Campfire Analytics was founded four years ago with a singular guiding principle: put people first. Above all else, we believed in building a company for its employees -- knowing that when employees are cared for, they take better care of our customers, who in turn keep the business financially viable. From our inception, this philosophy has been reflected in Campfire's culture, financial strategy, and employee benefits package.
No other event or circumstance has affirmed this principle more than the evolving crisis surrounding COVID-19.
We see the toll the Coronavirus is taking, not only on the physical and mental health of our communities, but also on the companies with whom we do business. Many of our clients are struggling to transition to a largely distributed workforce: What do remote workers really need to collaborate effectively and stay engaged? How can companies provide the flexibility and support that their people need, while minimizing operational disruption?
This situation is hard for so many people on so many levels, and everyone is impacted differently. I am grateful that the flexibility and independence we give our employees makes us more resilient now. We've always allowed our people to work in ways that allow them to be their most productive; before the COVID-19 emergency, roughly half of our employees already worked from home on a regular basis. As such, our teams long ago adopted best practices for a distributed workforce, including fervent use of collaboration tools such as Slack, and video conferencing to help humanize our remote connections.
In addition, we have always offered virtually unlimited sick days for our employees, as well as generous mental health benefits. We do everything we can to make accommodations for employees who need time to deal with personal or family needs as they arise. To ensure our clients are not disrupted by any situation affecting our employees, we have a system of knowledge sharing in place that allows us to swap resources across projects when needed. Furthermore, our financial strategy deprioritizes executive compensation in favor of savings that will sustain our workforce through unforeseen downturn. We want our people to feel taken care of, not just in times of crisis, but at all times.
Again, this isn’t a contingency plan for COVID-19; this is simply how we’ve run our business from the beginning.
So while we seek ways we can help our communities and our clients through this crisis, we are also hopeful for the possibility it presents. We hope that at least one positive outcome will be that other employers take to adopting policies that better support their workers. When we treat employees with respect and compassion, our customers and communities benefit.
Stay safe and be good to each other.