Banzai is a True Study in Steady

At age 7, Joe Davy thought he wanted to become a software engineer. In college, he worked as a programmer at IBM while pursuing a degree in economics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Then the entrepreneurial bug bit and he never got that degree. After founding two companies in his native North Carolina, he wound up in Seattle working as a general manager at tax-compliance software firm Avalara. In 2016, he founded marketing software company Banzai. He was just 26 years old.

The 100-plus employee company now boasts revenue “in the eight figures” (at least $10 million) and last year made “Seattle Business” magazine’s 100 Best Companies To Work For list based on its positive corporate culture. Along the way, “Forbes” recognized Davy with its prestigious “30 Under 30” award.

Banzai – the company name is a traditional Japanese exclamation meaning “10,000 years” – is organized around three simple values: Learning, serving others and longevity. It is focused on steady, long-term growth as it considers going public in the next few years. 

“We don’t want to set any land speed records, but when you can do it consistently for 20 years, you can build a huge business,” Davy says. “We don’t want to be the slowest, but we want to be the longest.”

The company has more than 4,000 customers ranging from small businesses to Fortune 500 firms, including Microsoft and Dell.

Banzai has taken numerous steps to shape its workplace in the midst of such consistent growth. In keeping with its philosophy rooted in Japanese culture, the company hosts four weekly “Kaizen” calls (kaizen is a Japanese term that means, roughly, “continuous improvement”) aimed at improving relationships among employees to help boost morale. Davy says it happens “one casual conversation at a time.”

Banzai practices “blind recruitment,” a process that completely ignores age as a determination of eligibility for employment. It works with an organization called Chronically Capable to help employ people suffering from chronic illnesses.

Employees receive $200 per month to use for courses, books, education, office supplies, desks and food. It employs a service called 15Five, which has a “high five” feature to celebrate employee achievements, projects and partnerships.

Davy, who also serves as a director of the North Carolina Museum of Art Foundation, says company culture is rooted in careful, consistent hiring practices.

“It’s not that we necessarily go out and try to hire people that we think are really friendly. We want to hire the best,” he says, “but I think that when people are really happy with their job, it just makes them happier people in general.”