What's It Like to Work at Wolverine Trading?

How does your team cultivate a culture of learning, whether that’s through hackathons, lunch and learns, access to online courses or other resources?

Our team’s culture of learning is deeply embedded in our philosophy of growth. Our core belief is that context gives form to intangible information. The best way to learn is to do. This belief defines our structures.

Learning is best done through meaningful work. Rather than isolate education, such as workshops, we embed learning within the work. Each day is an opportunity to expand our reach, technically, organizationally or philosophically. Everyone has some intrinsic interest that motivates them to explore beyond the task. An employee’s interest is a well of initiative to be tapped. Our strategy is to identify those interests and align them with areas of meaningful ownership.

Shared information allows collaboration. Teaching reinforces personal understanding and elevates others. Developers acquire ownership for more than operational efficiency. Ownership creates passion. Teaching provides an outlet to express that passion and foster passion in others. We prefer human documentation. We encourage employees to share domains. We build redundancy in knowledge. Shared ownership allows many people to collectively represent knowledge rather than simply execute as individuals.

How does this culture positively impact the work your team produces?

Interest-driven ownership pays off in several ways. It allows people natural initiative because they work on things they care about. It results in faster and stickier learning since there is an emotional investment. And it creates long-term retention of employees and their knowledge because they experience satisfaction through the excellence of their domains. 

Software engineers create tools to remotely diagnose issues, bridging the gap between developer and user. Those passionate about mathematics analyze graph layout algorithms to create the perfect look. Those interested in hardware optimize machine configurations for software. Others bring languages, protocols and technologies to architect workflow pipelines and efficient practices. Each project brought by a developer is pushed forward as an expression of passion.

Ultimately, our teams believe in building individuals who own, who grow and who propagate their knowledge to anyone willing — or doomed — to listen. We kindle a culture of owners who understand, create and share. Our employees become the living embodiment of knowledge. Learning is more than personal self-improvement; it’s the foundation of our architecture.

What advice would you give to other engineers or engineering leaders interested in creating a culture of learning on their own team?

Most important is to recognize that a team reflects its company. Culture grows from the architecture of the larger organization. Every company contains the potential for learning. Encourage knowledge-sharing. This doesn’t require formal presentations. Make space for organic conversations. Normalize the idea that everyone has something to teach and learn, regardless of experience. Teach constructive conversation and nurture it by example. Employees need to feel safe asking questions, challenging assumptions or stating what they don’t know. This safety is the bedrock of learning. Without it, people become risk-averse, which sounds a death knell for innovation. 

Present the bigger picture. Employees are motivated to care when they understand why something matters. It creates satisfaction to see their contribution to the business. Take time to show the forest as well as the trees. Context leads to insight, and insight leads to innovation. Create people who yearn for knowledge so they can build and share. When you do that, learning stops being a task and instead becomes part of life. A culture of learning can create unconstrained opportunities for individual growth and for the company.

What is your role and what attracted you to your company? Describe the moment when you knew you’d found the right fit.

I joined Wolverine as a software engineer because the role checked a lot of boxes for me — C++, Chicago and yes, the free breakfast and lunch didn’t hurt. But I stayed because of the problems I get to solve and the people I get to solve them with. A few weeks after starting, I remember calling my parents and talking nonstop about work. When I finally paused, they said, “It sounds like you made the right job choice.” They were right. That was the moment I realized I’d found a place where I could grow, be challenged and genuinely enjoy what I do every day.

What’s your favorite part about working at your company? The projects, the team culture, the opportunities for career advancement?

One of my favorite parts of working at Wolverine is the complexity and variety of the problems we tackle. Every challenge has multiple potential solutions and the landscape is constantly shifting. I love taking a large, ambiguous problem, breaking it down, thinking through how it might evolve and designing something efficient and resilient. That combination of technical depth, creativity and forward-thinking keeps me engaged and excited to come in each day.

What advice would you give to jobseekers looking to join your growing team?

Think deeply and ask questions — lots of them. The trading world has many layers and no one understands them all on day one. Growth comes from leaning on the people around you, taking good notes and approaching every problem with multiple potential solutions before you write a single line of code. Curiosity and thoughtful problem-solving go a long way here.