Upon walking through the double doors of Deacom’s headquarters, you will immediately see a large wall where the words “The Artisans of ERP Software” are surrounded by 5×7 blocks.

At first, you might think, “Oh, that’s cool-looking,” but upon closer investigation, you will notice that those “blocks” are actually logos of Deacom’s customers, photos of employees and snapshots of our customers in action.

These pictures are worth more than 1,000 words. They tell a story of who we are, what our values are and where we came from. It’s a unique design element that has become a focal point of our headquarters.

When we were designing the building three years ago, we were looking for creative ways to showcase our culture visually. We wanted visitors to understand who we are without us having to speak one word. We landed on this photo wall concept as our biggest office feature and it took what seemed like forever to filter through 20 years of photos to find best representations of Deacom to display.

So which photos did we choose? Here is a sampling of what types of images you will find on our Artisan wall and why these are the ones that made the cut.

Our roots still define who we are today.

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Here you’ll find our founder and CEO, Jay Deakins, holding his daughter, Caroline, in 1995 while writing some of the first lines of Deacom’s code. We have come quite a long way since this one-person company operating in the basement of his Berwyn home, and it’s important that we never forget our roots. Keeping this “small company” mentality while working alongside 130+ other professionals helps to foster the approachable and personable work environment we are proud of.

Our customers are a big part of our success.

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Our culture expands beyond our own employees and is also fueled by our customer relationships. When they visit our office, they love playing “Where’s Waldo” to find their company’s logo on the wall. Many of our long-term customers have mentioned how exciting it is for them to see the growth of Deacom over the years and this evolving display of customers is a great visual demonstration of that.

Relationships don’t start and end at the front doors.

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Whether it’s a wing-eating competition, kickball game, beer tasting or just an ad hoc Friday happy hour, team get-togethers are critical to our culture. Conversations need to extend beyond day-to-day work topics in order for team members to foster valuable, trusting relationships with each other. What better way to do that than outside of the company walls?

One word: Impact-ocracy

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You may not have heard of that term before because, well, we made it up. But this is the heart of what we do and who we are. We strive to not just make an impact on our own business, but also help our customers do the same. They value this approach and aren’t afraid to show it. In fact, one customer recently sent us engraved Jim Beam bottles signed by their head distiller as a thank-you gift. Truth be told, this gift was so unique, many team members have yet to break the seal to their bottle. Now that’s self-control!

Trophies come in the form of bobbleheads.

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I’ll bet you have never seen a bobblehead army until now! All of our team members are extremely intelligent and hard-working people. Often times, someone will go above and beyond to truly stand out from the crowd. Throughout the year, our founder and CEO will recognize these individuals and present them with their own, custom bobblehead. We’ve had employees wear their favorite jersey, hold Oscar the Grouch figurines, and even dress up like a pirate for their bobblehead. Creating our bobblehead army has become a fun way to thank team members for the significant impact they are making.

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In the three years we have been in this building, this wall has proven to hold more value than just hiding pipes and electrical wire. It cements our culture.

Businesses that want to create a similar feature to our Artisan Wall do not need to start so big. It is entirely possible to scale it back if you have a smaller space to work with. However you do it, I cannot stress the importance of refreshing the images to keep things exciting. Have you just received an award? Did you uncover an old photo of your original product? Or did you just land a big deal? Put it on display and start telling your culture story through pictures.