Culture of the Company
Anne Hathaway and Robert De Niro starrer movie, “The Intern” is a classic example that talks
about how Corporate/Start-up culture works and about work life balance.
Corporate culture is the collection of values, beliefs, ethics and attitudes that characterize an
organization and guide its practices.
To some extent, an organization's culture can be articulated in its mission statement or vision
statement. Elements of corporate culture include the organization's physical environment, human
resource management practices and staff work habits. Corporate culture is also reflected in the
degree of emphasis placed on various defining elements such as hierarchy, process, innovation,
collaboration, competition, community involvement and social engagement.
The Company ‘About the Fit’ represents a new-age organization in which horizontal hierarchy
exists, where communication is easier and smoother, every individual is approachable including
the head of the organization. This kind of a change came about with the rise of the start-up
culture, where young people started building their own organization, similar to Anne Hathaway
who plays Jules Ostin in the movie, who is the founder and CEO of a fast growing e-commerce
fashion start-up. And then we have Robert De Niro who plays Ben, a 70-year old widow, who
lands an internship in the company, finds himself helping the millennial-aged staff with both
their work and personal issues, including fixing relationships that sputter out in the digital space.
Also, Ben is always formally dressed, whereas his co-workers are always informally dressed.
Ostin is the ultimate multi-tasker, riding her bicycle from meeting to meeting inside her hip
Brooklyn, N.Y., headquarters, while texting, solving online customer crises, weighing in on web-
page designs and managing most of the time to look incredibly chic, befitting a fashionista
Internet sensation. And yet, this entrepreneurial energy – the kind that we soon learn has resulted
in the company hitting its five-year growth goals in a mere nine months – comes with sacrifices.
‘About The Fit’s’ incredible growth has put everyone at the company in a tailspin, from the IT
department, to customer service, to warehousing and inventory, to, of course, its founder, Jules
Ostin. To prevent the Start-up from failing, its outside investors propose bringing in a ‘seasoned
CEO’ to oversee operations. The VCs that Ostin must answer to are venture capitalists, private
investors who provide venture capital (startup money) to promising business ventures. Many
VCs want to grow a company to the IPO or Initial Public Offering stage, so they can sell their
shares to the public at a high profit and exit the business. So, even if the founder – in this case
Ostin — is running the company, the investors can make important decisions about operations
and future direction because their money is fueling the growth.
Then, we see in the movie that when too much of anyone’s personal life is mixed with their
professional life, then it starts affecting everything around them. When someone put too much of
focus on their personal life then it might seem like you’re not too keen about working and are not
professional enough. In the movie Ben tries to balance taking care of Jules’ daughter as well as
her work life appointments.
Work culture mostly depends on how the organization is run and how employees behave with
each other. Anne Hathaway is the kind of boss in the movie, who always moves around and
motivates her employees every step of their way. She also believes in maintaining a good
relationship with her employees. This has led to smooth flow of work in the workplace. It also
shows how employees are satisfied in the organization. This behavior is influenced by Ben, and
Ben makes sure that Jules has a good relationship with her employees to maintain a good work
culture.
The better the work culture the better the employees will respond to tasks. When Ben in the
movie influenced Jules to change her ways with her employees, the employees started to open up
and were more honest. The employees were happier and wanted to work better. This senior
intern teaches everyone that certain values of business are timeless: having a strong work ethic,
showing up on time, staying organized, dressing for success and always having a willingness to
learn new skills. What’s more, Whittaker helps his younger cohorts appreciate emotional
intelligence in the workplace – compassion and understanding are all part of working in a team
and achieving success.
