Ably's journey from a small team in Camden to an acclaimed company across Europe involved a significant evolution in its culture and values, particularly as it grew from 13 to over 40 employees. Initially, the company's values were loosely defined around preferred traits like flexibility and minimal office politics, but as the team expanded, there was a need to formalize these into actionable and measurable values. This process was guided by Carl Martin, who, alongside the founders, surveyed employees and conducted interviews to establish core values that would align with Ably's mission to become the definitive infrastructure for the real-time internet. The resulting values emphasized openness, bias for action, continual improvement, human-centric technology, dependability, and bold creativity, replacing an initial emphasis on taking the hardest paths with a focus on creative problem-solving. To ensure these values were not just aspirational, Ably integrated them into key processes such as hiring, onboarding, and performance reviews and committed to regular feedback sessions to keep them relevant and lived. This ongoing commitment to values aims to foster a cohesive and dynamic company culture as Ably continues to grow and refine its approach.