For the past 5 years, we didn't have something called 'Culture Book'. Whenever a newbie steps in, it's natural to pick up the job and go with the flow. We hardly force them into other periodical office traps like team-bonding activities or late night drinks.

The dwarves culture handbook

A comprehensive guide to who we are, how we work, and what we believe

📔 Handbook

Dwarves handbook

How we blend software consulting with an open learning community where tech enthusiasts share knowledge, collaborate, and grow together.

As a community

Dwarves as a community

Since most Dwarves Foundation employees work in Saigon, this section is written with that as the default. Some benefits don't make sense in other countries. We will try our best to provide comparable benefits and perks as it makes sense, though...

Benefits & perks

Our tech radar helps us assess and adopt new technologies, inspired by ThoughtWorks. Learn about its structure and how we use it.

Radar

Tech radar

Our Discord isn't just another company server; it's a place for both our team and the wider developer community. This guide explains how it works and where you fit in.

Discord

Dwarves network discord

Bounties reward community members with $ICY for contributing work that helps developers expand their skills beyond their usual focus.

Earn

Earning with sidegig

Discover how ICY, our community token, rewards contributions and builds engagement within the Dwarves ecosystem. Learn how you can earn, use, and benefit from this innovative web3 experiment.

🧊 ICY Token

Memo is where we share everything we learn, build, and think about product craftsmanship, engineering, and our culture. It's our commitment to learning in public.

Memo

Memo handbook

Sharing knowledge and skills is core to our culture. Learn why it's vital for growth, how it improves communication, and see guidelines for effective sharing.

Sharing knowledge

Our weekly internal demo event where teams share their latest projects and insights. Learn about our culture of sharing, collaboration, and continuous improvement.

Showcase

Our commitment to ethical standards and compliance

Compliance

Every team member embodies our values and represents our brand in every interaction.

You are dwarves foundation

Common questions (and answers) about working with us

FAQs

From day one to finding your purpose, your journey with Dwarves Foundation starts here.

💎 Getting started

How to borrow company assets like books or devices, or request new ones. Simple steps for getting the gear you need.

Request an asset

Borrowing & requesting company assets

A guide on how to check in at the office and claim ICY token rewards.

Office check-in process for earning ICY

Meetings are important, but they need structure to be productive. This guide covers the essentials for running meetings smoothly, respecting everyone's time, and getting things done.

How to conduct a meeting

A step-by-step guide to setting up your @d.foundation email alias to send and receive mail directly within your personal Gmail account.

Configure your company email

You will always grow by learning and playing with new and cool technologies. From books to conferences, you’ll get a yearly budget for your learning and development goals.

Continuing education allowance

To make working together flexible and productive, we follow a few simple rules for meetings and group work. Here's how we keep meetings effective.

Effective meetings

We use email as our formal tool for both internal and external communication. Every email is utilized for a specific field, which comes along with different instructions.

Email use

Email communication and use

A consistent on leave process prevents a company from being accidentally disrupted when an employee request to be absent.

Leave request

Submit a leave request

Strong relationships are core to our culture, and 1-on-1 meetings are how we build them. Managers meet with direct reports regularly (usually weekly) to connect. Here's how we do 1-on-1s and tips to make them count.

1-on-1 meetings

Password sharing

Sometimes the situation calls for realtime payment. Team lunch, device purchase, house cleaning, monthly drinking water. Normally, we pay it forward and claim those expense later. The reimbursement will be included in your payroll of that month.

Reimbursement

Hiring means we need help. We only hire people who tell us what to do, not the other way around. We always look for long-term teammates that why we want to ensure the new hire is a value fit and culture fit.

How we hire

We do the business to provide engineering capabilities to help customers on their business. A part of the benefits package is the Stock Option Plan, and the money is the sensitive topic in most companies, but we want you to understand so you could commit your best to make Dwarves Foundation a right place to work.

How we spend money

We organize our work in 8-week cycles with a focus on autonomy and craftsmanship. This framework helps us deliver high-quality software while maintaining flexibility and work-life balance.

How we work

How we balance remote and office work at Dwarves

Hybrid working

This page explains our knowledge base, which is basically our team's shared brain where we keep important stuff. Using it helps us work smarter together and makes sure we don't lose good ideas or lessons learned.

Knowledge base

Our second brain

Forget the typical tech industry churn. Here's how you can actually build a lasting career and master your craft at Dwarves Foundation.

Making a career

Marketing assets

We measure what matters at Dwarves through MMA (Mastery, Meaning, Autonomy). This framework helps us evaluate growth while creating a culture where everyone can thrive and contribute meaningfully.

We support your growth through side projects while ensuring they don't conflict with your work at Dwarves Foundation. This policy helps you balance outside work with your primary responsibilities.

Moonlighting

Navigate changes

A guide to the Non-Disclosure, Non-Solicitation, and IP agreements you signed when joining Dwarves.

NDA & Agreements

Understanding your NDA & other agreements

If you’re doing creative work, research suggests you’ll want to be surrounded by ambient noise. A café or co-working space is the perfect choice in this case. If you need to focus on a specific task, however, you’re going to want silence as quiet spaces help us focus on straightforward tasks.

Places to work

We serve a single purpose, to empower innovations and co-create the next big things.

Purpose

Our purpose

How we structure our time to maximize creativity, productivity, and balance

Work routine

Keeping laptops and phones secure is vitally important. We're a software company and many of us have access to secure systems (both our own and our customers). The following guidelines apply to how we physically secure our laptops and mobile devices that may contain customer or user data.

Security rules

Tools and systems

How we invest in and build the future through our ventures initiatives

Ventures arm

How we empower innovation through software craftsmanship and build products that matter

What we stand for

Our core values guide our strategies and individual actions so that we create a company whose character is as radical as our work.

What we value

Figuring out who to ask about a specific issue or question shouldn't be a guessing game. This guide outlines our main areas of focus and who helps lead them.

#handbook

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