When I moved from Baton Rouge, Louisiana to San Francisco in 2011 to work for Atlassian, I wasn’t sure what to expect. From the outside, everything looked great. They even had these values that seemed to be a big deal. It didn’t take long being on the inside to realize what an amazing place to work this truly was. And, how seriously they take the values. There is no #1 or “most important” value. They’re all important and in all sorts of different ways and situations. In 2013, however, be the change you seek became a value with a ton more emotional attachment.
On June 26 2013, the US Supreme Court handed down a historic decision on Proposition 8. All couples in California could finally get married. That day, a few of us on the Bitbucket team circulated a Confluence blog post within the company asking a simple question, “Can we celebrate the prop 8 decision publically?” In my past company experience, there wouldn’t even have been a venue to ask such a question. Even if there had been, it would have probably been even less of a positive response. But, because of two values in particular: be the change you seek and open company, no bullshit, we felt there was no reason not to at least ask. As we told you in our blog in 2013, the response internally was amazing! And we made an awesome t-shirt for our employees.
This event started a new tradition at Atlassian. Last year, we made a new t-shirt in time for San Francisco Pride.
Two years on, we decided it was time to go even further. In February, a group of Sydney Atlassians worked on our first formal participation by having a booth at Mardi Gras Fair Day, part of Sydney’s LGBTQ Pride celebration.
It looked like they had so much fun celebrating equality in Sydney that the San Francisco office decided to join in and march in the San Francisco Pride Parade. As luck, and history would have it, we picked the perfect year to start. On June 26 2015, the US Supreme Court handed down another historic decision. Now, everyone in the United States of America can get married, even me. We decided to go all out.
We are excited to unveil our newest global emoticon, (pride). Just restart HipChat to use it. #LoveWins #Pride pic.twitter.com/OMmajv9A3q
— Atlassian Hipchat (@HipChat) June 26, 2015
Best. Friday. Ever. #LoveWins pic.twitter.com/HI155Epyv3
— Atlassian (@Atlassian) June 26, 2015
I pushed to bitbucket and I see @Atlassian is celebrating the US supreme court decision on marriage equality too. 🙂 pic.twitter.com/XD8ELUrC1j
— Mark Reid (@mdreid) June 28, 2015
And, of course, the main event of the weekend for us. The parade:
As a gay employee of Atlassian, these past few years have shown me that not only do I work for one of the best companies on Earth, I also work with some of the best people on this planet. 3.5 years in, I still can’t imagine being anywhere else.
If you want to join in the fun and work in an environment where you can be yourself, apply at atlassian.com/careers.
