People + Culture started as a thought experiment inspired by painful experiences at work.
Origin Story
After checking off every box from good schools to great jobs at Microsoft, Apple, and Meta, over 20 years, what’s left with founder Miroo was the experience of burnout, depression and the feeling of emptiness.
Sure, she got a good resume, too, but she didn’t feel motivated to keep going anymore and started wondering,
“Is this the only way of working? Do I really have to suffer at work until I retire? Is there another way?”
The search for an answer to this question led founder, Miroo, to many training sessions and meetings with many like-minded people who empathized with the same question.
Through this process, she learned how to balance herself in the volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous world of workplaces. But Miroo wanted more than her feeling good alone - she knew that unless she shared the insights and practiced with others, nothing would change.
Therefore, she started offering training at Meta with employees and teams that suffered from debilitating wellbeing. In retrospect, this was the beginning of prototyping for People+Culture’s programs, now.
After coaching and training over 50 teams, 1,000 employees over 4 years, Miroo felt confident about the positive impact of emotional intelligence and mindfulness as the support system for the culture of wellbeing at workplaces.
The impact wasn’t just for individual employees but also for teams and collective goals. When individuals and teams felt balanced internally, they could support one another and collaborate better.
This helped them achieve their collective goals better, without sacrificing individual wellbeing. Furthermore, individuals in the team felt more congruent and connected with themselves and one another, creating the culture of care in the team. It created a virtuous cycle.
With this insight, Miroo dreamed of offering holistic approaches to building the culture of wellbeing in other workplaces. Finally, People+Culture was born in 2022 in San Francisco.
Mission
We help leaders and workplaces build the culture of wellbeing so that both people and businesses can grow together sustainably.
Mission
Values
At People+Culture, we value the following qualities in our work and in our relationships with clients:
Sincere Attention
Listen deeply and
respond genuinely.
Clear Intention
Guide with intention rather than expectation.
Wholeness
Orient our work
toward wholeness.
Belonging
Imagine together welcoming differences of one another
Balance
Surf skillfully between being and doing.
Meet the Founder
Meet the Founder
Hello! My name is Miroo Kim
Glad to see you here!
(she/her)
According to Gallup, we spend an average of
I am a heterosexual cisgender woman.
I am a first-generation immigrant.
I was born and raised in Korea and came to the US for graduate school.
I am a daughter and an older sister.
I am a wife to a loving man named Dan and stepmother to a lovely young human Ozzie.
I am a technologist, with work experiences at Apple, Microsoft, and Meta for 20 years.
I am a mindfulness and meditation teacher.
I am an organization culture coach.
I am an entrepreneur and founder of People+Culture.
Like you, I have many different identities.
What I am most interested in, and passionate about, is how to alleviate suffering and create the culture of wellbeing at workplaces.
hours at work in our lifetime.
The only thing we spend more time doing is sleeping.
81,396
So how is life at work…since we spend so much time there?
60% of people are emotionally detached at work
19% of people
are miserable
This isn’t just a statistical
explanation—I experienced it myself.
I was building a seemingly great career, all the while suffering immensely from burnout and depression.
I felt utterly lonely and empty and was going in circles, constantly asking myself, “Why am I feeling this way? How can I feel better?”
It wasn’t simple to find the answer to this question, as there are many factors at play.
That’s why for 5 years I experimented with various teams and people at all levels from leadership to interns in different organizations from education (e.g. INSEAD) to nonprofit (e.g. Greenpeace) to for-profit organizations (e.g. dcamp, Meta, AWS), I learned the possible ways for individuals to feel well and grow with their career, for teams to achieve goals together with psychological safety, and for organizations to grow sustainably with the culture of wellbeing.
I now understand how to feel well while working.
Of course, there are stressful moments at work but I don’t suffer at work anymore.
No one needs to sacrifice their wellbeing
to work and achieve business goals.
At People+Culture,
we can help you.
As seen in
Documentary
Educational Broadcasting System
Korea, 2019
(time stamp 4:42-12:23)
Podcast Interview
Right Off Track
hosted by Anya Smith, 2023
Podcast Interview
Conscious Entrepreneur
hosted by Alex Raymond, 2023