- Headquarters: Los Angeles, CA
- US Employees: 46
- Industry/Focus: Precision medicine consulting
- Year founded: 2013
Though founded in 2013, DeciBio works to maintain its entrepreneurial drive, even among its most junior employees. “We're big believers in hiring really intelligent, motivated people and giving them freedom to operate,” said senior partner Andrew Aijian. “We want to give our team the sense that they can build something, that they're helping to build the company, and that they have the opportunity to do things that interest them outside of the day-to-day tasks of consulting work.” This facet of the company’s culture is why it was named a GenomeWeb Best Place to Work, according to Aijian.
Entrepreneurship is one of the four core values LA-based DeciBio aims to instill in its employees, who provide strategy consulting, data analytics, and market research for clients in precision medicine. The firm has a relatively flat hierarchical structure, and employees are encouraged to “punch above their weight,” Aijian said. “As soon as someone shows that they're capable of something, we let them do that thing,” he said. The firm also offers a career development program in which employees with at least three years of tenure are paid to pursue external development opportunities, such as working at another company for several weeks to gain exposure in an area of interest before returning to integrate their experience into their work.
The other core values — passion, community, and thought leadership — shape the company's approach to employee development, Aijian said. Passion is not limited to passion for work, he added; it’s the concept DeciBio leadership uses to focus their approach to work-life balance. “We want people to be really passionate about their job … but also not have their work come at the expense of their passions outside of the office,” he said. “As long as people are passionate, we think that it reflects that they have a sense of balance.”
To support this balance, employees can work remotely from anywhere in the world for one month each year, and senior employees have the option to do so indefinitely. The firm also offers 17 paid holidays each year, unlimited paid time off, 12 weeks of paid new parent leave and eight weeks of unpaid leave, and four weeks of additional paid pregnancy disability. Employees work three days in the office and two days from home each week.
To cultivate community, the company holds an annual company-wide off-site retreat where employees can bond, get face time with the senior team, and develop their skills. The leadership also reports on financials to the employees each quarter, a practice Aijian said gives employees a greater sense of ownership. Every employee is paired with a mentor and can provide formal feedback on more senior colleagues. The firm recently instituted a system by which employees can nominate a team member for a small bonus to recognize a contribution the senior team may not have seen.
Aijian described DeciBio’s approach to diversity as “bottom up.” Regularly checking in with the staff allows the company to reallocate resources from initiatives that have become less important over time. “It allows us to make sure that we don't have biases or blind spots within the leadership, because we're allowing the feedback to percolate up.” Creative recruiting efforts have increased the diversity and caliber of offerees by, among other things, casting as wide a recruiting net as possible, minimizing bias in evaluations, and evaluating candidates for their potential, according to the company, and the leadership team includes members identifying as LGBTQ+, POC, and women.
As for thought leadership, employees are encouraged to develop their own brand early in their careers by writing and publishing their insights online, presenting at conferences, authoring market reports, and working directly with client teams. “We do a good job of building a team that has a shared passion for the life sciences and for healthcare and for making a difference. They’re hyper motivated and very intellectually curious,” Aijian said. “And they’re just genuinely very good, friendly people.”