⫹⫺ The Smell Of The Place
CMMN WLTH 109 - Cheat Codes for Creators, Makers & Doers
Hello my friends,
Sharing one of my all-time favorite speeches this week.
A close friend and colleague introduced me to Prof. Ghoshal’s “The Smell Of The Place” while we were setting up a new team together and it remains one that I regularly go back to.
Culture is downstream of the context you create for the team.
Shoot me a reply if it resonates,
— Andy
In this week’s email:
Product - Successful companies can be design-led.
People - Create a positive culture by changing the context.
Process - Spend your time doing the things you want to do.
Out of Office - Air conditioning moves markets.
*Product
A Design Led Company by Brian Chesky
“You can tell the health of an organization by the relationship between design and product marketing”
Brian Chesky is the only CEO in the S&P 500 who trained as a designer.
Airbnb avoids A-B testing. Instead, designers and PMs start with a hypothesis and only ship things that you’re proud of.
You can’t create products unless you know how to talk about products. Storytelling is as important as the idea.
*People
The Smell of the Place by Prof. Sumantra Ghoshal
“I genuinely challenge you to go to the forest of Fontainebleau in spring […] There is something about the smell of the trees in spring. You want to jump, you want to jog, you want to catch a branch, to run, do something.”
The "smell of the place" metaphor describes the context of workplace culture.
Executives need to empower mid-level managers to foster collaboration, encourage innovation, promote transparency, and empower employees.
There are four attributes that characterize rigid and inflexible cultures: constraint, compliance, contract, and control. These are norms that managers create that shape the behaviors of people.
*Process
Time Management by Anne-Laure Le Cunff
“What is urgent is often different from what is truly important. Short-term and long-term goals do not always align. What’s expected from you and what you actually want to do are not always the same.”
Add everything to your calendar including blocks of focus time used to research and think.
Get enough sleep and avoid multitasking will significantly help attention and improve focus. Remove distractions not just by turning off notifications but by putting your phone in another room.
Time management is as much managing your time as it is managing your energy.
*Out of Office
Air conditioning is the key to economic prosperity.
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airconditioning is the by-product of economic prosperity...