What it’s like to work at The Next Web Labs

As you may know we work from a lot of different cities. So we don’t have one ‘The Next Web Office’ but have lots of work spaces in different parts of this globe. One of the work spaces is based in Amsterdam. That’s where it all started, where The Next Web founders work from and is also the home of The Next Web Labs.

The Next Web Labs is the place where we turn ideas in to great products. That’s right, we build startups. These include tools like  Twitter Counter, Social Statistics and Spread.us.

As we’re looking for people to help The Next Web Labs to achieve world domination, I thought I would share with you a bit more on what it’s like to work here.

Chief Whatever Officer

I started my adventure with The Next Web eighteens months ago, when Boris emailed me from San Francisco. He asked for my thoughts on how to get ten times more traffic on Twitter Counter. I replied, and a week later we drank a cup of coffee in the sun and at the end of the conversation he asked me “So, when do you begin?”.

My business card says ‘Chief Monetization Officer’ now. Fancy title huh? As always, it’s more about what you do than what is on your card. It could have also said Chief Clown Officer or Chief Coffee Maker or the variations my work friends shouted the first few months when it would fit the occasion. It’s not that  important.

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Simply put, I make sure we get as much traffic to all our sites as possible, and create as much energy and as little friction as possible so that people stay longer, subscribe to the newsletter and use our neat services.

Next to that, I have always tried to pick up things I have no experience with whatsoever – like getting familiar with the basics of intellectual property and how to protect your brand(name). And that is what I have always looked for when working with a group of people: the opportunity to play with your role and do things that don’t necessarily fit with what’s on your business card.

It is something that I feel is an important part of working at The Next Web Labs. You learn from each other who has a good eye for what and it means a developer can change my proposed A/B test for the best. Still, that doesn’t mean I can improve his or her code – although I have it on my list.

A group of skilled, good-looking team of lunatics

Let me assure you that each day I enter a work environment that complies with all legal obligations, is filled with energetic and fun people topped up with a crazed culture. On your first day you are warned not to leave your coat on your chair: if you happen to forget this you have to do an ad fundum of beer at luchtime. It sounds like a great punishment, but it combines less well with a peanut butter sandwich let me tell you.

It’s a fun environment where people help each other out and where we occasionally have spontaneous presentations on the strategy of inbox zero or the different applications of tinfoil. A couple of us do a daily regime of push ups – but even those cannot be done without a dose of geekiness by tracking the angle of the elbow, it seems. The corporate dresscode is whatever makes your day, ranging from flipflops, strange colors to three-piece suits.

What I am trying to say here is that all our ventures start with “Wouldn’t it be cool or funny if…” and along the way we know how to embrace failures, celebrate our successes and most importantly know how to have fun.

Are you, or do you know, someone who can help us to world domination? Check out our jobs.