Lessons from Patty McCord

Patty McCord, the former Chief Talent Officer at Netflix and co-author of the renowned Netflix Culture Deck, is celebrated for her revolutionary approach to HR and company culture. Her philosophy, detailed in her book "Powerful: Building a Culture of Freedom and Responsibility" and various interviews, champions a workplace built on trust, transparency, and a focus on high performance.

On Building Great Teams

"Great teams are not created with incentives, procedures, and perks. They are created by hiring talented people who are adults and want nothing more than to tackle a challenge, and then communicating to them, clearly and continuously, about what the challenge is." [1][2]
"Excellent colleagues, a clear purpose, and well-understood deliverables: that's the powerful combination." [2][3]
"The best thing you can do for employees is hire only high performers to work alongside them." [4] This realization came after a round of layoffs at Netflix, where the remaining high-performers thrived in the new environment.
"You're a team, not a family." [3][5] This distinction is crucial for making necessary personnel changes that benefit the team's overall performance.
"Retention is not a good measure of team-building success; having a great person in every single position on the team is the best measure." [1][6]
"A business leader's job is to create great teams that do amazing work on time. That's it. That's the job of management." [2]
"Great teams are made when every single member knows where they're going and will do anything to get there." [5]
"More people will not necessarily do more work or better work; it's often better to have fewer people with more skills who are all high performers." [4]
"Successful sports teams are the best model for managers; they are constantly scouting for new talent and culling their current roster." [4]
"Great teams relish a challenge." [5]

On Freedom and Responsibility

"We saw that we could treat people like adults and that they loved it.” [6] This principle underpins the culture of freedom and responsibility.
"People have power; don't take it away." [7][8] McCord argues against the idea of "empowering" employees, stating that they already have power and companies should focus on not taking it away with restrictive policies.
"Trusting people to be responsible with their time was one of the early steps in giving them back their power.” [1] This was exemplified by Netflix's famous "no vacation policy" policy.
"If you hire good people, and communicate your real needs with them, they will help you overcome them and grow." [3]
"The more time managers spend communicating and elaborating and being transparent about the job to be done...the less important policies, approvals, and incentives are." [3]
"We wanted people to be able to do the right thing with plenty of context and make the right calls because they were smart people with good judgment." [9]
"We coupled freedom [with] responsibility. It [also] implies reliability and deliverables." [9]
"The boldest thing I ever did...was mostly around just stopping doing things that didn't matter." [10]
"If we can teach everybody in the company how to read a profit and loss statement...if we can teach them what the different teams do and what they're setting out to accomplish," they will be better equipped to make good decisions. [11]
"Don't let hiring become a numbers game." [5]

On Radical Honesty and Communication

"Humans hate being lied to and being spun." [6][7] This is the core of the argument for "radical honesty."
"Part of being an adult is being able to hear the truth. And the corollary is that you owe the adults you hire the truth." [1][6]
"If you want to know what people are thinking, there is no good replacement for simply asking them, best of all face to face." [3]
"Feedback should be direct, not anonymous." [3] McCord believes that truthful people will be truthful in all their interactions, and anonymity is not necessary.
"Being transparent and telling people what they need to hear is the only way to ensure they both trust and understand you." [6]
"If you don't tell your people about how the business is doing and the problems being confronted—good, bad, and ugly—then they will get that information somewhere else, and it will often be misinformation." [1]
"Cynicism is a cancer. It creates a metastasizing discontent that feeds on itself, leading to smarminess and fueling backstabbing." [2] Transparency helps to combat this.
"The job of communicating is never done." [1]
"Telling the truth about perceived problems, in a timely fashion and face to face, is the single most effective way to solve problems." [4][12]
"A workplace that practices radical honesty encourages transparency and openness in an environment where everyone feels secure, seen and appreciated so we can have productive problem solving.” [13]

On Performance and Growth

"The greatest motivation is contributing to success." [7]
"True and abiding happiness in work comes from being deeply engaged in solving a problem with talented people you know are also deeply engaged in solving it." [1][5]
"People should hear frequently about how well they're performing." [14] McCord is a vocal critic of the annual performance review, advocating for more frequent and informal feedback.
"If you're successful your company will change." [15] This means that the skills and people you need will also change over time.
"It's even more difficult to let people go who have done a great job. But it is necessary for the company and the people too." [6] This is to ensure the company has the right skills for its future needs.
"Be a great company to be from." [5][16] The goal shouldn't be to retain employees for life, but for them to have a great experience and move on to do other great things.
"Advice for all working people: Stay limber. Keep learning new skills. Consider new opportunities." [5]
"If you're 18 months in any job that's exactly the same as what they hired you to do you should probably not expect a lot in the future." [15]
"A business is about providing a service that makes a profit, it's not about making employees happy." [5] Happiness is a byproduct of meaningful work with great colleagues.
"My mantra is: problem finders are cheap." [2] The value is in solving problems.

On Challenging Traditional HR

"Don't waste your time fighting in the perks war." [3] Perks like free sushi are not what truly motivates high performers.
"You need a process for hiring, but it doesn't need to be bureaucratic." [17]
"Most companies are clinging to the established command-and-control system of top-down decision making but trying to jazz it up by fostering 'employee engagement' and by 'empowering' people." [1][2]
"We evolved a new way of working through incremental adaptation: trying new things, making mistakes, beginning again, and seeing good results." [1][3]
"When engineers start to whine about a process you're trying to implement, you want to really dig into what's bothering them, because they hate senseless bureaucracy and stupid process." [1]
"I had to convince my CFO that a severance agreement was better than a performance improvement plan." [15]
"There's a dangerous fallacy that data constitutes the facts you need to know to run your business." [1][2] Intuition and qualitative feedback are also critical.
"Don't assume that people are stupid. Assume instead that if they are doing stupid things, they are either uninformed or misinformed." [1][5]
"Truly understanding how the business works is the most valuable learning, more productive and appealing than employee development training." [5]
"Lead by example, especially when it's hard." [3] This is crucial for building a culture of trust and radical honesty.

Learn more:

Lessons from Patty McCord

On Building Great Teams

On Freedom and Responsibility

On Radical Honesty and Communication

On Performance and Growth

On Challenging Traditional HR

Written by Antoine Buteau

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