BOOK REVIEW: NO RULES RULE
No Rules Rules book is written by Reed Hastings who is Netflix Co- founder and CEO and Erin Meyer. I read this book in almost twenty two hours not continuous. This book is about Netflix and the culture of reinvention, while buying the book I thought the book will be on a life of having no rules and some suggestions on someone’s life but it is not on someone’s life. It is about Netflix. It is about the culture of Netflix. It is about so many lives’ working for Netflix who grew it and made it one of the top companies. The book is written in very easy language; every detail is highly researched and presented well. It is one of the best books recommended for the leaders who want to build efficient team for great organization. The theme of the book is culture of freedom and responsibility and it is defined with talent density, candour and removing controls.
Reed tells that Blockbuster’s story is not an anomaly. The majority of industries fail when they shift. Kodak failed to adapt from paper photos to digital. Nokia failed to adapt from flip phones to smart phones. Policies and control processes became so foundational to some work that those who were great at colouring within the lines were promoted while many creative mavericks felt stifled and went to some work elsewhere. Reed felt sorry to see them go, but he believed that this was what happens when a company grows up.
Then two things occurred. The first is that Reed’s team failed to innovate at Pure Software. They had become increasingly efficient and decreasingly creative. In order to grow they had to purchase other companies that did have innovative products. That led to more business complexity which intern led to more rules and process.
With Reed’s next company, Netflix, he hoped to promote flexibility, employee freedom and innovation, instead of error prevention and rule adherence. At the same time, he understood that as a company grows, if you do not manage it with policies or control process, the organization is likely to descend into chaos.
If you give employees more freedom instead of developing processes to prevent them from exercising their own judgement, they will make better decision and it is easier to hold them accountable. This also makes for a happier, more motivated workforce as well as a more nimble company. But to develop a foundation that enables this level of freedom you need to first increase talent density and candour but reduce controls.
Reed Hastings is an American businessman. He is the Co- founder and executive chairman of Netflix. He is former member of the California State Board of Education. He founded his first company in 1991 Pure software which produced products to troubleshoot software. In 1997 Hastings and former Pure Software employee Marc Randolph co- founded Netflix.
Erin Meyer is an American author and professor at Instead Business School in Paris. She is famous for her book, The Culture Map: Breaking Through The Invisible Boundaries of Global Business.
Comments
Post a Comment
If you have any doubt, please let me know.