About us | Doist

The building blocks of our identity

We’re committed to building a company and culture with a lasting impact on the world.

Working without borders
From Jamaica to Poland, Taiwan to Australia, diversity is in Doist’s DNA. We believe the future of work transcends all kinds of borders.
Balancing ambition and wellbeing
Ambition without rest isn't sustainable. And working without ambition breeds complacency. Our team is proof you can have both.
Supporting our users’ goals
As Doist creates simple yet powerful tools, many people across the globe will thrive, both professionally and personally.
Thinking in decades, not in quarters
We opt for solutions that will get us where we want to be in the long-term. We’re running a marathon, not a sprint.

Our core values

They are few, but they are mighty. From creating processes to decision-making and recruiting, we build our five core values into nearly every single thing we do.

You aspire to put a dent in the universe. You set high standards for yourself and those around you. You solve issues that have a high impact on our customers and our company.

You care deeply about the quality of your work. You’re continuously learning and pushing yourself to the limits of your ability. As a champion of your craft, you are also a champion of your well-being – you work intensely, then disconnect completely.

Others can trust that you’ll deliver on time. You keep your word and trust your teammates to do the same. You are proactive, take ownership, and remain accountable with little or no direction.

Your communication is clear, concise, and engaging. You keep others in the loop and never go radio silent. You speak respectfully and foster warm relationships through your interactions. You’re culturally and socially aware and can appropriately navigate social situations.

How we work

Radical? Only for now. By using our core values to model our behavior, we show the world that a more empowering future of work is possible – and is already happening.

We embrace asynchronous teamwork

People have the space and trust to disconnect to focus on deep work. No one is expected to respond to messages immediately.

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We trust our teammates by default

Autonomy and transparency are more effective motivators than time tracking and micromanagement.

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We care about our team’s mental health

Adjusting to remote work can be hard. We respect that challenge and support people through the transition and throughout their remote career.

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We embed our values in our products

Design is never neutral. We build products that embody our values and respect our users’ time and attention.

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Giving back, globally

Part of being a remote company means being responsible citizens of the world. Every year we donate up to 2% of our revenue growth to support the vital work of internationally-minded organizations like:

Fast API
Software in the Public Interest
2021
Pallets Projects
2021
SQLAlchemy
2021
Python Software Foundation
2021
Electronic Frontier Foundation
2021
Girls Who Code
2021
The Ocean Cleanup
2019 - 2020
National Breast Cancer Foundation
2019 - 2020
NAACP
2019 - 2020
Amnesty International
2019 - 2020
Doctors without Borders
2019 - 2020
International Rescue Committee
2017 - 2018
Stop Hunger
2016
Doctors without Borders
2016
Malala Fund
2016
Heifer International
2016
Charity Water
2015
Software Freedom Conservancy
2013

Becoming Doist

In the beginning, there was no Doist. No company. No team. No bigger vision.

There was just a stressed out computer science student struggling to manage multiple jobs on top of a full course load. So he built a little app to keep track of it all which he imaginatively called Todoist.

It turns out, he wasn’t the only stressed out person in the world struggling to manage multiple responsibilities and yearning for some semblance of control over a busy life. The audience grew. The team grew. The vision grew. The bug reports and feature requests grew too. Somewhere along the line, all that energy to help stressed out people live calmer, more organized lives coalesced into a real company with a real mission. Today, Doist is a remote-first team of 93 people representing 41 nationalities in 39 countries and 75 cities.

Over the past 13 years, Todoist has grown from a personal side project to a market-leading Swiss Army Knife of life organization. Millions of people around the world rely on Todoist every day to keep track of everything – from the mundane logistics of being an adult to their most important professional goals.

In 2017, we launched a second product – a team communication app called Twist, designed for calmer, more organized, more transparent teamwork. Because, let’s face it, you can try to be as calm, organized, and in control as you want, but if your team communication is a raging hot mess you’ll still be stressed out, miserable, and incapable of reaching your full human potential.

The point is, a lot has changed, but our desire to create a lasting legacy has only deepened. We’re building the future that we want to work in. One where jobs are borderless (not to mention commute-less!). Where careers don’t have to come before families. Where people of all shapes, colors and sizes are trusted to work without distractions on things they care about. And where we can all unplug at the end of the day guilt-free with the peace-of-mind that our tasks and teamwork are accounted for.

Will it solve all the world’s problems? No. Will it make a whole lot of lives a whole lot better? We’ve been living in that future for over a decade so we speak from experience when we say “hell yes!”

We don’t know what Doist’s next decade will bring, but it won’t include selling out or getting acquired. We don’t have an exit strategy – we have a mission to simplify complexity, cultivate focus, and catalyze success for people all across the globe.

Becoming Doist