We have always strived to make Cloudflare somewhere where our entire team feels safe and empowered to bring their whole selves to work. It’s the best way to enable the many incredible people we have working here to be able to do their best work. With that as context, we are proud to share that Cloudflare has been certified and recognized as one of the Top 100 Most Loved Workplaces in 2023 by Newsweek and the Best Practice Institute (BPI) for the second consecutive year.
Cloudflare’s ranking follows surveys of more than 2 million employees at companies with team sizes ranging from 50 to 10,000+, and includes US-based firms and international companies with a strong US presence. As part of the qualification for the certification, Cloudflare participated in a company-wide global employee survey — so this award isn’t a hypothetical, it’s driven by our employees’ sentiment and responses.
With this recognition, we wanted to reflect on what’s new, what’s remained the same, and what’s ahead for the team at Cloudflare. There are a few things that especially stand out:
It starts with our mission and people
Helping to build a better Internet.
If you speak to any member of the Cloudflare team about why they’re here, they’ll almost certainly talk about our mission. Whether it’s in our careers, or our lives more generally, so many of us have been positively impacted by the Internet. It is an incredible resource for humanity, and being able to contribute back to it is definitely a draw for many Cloudflarians. In an internal survey from September 2023, 92% of our team stated that they are inspired by Cloudflare’s mission to help build a better Internet — and 88% said that their work is important to the company.
Working on these kinds of problems, at the scale Cloudflare is at, requires constant innovation and figuring out solutions at the frontier of technology. At the same time, Cloudflare for years has been giving back to the community and society — through programs like Project Galileo, Athenian Project, and Project Cybersafe Schools — that make us especially proud of the work we do.
Cloudflarians get a real sense of our company culture, team, mission, and how we work, right when they start interviewing with us. Candidate feedback paints a picture of what this looks and feels like:
“The entire process is really different from anything I’ve experienced before — and I’m enjoying it very much. Also, the informal tone makes it much more human and everyone is so approachable.”
“I’ve never met a group of people at a company that are all consistently excited about the work they are doing.”
Before anyone gets an offer, every candidate in the final stage connects with one of our executive leaders including our co-founders. This has been part of our interview process for many years, and is designed to ensure candidates truly understand what they’re signing up for in their role as part of joining the Cloudflare team, and to make our executive team accessible to everyone starting on day one. Transparency is one of our core values, and we want all employees to have a direct line to our leadership.
Transparency also serves as our guiding light when we engage with the public. We are quick to share detailed reports amid and after incidents, in the hopes that they will benefit the Internet-at-large. And we share regular impact reports detailing our progress around key environmental, social, and governance initiatives.
We have continued to receive unmatched interest with close to half a million applicants in the first half of 2023, which is nearly a 300% increase from 2022. Our offer acceptance rate remained equally as impressive at a rate of 90%. We are continuing to hire worldwide with hundreds of open positions across the organization ranging from Sales to Engineering.
Supported & Flexible
We are committed to developing a globally distributed team with a flexible working approach. Individual teams opt into: hybrid, remote, or in-office, depending on what works best for the folks on the team, and the team more broadly. As an example, we've seen less tenured folks on certain teams wanting to go into the office more frequently to work together in-person. For reasons across the board, we give teams the ability to choose what works best for them. We’ve found that this approach gives teams the opportunity to establish their optimal working arrangements that fit with their objectives and enable collaboration.
Our paid time off policy is on a take-what-you-need basis. We encourage employees to find a comfortable work-life balance by taking as many days off as they need while still being able to perform their jobs satisfactorily.
Benefits & Community
We want to empower and inspire our team members to do their best work every day — and this includes making sure they feel happy, healthy, and fulfilled both inside and outside of our workplace. Aside from comprehensive healthcare benefits, this also includes support for family planning like parental leave and Carrot Fertility, access to mental health and mindfulness programs through Ginger and Headspace apps, and three days of paid time off each year to volunteer in our respective communities.
Diversity, equity, and inclusion is a priority at Cloudflare to help ensure a sense of belonging and community for all of our employees and to best propel our business forward. Our 15+ Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) are employee-led and have designated executive sponsors of each group. These communities come together to support each other, celebrate their cultures, and help with initiatives to educate, support professional development, and more. We have a robust number of ERGs and this continues to grow as the diversity at Cloudflare expands.
Consistently growing our team
Our employees believe that Cloudflare is a special place, with an especially meaningful mission. They believe there is no other place where a team so small is having such a large impact on the Internet. To keep up, it's critical that we have great people across the company to help us continue our mission. To learn more about the Cloudflare career opportunities, please check out Cloudflare Careers!
Anyone who knows me knows that I am a proud member of the HBCU (Historically Black College or University) alumni. The HBCU Smart Cities Challenge invites all HBCUs across the United States to build technological solutions to solve real-world problems. When I learned that Cloudflare would be supporting the HBCU Smart Cities Challenge, I was on board immediately for so many personal reasons.
In addition to volunteering mentors as part of this partnership, Cloudflare offered HBCU Smart Cities the opportunity to apply for Project Galileo to protect and accelerate their online presence. Project Galileo provides free cyber security protection to free speech, public interest, and civil society organizations that are vulnerable to cyber attacks. After more than three years working at Cloudflare, I know that we can make the difference in bridging the gap in accessibility to the digital landscape by directly securing the Internet against today’s threats as well as optimizing performance, which plays a bigger role than most would think.
What is an HBCU?
A Historically Black College or University is defined as “any historically black college or university that was established prior to 1964, whose principal mission was, and is, the education of black Americans, and that is accredited by a nationally recognized accrediting agency or association determined by the Secretary of Education.” (Source: What is an HBCU? HBCU Lifestyle). I had the honor of graduating from the nation’s first degree-granting HBCU, Lincoln University of Pennsylvania.
One of the main reasons that I decided to attend a HBCU is that the available data suggests that HBCUs close the socioeconomic gap for Black students more than other high-education institutions (Source: HBCUs Close Socioeconomic Gap, Here’s How, 2021). This is exemplified by my own experience — I was a student that came from a low-income background, and became the first generation college graduate in my family. I believe it is due to HBCUs providing a united, supportive, and safe space for people from the African diaspora which equips us to be our best.
The HBCU Smart Cities Challenge
There are a wide range of problems the HBCU Smart Cities Challenge invites students to tackle. These problems include water management in Tuskegee, AL; broadband and security access in Raleigh, NC; public health for the City of Columbia, SC; and affordable housing in Winston-Salem, NC—just to name a few. Applying skills with smart technology to real-life problems helps improve upon the existing infrastructure in these cities.
To solve these problems, the challenge brings together students at HBCUs to build smart city applications. Over several months, developers, entrepreneurs, designers, and engineers will develop tech solutions using Internet of Things technology. In October, Cloudflare presented as part of a town hall in the HBCU Smart Cities series. We encouraged local leaders to think about using historic investments in broadband buildout to also lay the foundation for Smart Cities infrastructure at the same time. We described how, with solid infrastructure in place, the Smart Cities applications that are built on top of that infrastructure- would be fast, reliable, and secure — which is a necessity for infrastructure that residents rely on.
Here are some quotes from Norma McGowan Jackson, District 1 Councilwoman of City of Tuskegee and HBCU Smart City Fellow Arnold Bhebhe:
“As the council person for District 1 in the City of Tuskegee, which represents Tuskegee University, as the Council liaison for the HBCU Smart Cities Challenge, as a Tuskegee native, and as a Tuskegee Institute, (now University) alumnae, I am delighted to be a part of this collaboration. Since the days of Dr. Booker T. Washington, the symbiotic relationship between the Institute (now University) and the surrounding community has been acknowledged as critical for both entities and this opportunity to further enhance that relationship is a sure win-win!“ – Norma McGowan Jackson, District 1 Councilwoman of City of Tuskegee
“The HBCU Smart Cities Challenge has helped me to better understand that even though we live in an unpredictable world, our ability to learn and adapt to change can make us better innovators. I’m super grateful to have the opportunity to reinforce my problem-solving, creativity, and communication skills alongside like-minded HBCU students who are passionate about making a positive impact in our community.“ – Arnold Bhebhe,Junior at Alabama State University majoring in computer science
How Cloudflare helps
Attending an HBCU was one of the best decisions I have made in my life, and my motivation was seeing the product of HBCU graduates — noting that the first woman Vice President of the United States, Kamala Harris, is a HBCU graduate from Howard University.
The biggest honor for me is having the opportunity to build on the brilliance of these college students in this partnership, because I was in their shoes almost 25 years ago.
Further, to help protect websites associated with HBCU Smart Cities projects, Cloudflare has invited students in the program to apply for Project Galileo.
Finally, the HBCU Smart Cities Challenge are continually looking for mentors, sponsors and partnerships, as well as support and resources for the students. If you’re interested, please go here to learn more.
In this blog post, we’ll highlight a few stories from some of our 17 Employee Resource Groups (ERGs), including the most recent, Persianflare. But first, let me start with a personal story.
Do you remember being in elementary school and sitting in a classroom with about 30 other students when the teacher was calling on your classmates to read out loud from a book? The opportunity to read out loud was an exciting moment for many of my peers; one that made them feel proud of themselves. I, on the other hand, was frozen, in a state of panic, worried that I wouldn’t be able to sound out a word or completely embarrass myself by stuttering. I would practice reading the next paragraph in hopes that I wouldn’t mess up when I was called on. What I didn’t know at the time was that I was dyslexic, and I could barely read, especially out loud to a large group of people.
That is where I began to know the feeling of isolation. This feeling compounded year after year, when I wasn’t able to perform the way my peers did. My isolation prevailed from elementary school to middle school, through high school and even into college.
In college, I found a community that changed everything called Eye to Eye – a national non-profit organization that provides mentorship programs for students with learning disabilities. I attended one of their conferences with 200 other students. It was a profound moment when I realized that everyone in the room shared the experience of anxiety and fear around learning. Joining this community made me feel that I was not alone. Community for me is a group of people who have shared experience. Community allowed me to see my learning disability as an asset not a deficit. This is what I think the author, Nilofer Merchant, meant in the 11 Rules for Creating Value in the Social Era, when she said “The social object that unites people isn’t a company or a product; the social object that most unites people is a shared value or purpose.“
When I came to work at Cloudflare, I decided to become an ERG leader for Flarability, which provides a space for discussing disability and accessibility at Cloudflare. The same deep sense of community that I felt at Eye to Eye was available to me when I joined Flarability.
Globally, 85% of the company participates in ERGs and this year alone they hosted over 54 initiatives and events. As the pandemic persisted over the last year, Cloudflare remained a hybrid workforce which posed many challenges for our company culture. ERGs had to rethink the way they foster connection. Today, we are highlighting Persianflare, Afroflare, Greencloud and Desiflare because they have taken different approaches to building community.
Persianflare is our newest ERG, and in a very short amount of time, ERG Leader Shadnaz Nia has already brought together an entire community of folks who have created lasting impact. Here’s how…
Persianflare: Amplify the voice of Iranian people Shadnaz Nia, Solutions Engineer, Toronto
“Persianflare is the newest ERG which strives to nurture a community for all Persians and allies, where we perpetuate freedom of speech, proudly celebrate rich Persian heritage, appending growth and Persian convention. We have assembled with a desire to amplify the voice of the Iranian people, and bring awareness to human rights violations there, during unprecedented and unbearable times in history.
Cloudflare’s mission is to build a better Internet and one of our initiatives this year was to support building a better Internet that provides a more private Internet for the people of Iran. At Cloudflare, we are fortunate to have executive leadership that takes action and works tirelessly to provide more uncensored and accessible Internet in countries such as Iran. We’ve done this by offering WARP solutions in native Farsi language for all Persian-speaking users, empowering them to access uncensored information and news, in turn, strengthening the voice of Persian people living in Iran.
This project was accidentally routed to my team by the Product Team when they needed a translator. At the time, myself and other Persian employees were feeling powerless as a result of Mahsa Amini being murdered in the custody of the Iranian morality police. This was the birth of Persianflare. Through this project, I started collaborating with other employees and discovered that many of my colleagues really cared about this cause and wanted to help. Throughout the course of this initiative, we found more Persian employees in other regions and let them know about our progress. Words cannot describe how I felt when the app was released. It was one of the purest moments in my life. By bringing together Persian employees, allies of Persianflare, and the Product Team, this community was able to create real change for the people of Iran. To me, that is the power of community.
We plan to circle together to celebrate the global Human Rights Day on December 10, 2022, to continue discussing and growing our community. As the newest ERG, we are just getting started.”
“Afroflare is a community for People of African Diaspora to build connections while learning from each others’ lives, perspectives and experiences. Our initiatives in 2022 centered on creating and cultivating community by supporting and echoing Black voices and achievements within and outside of Cloudflare. Earlier in the year, given that the pandemic was slowing down but still active, we provided curated content that would allow members and allies to create, contribute and learn about cultures of the African diaspora at their own pace.
For our celebration of US Black History Month, we aggregated lists of Black-owned businesses and non-profit communities in various cities to support. We also hosted internal chats called “The Plug,” which highlight the immense talent of our members at Cloudflare. Lastly, Afroflare worked with allies to present an Allyship workshop called “Celebrating Black Joy- An Upskilling Session for Allies.”
As 2022 progressed, we shifted to a hybrid of in-person and virtual events in order to foster more interaction and strengthen bonds. Our celebration of UK Black History Month included a cross-culture party in our Lisbon office. We collaborated with Latinflare & Wineflare on an International Wine tasting event featuring South African wines, and an African + Caribbean food tasting event called “Taste from Home. We wrapped up the festivities with a Black Woman in Tech panel to discuss bias and how to navigate various obstacles faced by the BIPOC community in tech.
Virtually or in-person, this community has become a family – we laugh together, cry together, teach each other, and continue to grow together year after year. Each member’s experiences and culture are valued as we forge spaces for everyone to feel free to be authentic. Afroflare looks forward to continuing its goals of creating safe spaces, as well as educating, championing, and supporting our members and allies in 2023.”
Greencloud: A more sustainable Internet Annika Garbers, Product Manager, Georgia
“Greencloud is a coalition of Cloudflare employees who are passionate about the environment. Our vision is to address the climate crisis through an intersectional lens and help Cloudflare become a clear leader in sustainable practices among tech companies. Greencloud was initially founded in 2019 but experienced most of its growth in membership, engagement, and activities after the pandemic started. The group became an outlet for current and new employees to connect on shared passions and channel our COVID-fueled anxieties for the world into productive climate-focused action.
Greencloud’s organizing since 2020 has primarily centered around “two weeks of action.” The first is Impact Week (happening now!), which includes projects driven by Greencloud members to help our customers build a more sustainable Internet using Cloudflare products. The second is Earth Week, scheduled around the global Earth Day celebration in April, which focuses on awareness and education. We’ve leveraged the tools available to Cloudflare employees and our community, like our blog and Cloudflare TV, to share information with a broader audience and on a wider range of topics than would be possible with in-person events. This year, publicly available Earth Week programming included sessions about Cloudflare’s sustainability focus for our hardware lifecycle, an interview with a sustainability-focused Project Galileo participant, a Policy team overview of our sustainability reporting practices, and a conversation about sustainable transportation with our People team. Covering a wide range of topics throughout our events and content created by our members not only helps everyone learn something new, it also reminds us of the importance of embracing and encouraging diverse perspectives in every community. The diversity of the Greencloud collective is a small demonstration of the reality that climate change is only successfully addressed through holistic action by people with many outlooks and skills working together.
As we embrace more flexible modes of work, the Greencloud crew is looking forward to maintaining our virtual events as well as introducing more in-person opportunities to engage with each other and our local communities. Building and maintaining deep connections with each other is key to the momentum and sustainability(!) of this work in the long term.”
Desiflare: South Asian delights Arwa Ginwala, Solutions Engineering Manager, San Francisco
“Our goal for Desiflare is to build a sense of community among Cloudflare employees using the rich South Asian culture as a platform to bring people together. The Desiflare initiatives that had the most impact were in-person events after the two long years of pandemic. People were longing for a sense of community and belonging after months of Zoom fatigue. It was a fresh breath of air to see fellow Desis in person, across multiple Cloudflare offices. Folks hired during the pandemic got an opportunity to come visit the newly-renovated office in San Francisco. Desis enjoyed South Asian food at the Austin office for the first time since Desiflare’s inception. Diwali was celebrated in Singapore and Sydney offices, and the community in London played cricket, a sport very popular and well-loved in the South Asian community. Regardless of country of origin, gender, age or cultural beliefs, and in the presence of a competitive atmosphere, everyone shared and rejoiced with memories from their childhoods.
We realize that Desiflare members have different levels of comfort regarding meeting people in person or traveling for in-person events. But everyone wants to feel a sense of community and connection with people who share the same interests. Keeping this in mind, it was important to organize events where everyone felt included and had a chance to be part of the community based on their preferences. We met virtually for weekly chai time, monthly lunches, and are now organizing virtual jam sessions for many Desis to showcase their talent and enjoy South Asian music regardless of where they are located. The community has been most engaged on the Desiflare chat room. It has provided a platform for discussing common topics that help people feel supported. Desiflare gives a unique opportunity to employees to connect with their culture and roots regardless of their job title and team. It’s a way to network cross-functionally, and allows you to bring your whole self to work, which is one of the best things about working at Cloudflare.”
Conclusion
The ERGs at Cloudflare have helped us realize the power of community and how critical it is for hybrid work. What I have learned alongside our ERG leaders is that if we as individuals want to feel connected, understood and seen, our ERG communities are essential. You can check out all the incredible ERGs on the Life at Cloudflare page, and I encourage you to consider starting an ERG at your company.
At Cloudflare, we have strived to build a workplace where our entire team feels safe and excited to bring their whole selves to work, so they can do their best work. That’s why we are proud to share that Cloudflare has been named one of the Top 100 Most Loved Workplaces in 2022by Newsweek and Best Practice Institute (BPI). Most Loved Workplaces recognizes companies where their workers love, and feel in sync with, the company they work for.
With this, and as we’re approaching the end-of 2022, we thought this was a good time to reflect on some of the things that go into being one of these Most Loved Workplaces and just some of what makes up our workplace and culture.
Something that really grounds our entire team is Cloudflare’s mission: to help build a better Internet. When you are solving some of the toughest challenges facing the Internet — helping make the Internet secure, fast, private, and reliable globally — you need a range of talented individuals to do this. The people at Cloudflare are exactly that, and are essential to our impact on the Internet.
The Internet wasn’t built for what it’s being used for today. In order for the Internet to work the way it does today, from powering critical infrastructure, to making it so that a busy working parent can order a healthy dinner right to their home, requires constant innovation on our part to make sure these online services can withstand the demand online, load quick, and not face cyber attacks and breaches. Cloudflare has a significantly large responsibility online, with about 20% of the web running through our network today — and every single team member here is contributing to this.
In addition to the results from Newsweek and BPI, Cloudflare additionally conducted an internal survey of its global team. This presented results of 94% of surveyed employees stating that they are inspired by Cloudflare’s mission to help build a better Internet. At Cloudflare, 92% of employees say their manager treats them with respect and 92% state that their work is important to the company.
“I’ve worked for so many Fortune 500, top companies in tech, and never have I felt more valued and grown so much than at Cloudflare. I love going to work, love working with my manager and team, we learn so much from each other and are motivated to smash sales goals and grow our presence in the world. ”
“…I love this company, management, and most of all my team. I am proud to be building a better Internet, and will continue to do so for years to come.”
“Honestly it is the best I’ve ever worked; it is a lot of work, and sometimes it can be stressful, but I’m sure I can count on my manager for support, and they take their time to explain again and again without making me feel bad for asking.”
“Having had the privilege to work at Cloudflare for the past five years, I can genuinely attest that our people are clearly our biggest asset. I personally feel empowered, respected, and yet intellectually challenged daily. It is impressive for any single company to assemble such a diverse and thoughtful group of co-workers. And it all starts with our leadership.”
Benefiting and having community
Cloudflare offers a comprehensive total rewards and benefits package, and invests in supporting team members through a variety of initiatives and programs.
Examples of benefits range — from our commuter benefits program, for employees working in an office or a hybrid role, we help support the transportation costs associated with commuting — to health and family benefits programs including fertility, caregiving, childcare, and family forming/planning, as well as emotional and mental health benefits — and, we encourage everyone to find a comfortable work-life balance by offering a take-what-you-need vacation policy.
One example of programs is Cloudflare’s Employee Resource Groups (ERGs), employee-led and company-supported groups of underrepresented and/or marginalized employees. These groups are focused on key Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives with leaders, executives, and members for each group, who join together in the workplace based on shared characteristics, life experiences, or interests. ERGs are generally based on creating a community of support and belonging, enhancing career development of their members, and contributing to the development of a more inclusive culture at Cloudflare. Today we have 16 ERGs at Cloudflare ranging from Proudflare, Womenflare, and Afroflare to Cloudflarents and Mindflare (you get the theme!).
Flexibility to work in your best environment
What’s been at the center of how we’ve approached supporting our team these past couple years is flexibility and experimentation. Cloudflare’s workplace shifted from completely in-office since the company’s launch and leading up to March 2020, to then an entirely new remote environment that we hadn’t had before. This has been a big experiment for us, and it’s an honor to be recognized among the top workplaces uplifting its people. We recognize that every team’s needs are different and that most of us want some level of flexibility in how and where we work. At Cloudflare, we support a variety of work environments that give teams the opportunity to establish their own optimal working arrangements. Whether that be hybrid, remote, or in-office that fit with their objectives and enable collaboration — each employee has flexibility.
Growing team
Cloudflare has grown its global team by 93% over the past two years and has overall prioritized the recruitment, retention, as well as success of employees. To give a sense of this, in 2021 we received more than 200,000 competitive applications, extending 1,455 offers — while seeing a 92% acceptance rate across the board, and alongside continuously low attrition rates.
Now approaching the end-of 2022, we have over 3,100 team members globally. As our co-founder, President & COO Michelle Zatlyn says, “Companies are collections of people. One of the best parts of my job is the people I get to work with.” And we are continuing to hire worldwide with hundreds of open positions across the organization ranging from Sales to Engineering. To learn more about the Cloudflare career opportunities, please check out Cloudflare Careers! And an enormous high-five to the entire Cloudflare team for your continuous effort and hand in helping build a better Internet.
During the Holocaust, and in the events that led to it, the Nazis exterminated one third of the European Jewish population. Six million Jews, along with countless other members of minority and disability groups, were murdered because the Nazis believed they were inferior.
Cloudflare’s Project Galileo provides free protection to at-risk groups across the world including Holocaust educational and remembrance websites. During the past year alone, Cloudflare mitigated over a quarter of a million cyber threats launched against Holocaust-related websites.
Antisemitism and the Final Solution
In the Second World War and the years leading up to it, antisemitism served as the foundation of racist laws and fueled violent Pogroms against Jews. The tipping point was a night of violence known as the Kristallnacht (“Night of Broken Glass”). Jews and other minority groups were outlawed, dehumanized, persecuted and killed. Jewish businesses were boycotted, Jewish books burned and synagogues destroyed. Jews, Roma and other “enemies of the Reich” were forced into closed ghettos and concentration camps. Finally, as part of the Final Solution for the Jewish Question, Germany outlined a policy to deliberately and systematically exterminate the Jewish race in what came to be known as the Holocaust.
As part of the Final Solution, the Nazis deployed mobile killing units. Jews were taken to forests near their villages, forced to dig mass graves, undress, and then shot — falling into the mass graves they dug. This was the first step. However, this was “inefficient”. More “efficient” solutions were engineered using deadly gas. Eventually, six main extermination camps were established. They were extremely “efficient” at exterminating humans. Initially, the Nazis experimented with gas vans for mass extermination. Later, they built and operated gas chambers which could kill more humans and do it faster. After being gassed, prisoners would load the bodies into ovens in crematoriums to be burned. In one of the larger death camps, Auschwitz-Birkenau, more than one million Jews were murdered — some 865,000 were gassed and burned on arrival.
It is through education that we will defeat bigotry and racism, and we will do our part at Cloudflare — through education and by supporting Holocaust educational organizations.
“Our response to ignorance must be education” – United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres
Supporting Holocaust educational organizations with Project Galileo
As part of Project Galileo, we currently provide free security and performance products to more than 1,500 organizations in 111 countries. These organizations are targeted by cyber attacks due to their critical work. These groups include human rights defenders, independent media and journalists, and organizations that work in strengthening democracy. Among them are organizations dedicated to educating about the horrors of the Holocaust, and preserving and telling the stories of the victims and survivors of the Holocaust to younger and future generations.
Cyber attacks on Holocaust-related websites
Over the past year, we’ve seen cyber attacks on Holocaust-related websites gradually increase throughout the year. These attacks include mostly application-layer attacks that were automatically detected and mitigated by Cloudflare’s Web Application Firewall and DDoS Protection systems.
In May 2021, cyber attacks on Holocaust-related websites peaked as they increased by 263% compared to their monthly average.
Applying to Project Galileo
Cloudflare’s mission is to help build a better Internet. Part of this mission includes protecting free expression online for vulnerable groups.
The Internet can be a powerful tool in this matter. However, organizations often face attacks from powerful and entrenched opponents, yet operate on limited budgets and lack the resources to secure themselves against malicious traffic intended to silence them. If they are silenced, the Internet stops fulfilling its promise.
To combat the threats, Cloudflare’s Project Galileo provides robust security and performance products for at-risk public interest websites at no cost. Application to Project Galileo is open to any vulnerable public interest website. You can apply via our partners or apply directly to Project Galileo if you don’t have any affiliation with our trusted partners.
A note from Cloudflare’s Jewish employees
Many of us, like myself, are descendants of Holocaust survivors. My grandparents fled from Nazi-occupied Poland to survive. Sadly, my grandparents — as other elderly survivors, are no longer with us. Many of us have faced antisemitism in various forms. Together, we are part of Cloudflare’s Employee Resource Group for Cloudflare’s Jewish community: Judeoflare. We have a responsibility to make sure the world remembers and never forgets the atrocities of the Holocaust and what racism and antisemitism can lead to.
At Cloudflare, we have our eyes set on an ambitious goal: to help build a better Internet. Today the company runs one of the world’s largest networks that powers approximately 25 million Internet properties. This is made possible by our 1,900 team members around the world. We believe the key to achieving our potential is to build diverse teams and create an environment where everyone can do their best work.
That is why we place a lot of value on the importance of diversity, equity and inclusion. Diversity, equity, and inclusion lead to better outcomes through improved decision-making, more innovative teams, stronger financial returns and simply a better place to work for everyone.
To become more diverse, equitable, and inclusive, we believe it’s important to focus on communities within and around our company.
Building internal communities at Cloudflare
At Cloudflare, like most workplaces, there are built-in communities: your direct team, your cross-functional partners and (because we take onboarding very seriously) your new hire class. These communities, especially the first two, are important to help you get your job done. But we want more than that for our team at Cloudflare. We believe that community builds connection and fosters a sense of belonging.
Because of that, we have supported the growth of over 16 Employee Resource Groups (ERG’s). We use the term ERG broadly at Cloudflare. We have many ERG’s focused on traditionally under-represented groups in tech: Afroflare (Black, African diaspora), Latinflare, and Womenflare; groups that have been historically marginalized: Proudflare (LGBTQIA+), Cloudflarents (parents and caregivers); as well as interest and affinity groups like Mindflare and Soberflare. To read more about all of our ERGs, visit our diversity, equity, and inclusion webpage or read about them on our blog. In addition to creating a community of support and belonging, our ERGs also work to enhance career development of their members and contribute to the development of a more inclusive culture at Cloudflare.
Building the skills to build communities
We define an inclusive culture as one where everyone feels safe, welcome and respected with a sense of belonging. We do not leave this to chance. We make investments in training and programs to develop and deepen the skills needed to nurture and preserve inclusive communities at Cloudflare.
One of our earliest offerings was Ally Skills training. The aim of this workshop is to help build awareness of the types of behavior and language which can be harmful to inclusivity at Cloudflare, and teach simple, everyday ways to support people who are targets of systemic oppression. During the workshop, team members share strategies on how to act as allies and how to create a long-lasting, inclusive culture at Cloudflare. As the program was being rolled out, the management team did the workshop together and quickly realized these were not skills reserved for ‘allies’ but it was our expectation that this was how all of our team members treated each other. These were necessary skills to be successful at Cloudflare. As a result, we reworked some pieces of the workshop and renamed it: How We Work Together.
We have also partnered with Paradigm IQ and Included to create a three-part Unconscious Bias Education Program. These workshops are a mix of eLearning and facilitated workshops where we learn about how to help mitigate unconscious bias and make our company a more welcoming and inclusive place for everyone. tEQuitable is an additional comprehensive resource which helps us create a safe, inclusive, and equitable workplace. They provide an independent sounding board where our employees may confidentially raise a concern, access a just-in-time learning platform, and get advice from professional Ombuds. They also help us identify systemic workplace issues and provide us with actionable recommendations for how to improve our workplace culture. What we especially love about tEQuitable is that it’s all about empowering our employees with tools and resources to address issues that may be impacting them, or they may witness impacting others, so we all play an active role in maintaining and nurturing our culture.
One other program worth highlighting is our Week On: Learning and Inclusion. This program came as a response to the murder of George Floyd in the US at the end of May 2020. Our Afroflare global leaders suggested we use Juneteenth as a full-day of deep learning from external experts on topics ranging from the history of race and racism to the psychological impact of racism on people of color. In 2021, we expanded it from a one-day program to a week full of programming with topics ranging from antiracism keynotes, inclusive people management workshops and inclusive recruiting practices.
Holding ourselves accountable to an inclusive culture
Increasing awareness and skill-building is valuable, but it is not enough. We also have to hold ourselves accountable by analyzing data, setting goals and measuring progress objectively. Each year we set company-wide goals around our diversity, and for the last few years we’ve added individual goals for managers — one focused on building a more diverse team, and one focused on building an inclusive team culture.
We also place a high value on behaviors at Cloudflare. This is imperative because we believe that culture is defined by the behaviors we reward. So in order to have a healthy and inclusive culture, we must reward the behaviors that promote and preserve that. We have defined these behaviors as our Cloudflare Capabilities.
We screen for these Capabilities during our interview process, and they are used in performance and promotion conversations. We hold ourselves accountable by using a very simple formula: Performance = results + behaviors. Equally weighted.
Our Recruiting Efforts
Speaking of interviewing, hiring is an important part of our diversity story. We believe that diverse teams win, and we put in a lot of effort to build diverse teams across the company. We have many team members who took unconventional paths into tech, and we believe that makes us stronger as a company. In fact, many of our job descriptions read: We realize people do not fit into neat boxes. We are looking for curious and empathetic individuals who are committed to developing themselves and learning new skills, and we are ready to help you do that. We cannot complete our mission without building a diverse and inclusive team.
In addition to an inclusive and expansive mindset around hiring, we also have interviews dedicated specifically to fit against our Capabilities, as well as leveraging technology and tools to help identify great talent who help to increase the diversity of our teams.
We have also made investments in events and partnerships that help support our diversity recruiting efforts. In August 2016, Cloudflare was one of the first companies to partner with Path Forward when it first launched its program in California. [Fun fact: that’s how I learned about Cloudflare and became interested in working here]. In Singapore, we have a similar partnership with Mums@Work.
We also engage with organizations and participate in events that help us reach talent from underrepresented groups. We have sponsored and spoke on stage at events like Lesbians Who Tech and Grace Hopper, where our co-founder, President and COO, Michelle Zatlyn, delivered the keynote in 2020. We regularly attend events and conferences hosted by AfroTech, Women Who Code, Girls Who Code, TAPIA, NSN, and more.
Engaging with external communities
Our ethos is to support and connect with external communities as well. Prior to the pandemic, when our offices were fully open and social and professional events were a thing, we regularly hosted external organizations to host events in our communal spaces. One example of such an organization is Wu Yee Children’s Services, a San Francisco Chinatown-based nonprofit that connects parents and caregivers to affordable childcare options, offers payment assistance to low-income families, and other family and community services. We were honored to host their orientation session. Another organization we hosted was Women Who Code SF. We regularly hosted their “ algorithm and interview prep” workshops, which helped women coders gain the skills they need to land good jobs in the tech industry. Unlike many of our tech company peers, we did not offer free lunch five days a week. It was important to us that our team members got out of the office and supported local businesses and restaurants. It is important that we do not isolate ourselves, but rather are part of a larger community.
We also believe in giving back to our local communities. Prior to COVID, Cloudflare dedicated one week every year to volunteer efforts. Coordinated across many of our large office locations, we would dedicate each day for a full week volunteering at employee-nominated, local non-profit organizations. Our participation pivoted to virtual during COVID, but we are anxious to return to in-person giving when we can.
While we are proud of these efforts, it is in using Cloudflare products and services for good that is truly special. Cloudflare’s mission to help build a better Internet means we are in a unique position to help vulnerable websites, applications and services be safer, faster and more reliable online.
Organizations working in the arts, human rights, civil society, journalism, or democracy, may apply for Project Galileo to get Cloudflare’s cybersecurity protection, for free. Since 2014, we’ve been leveraging our services to support vulnerable public interest web properties including, but are not limited to: minority rights organizations, human rights organizations, independent media outlets, arts groups, and democracy and voter protection programs.
Our support of one of these organizations has blossomed over the years. We are proud to announce our partnership with The Trevor Project. Founded in 1998 by the creators of the Academy Award®-winning short film TREVOR, The Trevor Project is the leading national organization providing crisis intervention and suicide prevention services to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer & questioning (LGBTQ) young people under 25. We support the organization through monetary donations, a partnership with our LGBTQIA+ Employee Resource Group, Proudflare, and free Cloudflare services through our Project Galileo Program.
Since 2017, we have donated about $8 million in cybersecurity tools under Project Galileo.
Cloudflare launched the Athenian Project in 2017 to provide our highest level of cybersecurity services for free to state and local governments in the United States that run elections. The project is designed to protect these websites tied to elections including information related to voting and polling places, voter registration and sites that publish election results. And voter data from cyberattack, and keep them online. During the 2020 U.S. election, we worked closely with civil society and government agencies to share threat information that we saw targeted against these participants and protected more than 292 websites in 30 states, including the Missouri Secretary of State, Solano County in California and The Colorado Department of State.
In recognition that election security is a global issue, we recently announced our partnerships with the International Foundation for Electoral Systems, National Democratic Institute and International Republican Institute to extend our cybersecurity protections to election management bodies around the world, as well as organizations that support free and fair elections. We look forward to continuing our work to protect resources in the voting process and help build trust in democratic institutions around the world.
Around the world, governments, hospitals, and pharmacies are struggling to distribute the COVID-19 vaccine. Technical limitations are causing vaccine registration sites to crash under the load of registrations. At Cloudflare, we want to help. Cloudflare’s Waiting Room feature allows organizations with more demand for a resource — be it concert tickets, new edition sneakers, or vaccines — to allow individuals to queue and then allocate access. Waiting Rooms can be deployed in front of any existing registration website without requiring code changes. As we watched the world struggle to fairly and efficiently distribute the COVID-19 vaccine we wanted to lend our technologies and expertise to help. Under Project Fair Shot, Cloudflare is providing Waiting Room to any government agency, hospital, pharmacy, or other organization facilitating the distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine for free until anyone who wants to be vaccinated can be, until at least 31-December 2021.
At Cloudflare, we believe in being principled, curious and transparent. Publishing our diversity report is aligned with these values.
We are Principled: One of the Cloudflare Capabilities is “Do the Right Thing” — that includes long-term thinking about how we build an innovative and sustainable workforce. We have a fundamental belief that fairness is the right thing. We believe that equity is the right thing.
We are Curious: Creating a more diverse and sustainable workforce is hard work. We want to draw lessons from the things we try, and we want to learn from what others are trying. Sustainable communities is not a zero-sum game, and we believe we can all benefit as an active part of the broader community.
We believe in Transparency: For many years, we have been transparent with our team about our diversity data and our goals, and we have measured our progress regularly. Now we are taking the step to share publicly because we believe in accountability and accept the responsibility to build a diverse and sustainable workforce.
You can check out our Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion webpage with our diversity report here.
While there is always more work to be done, we are grateful for the empathetic and curious team that makes Cloudflare what it is today. Together, we are optimistic we can build a better — and more inclusive — Internet.
Employee resource groups (ERGs) are important to a company’s success. They foster community and a sense of belonging, help drive organizational change, and improve the overall quality of an organization’s culture. Most importantly, they help organizations become more diverse, equitable, and inclusive. I’d love to share the history of ERGs at Cloudflare, as well as how they function and help influence the company.
The history of ERGs at Cloudflare
When I joined Cloudflare in 2017, one of the first things I did was search “LGBTQ” in our company chat. A chat room of a dozen or so employees titled “LGBT at Cloudflare” popped up. There was evidence of some historic chatter in the room, and it was clear some employees had gathered for drinks after work before. I immediately introduced myself to the group, and asked if they would be okay with me setting up a meet & greet event. We booked a conference room, ordered lunch, found an article to discuss, introduced ourselves, and collectively decided we wanted to continue hosting such events. In our second meeting, we decided we should make things official by deciding on a name. This was the birth of Proudflare, our employee resource group (ERG) for LGBTQIA+ employees and our allies, and the first official Cloudflare ERG. I was honored to serve as Proudflare’s first global leader.
Cloudflare employees have founded and advanced fifteen other ERGs since 2017. Afroflare, our ERG for people of the African Diaspora, was the next ERG to form, later in 2017. The most recent is Flarability, our accessibility ERG. All of our groups are focused on fostering community, celebrating diversity, supporting career development, and educating those around us, but serve different communities. We decided early on that if each ERG focuses on education, celebration, and inclusion, we’ll be successful in supporting our underrepresented communities and stimulating positive change at our company. We have come a long way and still have a lot of change to make, but I can safely say that we have definitely helped make Cloudflare more diverse, inclusive, and equitable.
Our definition: At Cloudflare, ERGs are employee-led and company-supported groups of underrepresented and/or marginalized employees or groups of employees who are focused on key Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives. These employees join together in the workplace based on shared characteristics, life experiences, or initiatives. ERGs are generally based on creating a community of support and belonging, enhancing career development of their members, and contributing to the development of a more inclusive culture at Cloudflare.
ERGs are led by passionate volunteer employees who serve in roles as global leaders, regional leads, initiative leads, communications leads, and executive advocates. We ERG leaders agreed early on to support each other in our work, so we formed an Inclusion Council. This council is made up of all ERG leaders as well as Cloudflare’s inclusion workshop facilitators and serves as a steering committee in order to surface and incite feedback on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) topics. We meet monthly, in rotating time zones so we may include leaders from all regions. Some of our most successful ERG partnership initiatives were forged in our Inclusion Council meetings between Womenflare and Afroflare, Asianflare and Desiflare, Mindflare and Proudflare, Latinflare and Afroflare, and more.
Most ERGs leverage executive advocates to help gain support from our senior executives and help those executives become more involved in DEI initiatives. Advocates meet regularly with ERG leaders, review company-wide or external-facing ERG communications, amplify the voices and visibility of ERGs through written communications and participation in events, and advocate for the ERG at the executive level. An example of a successful partnership between an Executive Advocate and an ERG is our CTO, John Graham-Cumming and Womenflare. John has held several meetings with Womenflare members to listen to their needs and experiences, share company decisions, and find ways to better advocate for the women of Cloudflare. He also meets with Womenflare’s leaders biweekly to help with major initiatives and any roadblocks to progress.
How do ERGs impact organizations?
The most important function of an ERG is to create a sense of belonging and community amongst their members and allies through chat room conversations and regular connection opportunities. ERGs typically also produce initiatives around global education and celebration opportunities such as Women’s Empowerment Month, Black History Month, Hispanic Heritage Month, etc. These initiatives include DEI discussion events, company-wide presentations, company-wide emails, blog posts, social media campaigns, Cloudflare TV segments, publication of antiracism resources, spotlighting of underrepresented and marginalized employees, advising Cloudflare teams on decisions such as inclusive benefits package selection and accessible office space construction, and helping to promote inclusion education programs.
Through these connection opportunities and initiatives, ERGs influence the overall organization. They attract more allies and encourage them to take DEI actions, help educate employees on systemic barriers to DEI, and help make the workplace more inclusive and enjoyable for everyone. I see ERGs as impactful grass-roots movements within a company and I’ve witnessed their positive impact firsthand.
Thank you for reading about Cloudflare’s ERGs. Sixteen ERGs is a good number, but I’m really looking forward to supporting the foundation and growth of even more, and helping our existing ERGs flourish. If you are interested in starting an ERG at your company or learning more about ERG best practices, I encourage you to check out the Human Rights Campaign’s article, Establishing an Employee Resource Group.
Cloudflare ERG mission statements:
Afroflare
Our mission is to help build a better Global Afro-community at Cloudflare and beyond. We support each other’s growth, share our community’s stories, and help to make Cloudflare a more diverse and inclusive company.
Asianflare
We provide a supportive environment for all employees of Asian and Pacific Islander heritage, work to create more awareness of the struggles our community has faced and continues to face today, and celebrate our rich shared cultures.
Cloudflarents
We provide community and resources for parents and families, and welcome allies, people who are interested in becoming a parent, or who are family-oriented.
Desiflare
We foster networking and build a sense of community amongst Cloudflare employees using the rich South Asian culture as a platform to bring people together.
Flarability
We curate and share resources about disabilities, provide a community space for those with disabilities and our allies to find support and thrive, and encourage and guide Cloudflare’s accessibility programs.
Greencloud: Sustainability Group
Greencloud is a sustainability-focused working group made up of Cloudflare employees who are passionate about the environment and addressing the climate crisis.
Judeoflare
We provide a forum for the Jewish people of Cloudflare where we support each other and celebrate our shared heritage.
Latinflare
The mission of Latinflare is to help create a more diverse workplace, create a sense of community + belonging for Latinx employees, and connect with the communities where we work.
Mindflare
We provide the Cloudflare community resources around mental health, as well as increase awareness and destigmatize mental health more broadly throughout our communities.
Nativeflare
With a shared goal of education, we recognize the heritage and cultural presence of Native American employees at Cloudflare and illuminate the historical impact of policies and racism that continue to fuel prejudice and injustice, even to this day.
Proudflare
Our mission is to Educate and Celebrate, Globally! We find ways to support and provide resources for the LGBTQIA+ community and make sure that the Cloudflare community is a welcoming, inclusive place for all.
Soberflare
Ensure the Cloudflare community is welcoming and inclusive to those abstaining from alcohol and/or drug use by increasing awareness and destigmatizing the decision to choose sobriety.
Vetflare
We encourage the recruitment and retention of veterans of military service from any military around the world. We also provide a supportive environment and community space for those who have served to network.
Women in Engineering
Our mission is supporting women’s professional development and success within Cloudflare.
Women in Sales
Our mission is to provide community experience and resources to help women in our sales organization to grow professionally and support each other collectively.
Womenflare
Womenflare’s mission is to create a community where all who identify as women feel supported and represented at Cloudflare.
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