

The first critical business practice that Hastings established at Netflix was to have only top employees. We’ll explore each practice in detail in this guide. In No Rules Rules, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings details his logic in cultivating the company’s culture, while co-author and business professor Erin Meyer provides context for how these unusual business practices shaped the company’s success. These practices have created a company culture that focuses on empowering employees to innovate and take accountability, rather than conditioning them to simply follow protocol. Eliminate controls, such as allotted vacation time and approval processes.Promote candor through constant feedback at all levels.Hire and keep the best employees-at any cost.

The keys to Netflix’s success have been unconventional business practices: To achieve this level of success, Netflix had to adapt and thrive in a rapidly changing industry. The company experienced a boom at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, gaining more than 36 million subscribers in 2020 as a result of lockdowns around the world.)

(Shortform note: Netflix had 167 million subscribers at the time of the book’s publication, but that number has since grown to over 200 million. Today, Netflix produces award-winning content, has more than 200 million subscribers across 190 countries, and is consistently listed among the best places to work. When Netflix launched in 1997, the company was essentially a mail-order version of Blockbuster, the video rental store that dominated the home entertainment industry at the time. 1-Page Summary 1-Page Book Summary of No Rules Rules
