Would the Netflix System of Management Work for You?

Would the Netflix System of Management Work for You?

Change is Good? We are all dealing with so much change these days. I saw a T-shirt recently that read: “2020. Directed by Quentin Tarantino.” Can’t we all relate? If we look at the reality of our streaming habits these days, Netflix is the clear winner for most of us, but are you willing to adopt and change to some of Netflix CEO’s, Reed Hastings’, more controversial management techniques?

Hiring and Retention: According to Harvard Business Review’s look at the company, they believe that: “the best thing you can do for employees — a perk better than foosball or free sushi — is hire only “A” players to work alongside them. Excellent colleagues trump everything else.”

Fire the Worst: Netflix also has a policy of making sure leaders don’t hang on to people who are not “A” players, using the test of “would you fight to keep this person.” If the answer is no, they show them the door. They do try to be fair to the leavers, however, realizing that: “If we wanted only “A” players on our team, we had to be willing to let go of people whose skills no longer fit, no matter how valuable their contributions had once been. Out of fairness to such people-and, frankly, to help us overcome our discomfort with discharging them-we learned to offer rich severance packages.”

And Skip Performance Reviews? The company decided that performance reviews and plans were a waste of time so instead, they instituted a continual process of 360 feedback, asking “managers and employees to have conversations about performance as an organic part of their work.”

What Should You Do?

Use What Would Work:  Developers and engineers who work at Netflix may be a very different group than you are leading. Indeed, even that company acknowledges they need a different system for warehouse workers. Your environment might also not be conducive to some of their techniques but just thinking about doing things differently may be useful.

Use Caution With 360s:  While I don’t advocate never using 360 reviews, I do believe that training managers to give skillful feedback can be challenging. Your problems are increased if you want to use peers for the same process. It can be difficult to weed out comments that may be inserted because of personality conflicts, competition or outright sabotage. Indeed, all that advice needs to be delivered in a way that the receiver can hear and integrate.

Abandon Performance Reviews and PIPs?  This can be useful if leaders actually give real-time, regular feedback. In my experience, however, they may avoid doing so because they do not like conflict or they are too busy. At least with a more structured performance management system, staff receives feedback at regular intervals, rather than not at all.

Hire and Keep Only ‘A’s?  Wouldn’t we all like to do that? Unfortunately, if you are managing a sector with a lot of competition for talent, that may not be possible.

For more innovative management ideas, go to Workplaces That Work.

What Do You Think?

We cover these and many more innovative leadership and management ideas in our workshops – live or virtual. Contact us at: 303-216-1020 or Lynne@workplacesthatwork.com