If a company changes its strategy, the culture can be too strong. You can see that a lot where established hardware companies struggle to adopt more of a software culture. A culture can be too weak to support the company strategy in any meaningful way. That is a competitive disadvantage because there is a lot more need for communication and coordination.
No disagreement on the long term planning aspect though.
Relatively useful:
“All you need is access to capital, or a lot of stuff that can only be done with capital, and that’s what you’re missing, girl.”
Not useful at all:
“What you really need is this cargo-cult aspect that the successful companies have years after their success, but also tons of failed companies have that we never consider, and it isn’t the main reason for the company’s success”
It's also very interesting because quite a few of the "visionary companies" have failed in the 30 years since it was written.
For example, Walgreens sold off their lucrative restaurant business and put all new stores in extremely high traffic areas and became the seller of not only prescriptions, but random things people need, but don't want to go to Walmart for. It paid off nicely, but it was extremely controversial at the time. They also didn't freak out when internet dotcom companies (set to take over the industry) popped up as they knew those competitors were missing the entire supply chain. Instead they took their time and automated things better to make customers happy in a different way like automated phone ordering. Was all of that genius, or luck. Maybe a bit of both. The same story with Barnes & Nobel and Amazon doesn't turn out so well.
Microsoft is a great example of a company which had...
a) many cultural shifts over time
b) still is a company with many different sub team cultures
...and regardless of where they were on the spectrum they have always managed to sell Windows, Office and SQL Server very well.
1. Marketing to the 'cool kids' with the expectation that everyone else will follow-along... is probably not good advice in the absence some key differentiation. For Microsoft, this could have just been the massive amounts of capital they could deploy towards getting the Xbox to market. Even then, just spending money is not a strategy.
2. Middle-aged IT people are likely to have more disposable income to afford a $X00 device and a library of games (where the real revenue is). They could also be thought to have less leisure time and place more value on it accordingly, which would correspond to spending decisions. They may also see themselves as 'skateboarders with tattoos.' There's nothing demographic specific about those properties.
This is not as relevant as many think...
Good sales people know that..
- it's hard to sell expensive items to anyone, let alone middle aged people who have many other things to pay for
- the best people to convince a middle age person to purchase something are their children
- it's infinitely easier to convince children that they need something
... which is why so many industries focus on selling it to the cool kids. Once the cool kids have something then the other kids want it. When kids want something they will get on parent's nerves until they eventually get it, unless the parents truly can'f afford it.
It was neat when I overheard the oldest coaching her sisters on how to plead in a cute tone.
But I have no qualms saying no most of the time. Immunity did take time to develop.
Today they gave their best pleading voice for chickens. All while holding baby chicks. Super cute.
Also, relatively expensive luxuries (such as video game consoles) do not need to be marketed toward people who have a lot of money. They just need an emotional appeal to the people who will want them -- then those people will either direct a larger percentage of their income toward those items or they'll motivate their parents/grand parents to buy them for them.
Lastly, even if a console costs $500, many poor people consider them a very cheap form of entertainment in the long run because that $500 console will last for several years where as a trip to the movies is very expensive since it only lasts a few hours.
Of course it’s entirely possible that you’re right and I’m just bitter that I can’t spend more time gaming :)
MS lost a decade because of stack ranking under Ballmer. Dropping that has allowed them to get back to being more competitive with Google and Apple.
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/business/2012/08/microsoft-l...
You're missing the point! One can't say what are the cultural elements of "great". All you can do is tradeoff one element for another. What defines a great company culture is one that is held consistently, and that you, personally, as a person with your own particular outlook (let's call it red or blue), enjoy and are productive in. What's great for you is not what's great for another.
Too bad we can't understand this in our politics.
> Reinforcing that "whatever the cultural values might be they have to be strongly endorsed by the leadership" can be part of that, but that's describing something other than the "great culture" itself.
Necessarily so! You cannot define "great" culture because there is no such single thing. You can define consistency, though. This is the critical element because it means that you can predict the repercussions of your actions and act accordingly. Rewards and punishments don't feel capricious and subject to "politics". You don't have to guess what your particular manager will do based on his particular and inconsistent whims.
> Too bad we can't understand this in our politics
Unless you have a very good reason to not get a vaccine and not wear a mask I will expect from you to do these things. Not because I don't understand what's not great for you. It's because I understand the objective reality of the disease.
Instead things become frictionless and the organization can become fluid.
The author is pointing out that a necessary ingredient (among others omitted) is strong culture--which is something of a tautology. Of course a company with great culture has a strong culture; if it were a weak culture, it wouldn't be pervasive or definitive of the company. A company with weakly held cultures wouldn't be described as a "company with great culture". At best it would be described as a "company with great team cultures", at worst a "company without culture". But none of these three statements hold any inherent truth about how productive the company might be, how happy people might be working at said companies, the values of the people working for these companies, or how the collective values of the employees impact the company.
The author is also looking at two companies that have been around for 15+ years. Where is the evaluation of all the companies with similar leadership values to Amazon and Facebook that didn't survive? Was their strong culture an aid or a hindrance? Did they fail despite their strong culture or because of it? Where is the evaluation of companies with similar success and longevity that don't have top-down cultural values? Can we say definitively that they don't have great culture?
I appreciate that the author has a lot of respect for and values the culture of previous employers, but when asking the question "What defines a great company culture?", I would hope for a more substantive answer. Reinforcing that "whatever the cultural values might be they have to be strongly endorsed by the leadership" can be part of that, but that's describing something other than the "great culture" itself.