If there's one person who is highly knowledgeable about corporate cultures, it is INSEAD-professor Erin Meyer. She took the stage at Amsterdam Business Forum, the IMPACT edition. Drawing from her global experiences and Netflix's unique ethos, Erin shared transformative insights on culture change.
Here are 3 tips:
Don't define your culture in absolute positives like respect (no company wants to be all about disrespect, right?) or integrity (have you ever come across an organization that said: ‘In this company, we are all about corruption’?)
Core values are only truly powerful when they focus on the tough dilemmas that are impacting your employees on an ongoing basis. So, choose core values that provide clear guidance in addressing real dilemmas: when faced with this dilemma in this organization, we go right (or left, if you will).
Employee freedom breeds innovation. While process kills organizational flexibility. So, ditch your guidebook if you want to build a culture that top-tier talent clamors for. Netflix makes a simple request to its employees: ‘Act in the best interest of our organization.’ Don't hesitate to learn from their approach.
Do you want the very best team? Then you should let go of ‘Fritz’, the mediocre employee. Erin calls this 'the rockstar principle': every team performs as well as its worst employee. How do you know who Fritz is? By taking the Keeper Test. We’ll explain how that works in this blog.
Erin Meyer is a professor at INSEAD, one of the leading international business schools.
She is author of two bestselling and award winning books:
- The Culture Map (2014) - Breaking Through the Invisible Boundaries of Global Business
- No Rules Rules (2020) - Netflix and the Culture of Reinvention (with Reed Hastings, founder of Netflix).