either a good guy or a bad guy… e.g. [bleeeeeep] or [bleeeeeep] would be a ‘bad guy’ in my mind.

Hilary: Readers will have to fill in the blanks on that one!

Jason: SuccessFactors seemed to be one of the good guys, providing a product that helped people be happier and more efficient on the job. As individuals we all have the ability to choose how much we invest in our work – emotionally, physically, and mentally. SuccessFacrtors is a company I could see myself supporting 100%.

Hilary: A+ on your homework.

Jason: So I came in for an interview and was hooked right from that moment because of the energy in the office, people buzzing around, and NO CUBICLES.

Hilary: [laughing] I made sure to put that in my internship posting—no cubicles!

Jason: It caught me off guard but once I thought about it, I realized that this sort of structure seemed to promote an atmosphere of real teamwork.

Hilary: So how does the day to day life here compare to that first impression?

Jason: I’d say my first impression was definitely reinforced once I met the marketing team. Everyone was welcoming and professional, and I assumed it would be a face-paced environment, which has turned out to be very true.

Hilary: You can say that again.

Jason: Clearly, this is a company with a lot of talented people who have a passion for the industry. The atmosphere is youthful, energetic, and positive which I have found motivates people even more. It’s like a synergistic chain reaction. This is something I had suspected, and now realize each day.

Hilary: How many months have you been on the team now?

Jason: Barely 2 months, I think it’s been 7 weeks. It’s been a blur, but in a good way.

Hilary: Has there been anything about our corporate culture that has stood out to you in your time here so far?

Jason: Lots of little things—people can do as they please as long as the job gets done. I enjoy listening to music on my headphones when I have my head buried in spreadsheets, or being able to take a lunch break 20 minutes earlier than the day before. I think my generation appreciates that kind of flexibility. Everyone chats online, which is a great way to stay connected and increase collaboration between co- workers.

Hilary: Especially since we have employees around the globe!

Jason: Right. Little things like that tell me that the company is gearing up for the future. So many companies are geared towards a rigid culture that is counterproductive to morale. Management is often out of touch with the workforce; walking around like you have a stick lodged somewhere it’s not supposed to be is never a positive attribute… you know? It’s a different kind of work force coming to the forefront now and SuccessFactors seems ahead of the game.

Hilary: I totally agree. The culture here definitely embraces forward-thinking ways of doing things, and I’m glad you’ve felt that firsthand. So…Ideally, what would you like to get out of this internship?

Jason: Well, a position here is one of my goals for sure. I’m done with school and ready to make a real difference. I feel like it’s a perfect fit in regards to corporate culture, and I believe morally in the product/service—a recipe for a good experience. But first and foremost, I’m here to learn as much as I can, whether within the marketing group or elsewhere in the company. And making some great friends along the way never hurts, right?

Hilary: That’s definitely one of the things that makes everyday enjoyable here—having a group of coworkers you truly enjoy being around and collaborating with. No more lunching in my cubicle like I did at my last job.

Jason: You definitely don’t see that around here too often!

Hilary: Cheers to that.

Pretty insightful after just two months here. Jason, thank you for sharing your fresh perspective on SuccessFactors!