When On began, its core behaviors were already evident. Three friends launched the company with a unique product and an ambitious dream to take on running's giants. Dreaming, taking calculated risks, approaching things with drive and optimism, making a positive contribution – were all evident. Some five years in, these traits were formalized and given names: Explorer, Athlete, Team, Positive and Survivor Spirits.
Walk back through history with Co-founder David Allemann as he recounts the story of On’s five Spirits.
“We started out with an incredible innovation. But maybe in five years, 50 years, we won't have the same product that we have today, we maybe won’t have the same business model potentially than we have today. What will survive is the Spirit, how we build the next generation of people, the next generation of products, the next generation of dreams, the next generation of innovation.”
Habits but not law. On’s Spirits are who we are.
Culture, values or 'Spirits' aren't codified rules – they're built through people. From the start, it was important to us that we hire amazing people who already embody in their values, in their personality, what On should be. We never believed that you could write the term ‘excellence’ on the wall at the entrance of the building, and then the team would just be excellent – you have to find the right people with the right values and mindset, yet diverse thinking. We were looking for people from the very beginning who are obviously very curious, who are able to do things without a lot of guidance and resources – kind of like swimming in cold water or sailing into uncharted territory. We wanted to bring people to the team who really have the drive of athletes – who think, ‘Hey, if you don't win something today, we'll win it tomorrow.’ People who stay positive when it gets a little bit tough, who can bring other people along, lift up the team. All the things that you probably see today in our Spirits have been a result of hiring an amazing team of very diverse people.
In the beginning, we really relied on the collective wisdom of the team to evaluate the next people we would hire. Really thinking about who we would be very, very excited about if that person joins the team. It was the collective expertise and the collective diversity of that initial group. Then eventually, we thought about the traits, the values that a person should have to be an amazing team member. It emerged from the initial team but as we grew bigger, we realized we should write them down. This wasn't difficult – the Spirits were already there – we just gave them words.
So, they’re really just us writing down what we collectively are as a team, and maintaining our Spirits is about living them – and living them comes in different forms. One way might be shaping the behavior of what you expect from yourself, but it’s also what you expect from others around you – and calling out if you feel that you're not living up to the Spirits or somebody around you isn’t. And it's very helpful that the Spirits also come with example behaviors.
Like everything On does, the Spirits center on action.
When you read our Spirits, you'll see they're action-focused, not abstract values. We wanted to write down something that can very much be a guide for us, that can really talk about how we rise up in certain situations, to help us to make a decision, or ask questions to potential new team members – and even guide us in asking if we feel that they embody the Spirits.
It's not just based around values, but around behaviors. We feel the most powerful teams are those who bring diversity to the group - not one person alone can embody each to the same strength but as a team can do so collectively. Take On Labs Paris in summer 2024: it took a massive, diverse team effort to create a unique space for LightSpray™ and to support our athletes. The sheer scale and success of our Paris presence demonstrated what we can achieve by pulling together, which created tremendous collective pride.
Foundations for the future. The Spirits were written with longevity in mind.
When we started On in 2010, we had to hold onto the crazy belief that we could become a global sports company. Some brands and companies can exist in a niche, but if you start a running shoe brand, you have to compete in a global arena of sport brands. You have to, somewhere in your heart of hearts, believe that it can be really big, and a big dream like this will take years, decades to realize. Hence we knew, especially at the moment when we decided to write the Spirits down, we had to build the culture of the organization in a generational way. We knew many of us wouldn't be hiring the next, second, or third generations, but we all believed they would continue to hire individuals who embody these behaviors and this mindset that we share.
We have generations of people at On today. It's amazing to sit in an onboarding session where new joiners immediately feel they belong, not merely because they learn about our culture but because they can feel it in the room inherently. It's a testament to our collective team. We probe for mindset, not just skillset - what an individual brings, how they can dream up the next big thing. It ensures we're constantly building upon what's already here, as every new person helps shape the next generation of On.
In practice, the Spirits touch each part of On. They’ve helped us define our recipe for success.
Our Spirits have been decisive in shaping On's Journey and defining our recipe for success.
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The Explorer Spirit was crucial at the very onset – it drove our ambition to explore countless "monster" prototypes, driving us to learn new skills while already in motion. It was driven by a lot of trial-and-error. For example, we asked ourselves – how can we reinvent lacing? That came from Thilo, our Chief Design Officer, not necessarily an engineer. I spent the first 6 months building our factory capabilities, learning about different rubbers and tooling. That's what the Explorer Spirit embodies - learning new skills, sometimes while you are already sailing. This relentless commitment drives our ambition today to create the best possible product.
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At the very beginning, we were learning and we were very focused on getting the basics right. Once we came out of these early years, the Survivor Spirit became super important – we started to limit the materials that our design and development teams could use to build shoes because we were starting to be very much focused on how we have a positive impact while keeping the quality.
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The Positive Spirit ultimately guides us in engaging with our community. Positivity and optimism have always been super important. We’ve had a term since the beginning that we call happiness delivery. You use any opportunity that you have to engage with our partners, our retailers, our customers, to really bring positivity and optimism to the table. We feel that's continuing to happen while scaling. We realize it's not always easy, but we keep going at it. We really believe in building loyalty with our community – being together with our fans. And it’s also led to some very important partnerships, ones that have really developed organically, such as with LOEWE and Zendaya.
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The Team Spirit shines through whenever we have the ability to be together. I'm always very happy to travel to our offices around the world – that's often where it shows the strongest. Whether we’re doing sports together, or heading out on one of our yearly hikes, these traditions always remind us of what we can achieve together as a team.
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The Athlete Spirit and the Explorer Spirit are closely connected. As we keep growing as a company, it's all really about mindset. The Explorer is about discovery, doing the new, and dreaming. The Athlete Spirit is about winning. If you think like an athlete, you have to have stamina. You have to train hard to deliver a performance on that one day. And, it's also about resilience because there are days when you’ve trained hard but you lose, and that's very hard. But, it’s the ability to put a lot of work into the dream and the desire to win. We think of On as a sports team because, ultimately, we embody the Athlete Spirit. We’re definitely a competitive brand. We don't just want to dream; we also want to win. And that's embodied by the Athlete Spirit and it means that even if you lose on one day, you definitely get up the next day to win and to train and then ultimately, to win on the next day. So dreaming and winning together is a very powerful combination.
