No Rules Rules tells the story of how Netflix’s creator, Reed Hastings, founded a business that questioned the status quo. As Netflix’s popularity increased, Hastings gave his workers more independence rather than imposing more laws. At Netflix, good performance is rewarded with a generous severance package, and hard work is overlooked. You don’t aspire to satisfy your boss at Netflix; instead, you exercise radical candor.

Dream Teams Consist of Stunning Colleagues
The authors argue your first priority should be to build a workplace that consists of stunning colleagues. A stunning colleague is creative, passionate, and productive. Once most of your team is built on stunning colleagues, you can safely call your team a dream team. As well as dream teams performing effectively, individual stunning colleagues will feel valued and satisfied when they are part of a dream team. As a result, the authors agree that an optimal environment for Netflix is one in which the team works together to accomplish ambitious shared goals.

How Netflix Builds Dream Teams
Furthermore, there are no guidelines on what is and is not suitable conversation with managers at Netflix. Instead, team members are free to discuss any subject with their superiors without fear of retaliation. Furthermore, they are free to make errors as long as they aim to change after doing so.

Hard work does not create successful dream teams. Instead, being effective is the secret to success. A stunning colleague is judged on their contributions to the team rather than how hard they work. When you find stunning colleagues who are also productive, you must reward them at the top of their market.

The Four As
The 4As are recommended by the writers as a way to boost your team’s feedback.

Aim to Assist: Your feedback should always have a positive purpose. Frustration or hatred should never be used as a justification for giving feedback. By being cautious with your words, you can still turn a typically negative statement into a constructive one.

Actionable: Always include a call to action in your feedback. It’s pointless to give feedback if there’s no way to act on it.

Appreciate: In addition to giving effective input, you must also learn how to embrace it. When offering feedback, instead of searching for an excuse, try to relax and appreciate that the feedback is coming from a positive place.

Accept or Discard: While you should embrace positive feedback, you will sometimes receive non-constructive feedback. Feedback that isn’t positive can be ignored.

Remove Controls
Employees are often exposed to a number of controls in the workplace. The authors argue, however, that Netflix’s growth has led to a reduction in the number of controls and rules in place as the business has expanded. Travel and cost approvals are one of the best safeguards you can eliminate. Set the context for spending money upfront and checking employee claims at the back end while withdrawing travel and expense policies. Set more context if people end up overspending. Encourage the finance department to perform routine audits of a portion of your receipts.

The Keeper Test
Netflix implemented a particular test after the dot-com bubble exploded, allowing them to assess which workers to retain in their team. They wanted to encourage leaders to ask themselves, “Which of my people would I fight hard to keep if they told me they were leaving for a similar job at another company?” ‘Do not waste money on some kind of PIP (Performance Improvement Plan) when you need to let someone go. Give this money to the employee in the form of a generous severance payment. Finally, when someone is shot, tell them the truth about what happened and honestly answer their questions.

Having a culture of freedom and responsibility seems to be working for Netflix. Maybe it will work for you as well ?