Perspective by Jack Nix

Preserving Your Team Culture as You Grow

When you're starting out in business, building a strong team culture often comes naturally. You know everyone’s name. You celebrate the wins together, fix the mistakes together, and the connection between leadership and the field feels personal and authentic. It’s easier to align your team when it’s small because communication is direct, expectations are clear, and relationships are built on daily interactions.

But as your company grows, keeping that same sense of team unity becomes a real challenge. You can’t personally oversee every crew. You can’t make every decision yourself. You can’t guarantee that every employee knows your intentions firsthand. Growth forces you to evolve — and that evolution must be intentional if you want to protect the culture that made your company successful in the first place.

The foundation for scaling culture is Core Values. If you're serious about maintaining a true team culture, Core Values can't just be a poster on the wall or a slide in an onboarding meeting. They have to be lived out daily — by leadership, by management, and by every person who wears your company's logo.

Here are a few best practices I’ve learned along the way.

1. Define Your Core Values Clearly and Authentically

Your Core Values should reflect who you truly are as a company, not who you wish you were, and not what sounds trendy. Keep them simple, actionable, and relatable. At Shelby Erectors, our Core Values are:

• Hard Working — We take pride in putting in the effort every day.

• Responsibility to Each Other — We look out for our team and hold ourselves accountable.

• Better Because We Can — We’re never satisfied with “good enough.” We improve because we believe we can.

• Give A Damn! — We care deeply about the work we do and the people we work with.

When Core Values are authentic, they attract the right people and set the tone for everything from hiring to promotions to how you handle mistakes.

2. Hire, Promote, and Lead Based on Values

Skills can be taught. Character cannot. As you grow, prioritize hiring people who naturally align with your Core Values. Reward those who live them out every day — not just the highest performers but the best teammates.

When promotions are based on values as well as performance, you create a leadership team that reinforces the culture instead of undermining it.

3. Create Systems that Scale the Personal Touch

The truth is, as companies grow, you must implement rules, structures, and formal policies to ensure everyone is treated fairly and consistently. That doesn’t mean culture has to feel cold or corporate.

It means using systems — like regular team checkins, leadership development programs, Core Value recognition awards, and open-door feedback policies — to extend your personal touch through your management team.

You can’t have lunch with every employee anymore. But you can make sure that every employee feels seen, heard, and valued through the systems you build.

4 Lead by Example — Every Day

In small companies, culture is often built by personality. In larger companies, culture is built by leadership behavior.

People pay attention to what leaders do even more than by what they say. If you want your Core Values to matter, you have to live them — in how you make decisions, how you handle challenges, and how you treat people.

When leadership is consistent with Core Values, it creates trust. And trust is the bedrock of any real team culture.

5. Be Honest About the Challenges

Finally, don’t pretend that maintaining culture during growth is easy. Be open with your team about the fact that change is hard. Remind them that growing pains are part of the journey, but the Core Values, which are the soul of the company, will remain constant.

Invite their feedback. Listen more than you talk. I'll be the first to admit, this is something I personally struggle with and continue working on every day to get it right. Real listening builds trust, shows respect, and gives you the insights you need to make better decisions for your people and your company.

Stay committed to the hard work of building something that lasts.

The quality of their work doesn’t just define the best companies in our industry — their people define them. If you can keep your Core Values alive as you grow, you'll build a company that you're proud of and you'll build a team that others will want to be a part of.

And in this industry, that’s the kind of legacy worth fighting for.

Jack Nix is President of SEAA and Chief Operations Officer for Shelby Erectors.