Book Notes - No Rules Rules

As soon as I saw the title, I knew this is a book I had to read.

NO RULES RULES

NETFLIX and the Culture of Reinvention

REED HASTINGS

ERIN MEYER

There are 10 chapters which cover the creative workplace culture of Netflix - the highly succesful streaming and film production company.

After having worked in various levels of progressive workplace culture at small and large companies, this book really connected the dots for me.

Here are my notes transferred from my Remarkable tablet (which I’ve fallen in love with)

Your number one goal as leader is to develop a work environment consisting of stunning colleagues
Stunning colleagues accomplish significant amounts of important work and are exceptionally creative and passionate
Jerks, slackers and sweet people with non stellar performance or pessimists on the team will bring down the performance of everyone

With candour, high performers will become outstanding performers . Frequent candid feedback exponentially magnifies the speed and effectiveness of your work force
Set the stage for candour by building feedback moments into your regular meetings
Coach your employees to give and receive feedback effectively following the 4A guidelines (live) (Give) )
- Aim to Assist (Giving)
- Actionable (Giving)
- Appreciate (Receiving)
- Accept or Discard (Receiving)
As a leader solicit feedback regularly and respond with belonging cues when you receive
Get rid of jerks as you instill a culture of candour

If you aren’t tracking worked in a day, what is the point tracking days per year?
Leaders must model big-vacation taking to set example and precedent to guide employee behaviour
Explain there is no need to ask for prior approval and no one is expected to keep track of days away from the office
Up to employee to take few hours, days, a week, a month off.
Communicate to provide context

Remove, and encourage managers to set context about how to spend money up front, and check expenses at the back end. If people overspend, set more context
No expense controls mean finance departments must audit annually
Fire people that abuse the system but speak about the abuse opening so everyone knows repercussions
Costs from overspending aren’t nearly as high as the gains that freedom provides because employees are able to make quick decisions to spend money to help the business.
When you tell people you trust them, they will show you how trustworthy they are

The methods used by most companies to compensate employees are not ideal for a creative high- talent density workforce
Divide your workforce ‘into creative and operational. and pay creative workers top of market. This might mean hiring one exceptional instead of 10 adequate people
Don’t pay performance-related bonuses and put into salary instead
Teach employees to build their own networks and to invest time getting to know their own - and their teams’ - market value on an on- going bases Adjust salaries accordingly

A culture of transparency: No closed offices or assistants as guards
Open up books to employees and show how to read Pth accounts. Share sensitive financials
Desicions the might affect workforce well-being be opened up early. May cause anxiety but will create trust (which is more valuable)
If the transparency is at loggerheads with an individual’s privacy - of info is from a work circumstance, be candid but if not, say it’s not your place to share
If you’ve shown yourself to be competent, be open about your own mistakes to increase trust, goodwill, innovation

In a fast, innovative company ownership of big - ticket decision should be dispersed across workforce at different levels, not according hierarchical status.
Netflix mantra and the book’s main jacket quote: “Don’t seek to please your boss”
When employees join company, tell them they have a handful of metaphorical chips to make bets with. A workers performance is judged on collective outcome of these bets
To help good bets encourage staff to farm for dissent socialize the idea and test out the big bets. Teach that if a bet fails it should be ‘sunshined’ openly sharing learnings etc

Encourage managers to be tough on performance by asking which of my people, if they told me they were leaving for a similar role, would I fight to keep?’
Avoid stack-ranking as they create internal competition. and discourage collaboration
‘Family’ metaphor for workforce isn’t as good as ‘Professional Sports Team’ Teach to instill feelings of . commitment, cohesion , camaraderie
When you realize you need to let someone go, a personal improvement plan is humiliating and costly. Instead use money for a generous severance
Employees may have fear that their job is on the line, so employees should ask their manager to ask ‘If I was thinking of leaving, how hard would you work to change my mind’
When an employee is let go, Speak openly and answer questions candidly. This will diminish their fear of being next and increase trust

A thorough live 360/ feedback session every 6- 12 months ensures clear feedback
Performance reviews aren’t the best mechanism as can be one -sided and limited to just one person (employee boys
A 360 written report is good for annual feedback but don’t link to promotions
Use 4A feeback guidelines for live 360 dinners and start, stop, continue method with roughly 25% positive, 75% development with an actionable (no fluff)

The overall goal should be innovation (not error prevention) and operate in a loosely coupled System
To lead with context, you need a high talent density. After this get in lockstep alignment by providing and debating context to enable sound decision - making
If a poor decision has been made, don’t blame. Ask what context you failed to communicate.
Is everyone highly aligned on vision and objectives ?
A loosely coupled organisation should resemble a tree rather than a pyramid. The boss is at the roots, holding up the trunk of senior managers who support the outer branches where decisions are made.
These policies, Reed argues do not work for Netflix/a creative engineering culture.
- Vacation Policies
- Decision- Making approvals
- Expense Policies
- Performance Improvement Glans
- Approval Processes
- Raise Pools
- Key Performance Indicators
- Management by Objective
- Travel Policies
- Decision - Making by Committee
- Contract Sign offs
- ay- Grades
- Pay- per performance Bonuses

Map out corporate culture and compare to the culture you are expanding into
In less direct countries, implement more formal feedback mechanisms.
Encourage adaptability. Discuss openly what candour means in different parts of world. Work together to adapt