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Trust Works #7: Liip and the Future of Sustainable Business

Trust Works #7: Liip and the Future of Sustainable Business
Photo by Het Suthar / Unsplash

Liip is a digital agency unlike most. Headquartered in Fribourg and spread across six Swiss cities, they develop online platforms, mobile apps, and digital services. But beneath the surface of award-winning tech, there's something deeper: a quiet revolution in how a company can operate—rooted in trust, purpose, and care for the planet.

After spending time exploring Liip’s inner workings, I’ve come to see them not just as an inspiring company—but as a living example of what it means to embed sustainability and trust into the DNA of an organisation.

The Basics

  • Company: Liip
  • Industry: Technology, Information & Internet
  • HQ: Fribourg, Switzerland
  • Team Size: 220+
  • Founded: 2007
  • Self-managed since: 2016

Trust and Self-Management: The Liip Way

Since 2016, Liip has operated without traditional management. Instead of hierarchy, they run on Holacracy—a system of decentralised governance built around:

  • Circle Structure: The org is made up of interconnected circles, each with its own domain and authority.
  • Dynamic Roles: Every person has different roles across one or more circles.
  • Link Roles: Connect circles and ensure alignment and flow of information.
  • Operating Rhythm:
    • Governance Meetings: Focus on roles, policies, and processes.
    • Tactical Meetings: Focus on day-to-day operations.
  • Consent-based decision-making
  • Code of Conduct: Defined through collective sensing and multiple iterations.
“Purpose over profits” isn’t just a slogan at Liip—it’s a design principle baked into how decisions are made.

Radical Transparency

Transparency isn’t a feature—it’s a foundation. At Liip:

  • Salaries are public, including for founders and partners.
  • Their salary model is built on three steps:
    1. Self-evaluation
    2. Peer review by three colleagues
    3. Confirmation in a salary conference
  • There’s a 2.5x salary ratio between the highest and lowest paid.
  • Employees own 100% of the company, with 35% participating in the shareholder pool.

There are no individual bonuses. If the company does well, everyone gets a share—an equal 14th salary. If not, nobody does.

Open Source by Default

Liip is a pioneer in Switzerland’s open-source movement, guided by the principle "open over closed". Examples include:

  • Contract clauses allowing release of non-customer-specific code
  • Development of Blökkli, a content editor for Drupal CMS
  • Co-creation of Geocity, an open-source platform for municipal information management in Yverdon-les-Bains

Open source is not just a tech choice—it's a cultural stance.

Sustainability Beyond Greenwashing

Liip doesn’t just reduce their footprint—they increase their handprint. That means focusing not only on internal impact, but on what they produce.

At Liip there is a conscious focus on:

  • Internal Footprint: Lowering CO2 emissions, energy consumption, and waste
  • Well-being: Emphasis on work-life balance, diversity, equal pay, education, and mental health
  • Sustainable Benefits: Employee ownership, access to sustainable pension funds
  • Training: Ongoing education, guest speaker sessions
  • Liipers' Fund: Budget for Liipwide sustainable contribution projects

Besides, they choose what to work on by careful consideration:

    • Ethics Check: Client vetting for alignment with sustainability values
    • Progress Metric: Internal tool based on the UN SDGs to evaluate project impact

And utilise sustainable practices in how they build client solutions:

  • Efficient Solutions: Focus on energy-efficient digital design
  • Green Hosting: Usage of sustainable web hosting
  • W3C Guidelines: Adoption of Web Sustainability Guidelines 1.0

Culture, Community, and Bicycles

There’s a famous saying at Liip: “Our laptops and our bikes are our most important tools.”

They mean it.

  • 96.64% of commuting and 99.86% of business trips use public transport
  • They actively support biking, even organising the Liip Bike Grand Tour across six cities
  • Flights? Not allowed on company expenses

Impact in Numbers

  • 300+ clients, with an average relationship of over 5 years
  • 2.5x wage ratio from highest to lowest salary
  • 69% of Liipers work part-time
  • 54 hours of training per person per year
  • Non-recycled waste cut from 3.8 tons in 2018 to 0.76 tons in 2022
  • 35% of employees hold shares in the company

Looking Ahead: From Footprint to Shadow

In their latest sustainability report, Liip introduces a new lens: the climate shadow.

It’s not just about measuring emissions, but looking at influence:

  • Where is your money invested?
  • What values do you promote?
  • What projects do you choose?

For Liip, the next frontier is this wider, deeper awareness of what they build and how they build it—through the Web Sustainability Guidelines, open-source contributions, and expanding their positive portfolio.

A Company to Learn From

Liip reminds us that sustainability isn’t a department. It’s a mindset. A practice. A shared commitment.

They’ve been doing this for nearly two decades—quietly, humbly, radically.

In a world full of noise, their work speaks louder than any press release ever could.

Want to see what sustainable, self-managed, purpose-driven business looks like?
Take a closer look at Liip's website and their sustainability report.Repo

And if you’re building a company with trust at its core, I’d love to hear from you.

Let’s keep designing organisations that work—for people, for the planet, for the future.

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