First Mode
What's the Company Culture Like at First Mode in Seattle?
This page summarizes recurring themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about First Mode and has not been reviewed or approved by First Mode.
What's the company culture like at First Mode?
Strengths in Seattle’s mission-driven, collaborative, hands-on engineering culture are accompanied by challenges from layoffs and ongoing strategic shifts that have affected direction and stability. Together, these dynamics suggest the Seattle office offers meaningful, innovative work with supportive peers, while navigating the aftereffects of reorgs and integration-related change.
Key Insight for Candidates
Defining tradeoff: Seattle’s scrappy, hands-on “we build it here” culture is now blending with Cummins’ more structured, matrixed processes. Expect a shift from rapid prototyping to scaled products with tighter safety/QA—trading some autonomy and speed for process discipline and stability.Evidence in Action
- We Build It Here — 'We build it here' in Seattle and the Centralia Proving Grounds anchors hands-on prototyping, testing, and iteration on real hardware. Seattle engineers experience end-to-end builds and field feedback loops, strengthening ownership, practical collaboration, and pride in impact.
- Half-Baked Ideas Welcome — At the Seattle engineering hub, psychological safety to float 'half-baked' ideas and cross-disciplinary teaming enable open, irreverent collaboration. Employees share early drafts without fear, get fast multi-functional feedback, and iterate quickly on tough problems.
Positive Themes About First Mode
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Collaborative & Supportive Culture: Teams in Seattle operate in a hands-on, build‑and‑test environment with approachable, cross‑disciplinary collaboration anchored by the Seattle engineering hub and nearby Centralia proving grounds. Colleagues are described as strong and supportive, enabling open idea exchange across levels and functions.
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Innovation & Creativity: Seattle teams emphasize rapid prototyping and iteration—“we build it here”—to tackle mining‑scale decarbonization challenges. An idea‑friendly, irreverent debate culture encourages trying and discarding concepts quickly to find practical solutions.
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Recognition, Pride & Shared Success: Work centered in Seattle on decarbonizing heavy industry (e.g., hybrid retrofit kits and haul‑truck programs) is seen as meaningful, fostering pride and camaraderie. Historical innovation nods and flagship projects reinforce a sense of shared impact.
Considerations About First Mode
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Change Fatigue & Ineffective Decision-Making: Seattle employees have navigated leadership and strategy shifts, including a late‑2023/2024 pivot and subsequent integration into Cummins, creating churn in direction and priorities. Quick iterations and shifting requirements are noted alongside this transformation, which some find stressful.
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Low Morale & Disengagement: Layoffs and restructuring in Washington—along with a late‑2024 bankruptcy process—directly impacted the Seattle workforce and undercut a sense of stability. These disruptions concentrated around WA operations weigh on confidence during the transition.
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