The Three Things That Keep Culture Alive

April 20, 2026

Welcome to another beautiful week. When an idea sparks that I think is worth sharing, it becomes this weekly newsletter. If something hits home, write back. I love conversations. This is Weekly Spark #47.

In March 2020, the world stopped. For Airbnb, it didn't just stop. It collapsed.

Overnight, 80% of bookings were cancelled. Billions in revenue evaporated. The IPO they had spent years building toward looked impossible. Brian Chesky, the co-founder and CEO, was staring at a company that could cease to exist.

Most leaders in that moment would have gone into survival mode. Cut fast.

Communicate little. Protect the numbers.

Chesky did something different.

He got ‘present’.

Not to the spreadsheet. Not to the board. Not to the headlines.

To his people. To what Airbnb actually was at its core. To the kind of leader he had committed to being long before the crisis arrived.

He laid off 1,900 employees. But the way he did it became a masterclass in leadership.

Every person received a personal note. Airbnb built an alumni talent directory and shared it publicly so other companies could hire them. They extended healthcare.

They let people keep their laptops.

And then he wrote a letter. Not drafted by a PR team. Written by a human being who was fully present to the weight of what he was doing.

That letter spread across the internet. Not because it was clever. Because it was real.

Eight months later, Airbnb went public. In the middle of a global pandemic that had destroyed the travel industry, they listed at a valuation higher than their pre-COVID peak.

Culture didn't break. It held.

And it held because of three things that Chesky had, whether he named them or not.

The Framework I Keep Coming Back To

After years of coaching founders, leadership teams and organisations, I have noticed a pattern.

The startups that scale without losing themselves, the ones where culture compounds instead of cracks, are not the ones with the best strategy decks or the most sophisticated org charts.

They are the ones where three things are alive simultaneously.

Awareness. Commitment. Connection.

Today, we will talk just about Awareness.

Awareness is The Super Skill

Awareness is being fully present to the moment in front of you.

Not the meeting you just left. Not the one coming after. Not the Slack notification pulling at your peripheral vision.

This conversation. This decision. This person.

When Chesky wrote that letter, he wasn't thinking about optics. He was present to the human cost of what was happening. That presence is what made it land.

As a founder, your most expensive moments are the ones where you are physically in the room but mentally somewhere else. A board presentation where you are performing instead of communicating. A one-on-one where you are solving instead of listening. A hiring decision made on autopilot.

Awareness is not a soft skill. It is a leadership superpower.

When it is present, you catch things early. You read the room. You say the right thing at the right time not because you planned it, but because you were paying attention.

To build understanding of the other two circles -

1. Commitment is doing great work because that is who you are. Not because the board is watching. Not because the press might cover it. Not because your investors will notice.

2. Connection is infinite respect and unconditional trust. Connection is not team-building activities or Friday drinks. It is the quality of the relationship between people. Infinite respect for each other as human beings. Unconditional trust that grows, not assumed, but earned, in every interaction.

Where The Magic Lives

Look at the diagram again.

Where Awareness meets Commitment, you get Growth. People who are present and dedicated keep getting better.

Where Awareness meets Connection, you get Collaboration. People who are truly paying attention to each other create something neither could alone.

Where Commitment meets Connection, you get Accountability. Not the fear-based kind. The kind where people hold each other to a high standard because they genuinely care.

And at the centre… where all three are alive at once?

That is where culture stops being a slide in your deck and starts being something your people feel every day.

That is where organisations scale without losing themselves.

That is where leadership stops being a title and becomes a way of being.

That is what Brian Chesky had in his worst moment. And it is what took Airbnb public against every odd.

The Question For You This Week

As a founder or leader, look honestly at your team right now.

Which of the three is strongest? Which one is quietly missing?

Because the one that is missing is where your culture will crack first.

This framework is something I will be coming back to in the weeks ahead. But if you want to explore what it looks like inside your team right now, you know what to do.

Just reply.

With focus and love, 

Utkarsh