You’d have to be crazy to work at this company — no, really. It’s a requirement.
By: Maria Magdaleena Lamp
Tags: Tech, Estonia, Software Development, Startup, Disrupt The Workplace

“The idea for Nevercode came from a problem that our team had when they were developing apps for companies like Skype and Microsoft,” Triin describes the genesis of her startup. “They had a lot of frustrating manual work that took a lot of their time — time they could have spent on actually creating better-quality apps.”

To cut out the repetitive work and hassle around building, testing and distributing apps, the team decided to solve the issue in-house. From there, the next step was a no-brainer: “We formed a separate company out of it because we saw that this problem we had solved for ourselves is one that many mobile app developers have,” says Triin. “And so we launched Nevercode.”

Far from dwelling on lofty, vaguely worded mission statements, Nevercode has their path figured out. “Our vision goes to 2040, where we actually see that there are no programming skills needed to create software or to make technology work,” Triin states matter-of-factly.

“Our mission is to make software defect-free by applying components from artificial intelligence and deep learning. We have such an ambitious vision that we’re all out of our comfort zones every day. It’s constant learning and constant development.”

To make their big ambitions a reality, Nevercode is putting together a team of people whose craziness is a match for the founders’. “We put the most emphasis on finding people with the right mindset,” says Triin. “We’re definitely looking for people who want to do crazy stuff and go the extra mile. People who are not afraid to take risks, fail, and learn. The main thing is that no one should join because we have really cool benefits and perks. It should be the company’s mission.”

The team enjoys a springtime outing. Photo courtesy of Triin Kask.

With members hailing from Russia, Germany, and Estonia, Nevercode’s small but fierce thirteen-person team is off to a pretty international start, with plans to keep adding to the diversity. “All sorts of research has shown that having people with diverse cultural backgrounds really benefits the whole organizational culture,” Triin says.

“Being an international team, you see the world as a whole. That’s very important in terms of our mission.”

The team has chosen the deceptively sleepy riverside town of Tartu in southern Estonia as their base, and for good reason. Having lived here for seventeen years, Triin knows firsthand what makes it a perfect place for the startup-minded. “Tartu is definitely the city of youth and the city of freedom,” she says. “People can be themselves. There’s a lot of potential and a lot of going on in terms of entrepreneurship. That makes the whole environment here very innovative, youthful, and entrepreneurial, so it’s really positive to be here.”

That positivity is a huge part of what drives team Nevercode — that, and an unconditional love for their product. “You can think of a product as just something we’re building, but actually it’s like a baby,” says Triin. “We never question its potential. Our team’s core assignment is to make sure that we give it all the support it needs to become a super product and realize its capabilities.”

Team members enjoy a successful hackathon. Photo courtesy of Triin Kask.

Triin believes that endless optimism, sometimes to the point of madness, is key to ending up where Nevercode wants to be. That means everyone on the team has to bring their own special brand of out-of-the-box passion to the table. “It’s really ambitious what we’re doing,” she says. “If we question that, we’re never going to achieve it.”