Hey readers, I'm trying out something new! Every month, I'll post three types of culture inspiration: a visual, a book, and an article to bookmark.
Visual: 6 Things to Do When Your Team Grows to 60 People
Organizational Design Consultancy NOBL Collective has illustrated a delightful chart to help organizations with the growing pains that occur once you've hit 60 people. With fewer than 60 people, it's easier to manage the business and culture by gut feeling. With more than 60 people, it's time to institutionalize some of the intangible norms you've set. Below is what you need to pay attention to. I just love diagrams like this, don't you? I always want to print them out and pin them above my desk.
Find this and more at nobl.io
Book: Superbosses: How Exceptional Leaders Master the Flow of Talent by Sydney Finkelstein
What do Alice Waters, Jon Stewart, Ralph Lauren, Miles Davis, Oprah Winfrey, and Lorne Michaels have in common? They are "talent spawners." They are leaders who not only get their employees and followers to achieve great things, but they inspire their employees and followers to go on to become great leaders themselves.
Think about the careers Jon Stewart launched: Steven Colbert, Steve Carell, John Oliver, Ed Helms, Jessica Williams, Samantha Bee, and Rob Corddry, just to name a few. Alice Waters did the same thing in the restaurant world. "When I first learned about Alice Waters," Finkelstein writes, "I was fascinated that a single person could foster such a disproportionate share of top talent." A superboss is a leader who helps other people accomplish more than they ever thought possible. And not every superboss leads in the same style. Finkelstein defines three types, who all operate in different ways: iconoclasts, nurturers, and glorious bastards.
What are their secrets? HBR reports, "They are unusually intense and passionate—eating, sleeping, and breathing their businesses and inspiring others to do the same. They create impossibly high work standards that push protégés to their limits. They are geniuses at motivation, inspiring people to do more than they ever thought possible. Remarkably, they can be intimately involved in the detailed work their people are doing, while at the same time lavish responsibility on inexperienced protégés, taking risks with them that seem foolish to outsiders."
Read the book to learn more secrets! It's a fascinating read, regardless of your industry or job.
Article to Bookmark: The 26 Most Popular People and Culture Articles of 2016
Damon Klotz is Culture Amp's Head of Community Extraordinaire (I added that last word- but it's true). I follow him on LinkedIn, and you should too! Damon helps curate Culture Amp's weekly "People Geekly" newsletter, which is full of helpful culture and people analytics news.
Damon combed through the past weekly issues of the People Geekly from 2016 and pulled out the most popular articles. I'm a total sucker for "best of" lists, so I found this to be a fun way to share the articles that readers found most useful. I have bookmarked this list for future reference. There are so many goodies in this list, including one I wrote for the Future of Work Platform: Career Planning in a Flat Org: How Spotify and Google Keep People Engaged.