When a managed IT provider in North Carolina won a Top Workplaces award, we dug deeper into what makes them tick—and found a company culture built on LEGO minifigs, an axolotl named Aloha, and four simple values that actually guide decisions.
When a managed IT provider in North Carolina won a Top Workplaces award, we dug deeper into what makes them tick—and found a company culture built on LEGO minifigs, an axolotl named Aloha, and four simple values that actually guide decisions.
Okay, I'll be honest—when I first heard that a managed IT services company won a Top Workplaces award, my initial reaction was "meh." Workplace awards can sometimes feel like participation trophies, right? The kind of thing companies give themselves after a really good quarterly report.
But then I kept reading about Net Friends, and something caught my attention. This award? It's determined entirely by confidential employee feedback. No application essays. No judges. Just employees telling it like it is about whether their workplace actually walks the walk.
That's when my interest piqued.
Net Friends has built their entire culture around what they call FITS values—and no, it has nothing to do with your jeans. It stands for something much more intentional:
Fulfill Implicit Needs—anticipating what clients and teammates need before they even ask
Improve People's Lives—focusing on long-term thinking and reducing risk
Treat Everyone Like a Partner—trust flowing in both directions
Share Knowledge—information flows freely instead of being hoarded
What strikes me about these values is how... practical they are. They're not the typical corporate buzzwords that sound good on a poster but vanish in the daily grind. These read like operating instructions for humans who actually work together.
And here's the thing—according to the employees themselves, it works.
You hear a lot of companies talk about mentorship programs. "We mentor our people!" they proclaim on career pages. But at Net Friends, every new hire gets paired with a mentor through a formal program. Not as a nice-to-have, but as standard operating procedure.
One support technician described the culture as one where "team members support one another and no one is left behind." Another employee—who came into IT from a completely different background—said they were "welcomed in and invested in rather than overlooked."
That second one hits different, doesn't it? We talk a lot about DEI and workplace inclusion, but here's what it actually looks like: someone from outside the traditional IT pathway getting a real shot, being supported, and thriving.
And get this—people are encouraged to ask questions and grow through mistakes instead of being afraid of them.
Mind. Blown.
In an industry where admitting you don't know something can feel like professional suicide, a culture that normalizes learning? That's rare. That's valuable. That's the kind of place where people actually stick around.
Net Friends runs on something called the Entrepreneurial Operating System (EOS). For those not in the know, it's a framework that helps companies get everyone aligned and moving in the same direction. In plain English? Nobody's guessing what the priorities are. Nobody's wondering if their work matters.
The company also does something I love: recognition isn't saved for annual reviews. Big wins and small wins get celebrated as they happen. In a world where most of us count down the days until our annual review (and not in a good way), this approach seems almost radical.
Here's where the story gets fun. Every employee at Net Friends gets a custom LEGO minifig. And the CEO's minifig? It "pulls double duty as the official office tour guide."
I don't know about you, but I want to work at a place where the CEO's tiny plastic representation gives tours. That's not corporate. That's just... human.
And then there's Aloha.
Aloha is a leucistic axolotl. She's apparently the only Net Friend who can glow green (which is apparently her party trick) and considers eating bloodworms a personal achievement. She's the office mascot, and honestly? I respect that.
Companies take themselves too seriously sometimes. The fact that Net Friends has an axolotl named Aloha hanging around tells me these are people who remember we're all human beings, not just productivity units.
Here's my take: awards are nice, but the real story is what they reveal. When employees consistently report high marks for culture, leadership, and engagement—and they do it anonymously, without pressure to make the company look good—that's the good stuff.
Net Friends has been around since 1997. They've accumulated industry honors like the MSP 501, ChannelPro Partner in Excellence Award, and a spot on Cloudtango's MSP Select 100. These are legitimate technical accolades.
But the Top Workplaces award? That's different. That's about the humans behind the technical excellence. The engineers, technicians, and account managers who show up every day.
CEO John Snyder put it well: "This award means a lot because it is not based on what we say about ourselves, it is based on what our team says about us."
That, folks, is the kind of validation money can't buy.
Workplace culture isn't about bean bag chairs and free snacks (though those are nice). It's about whether people feel seen, supported, and challenged in healthy ways. It's about whether knowledge flows freely and whether your colleagues have your back when things get hard.
Net Friends seems to get this. Their FITS values aren't just words on a wall—they're apparently how they actually run the place.
And if the proof is in the pudding, well... their employees seem to be eating pretty well.
Want to learn more about what it takes to build a workplace worth celebrating? Sometimes the answer is simpler than you'd think: treat people like partners, share what you know, and never underestimate the motivational power of a good axolotl.
Tags: ['workplace culture', 'it services', 'managed services', 'employee engagement', 'company culture', 'north carolina', 'top workplaces', 'workplace awards', 'it industry', 'team building']