Even more important, I saw that they were premised on false assumptions about human beings: that most people must be incentivized in order to really throw themselves into their work, and that they need to be told what to do. (Location 120)

A company’s job isn’t to empower people; it’s to remind people that they walk in the door with power and to create the conditions for them to exercise it. (Location 127)

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. (Location 133)

Tags: leadership

The most important thing to understand about transforming a culture, whether that of a team or a whole company, is that it isn’t a matter of simply professing a set of values and operating principles. It’s a matter of identifying the behaviors that you would like to see become consistent practices and then instilling the discipline of actually doing them. (Location 144)

Great teams are made when every single member knows where they’re going and will do anything to get there. 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. (Location 179)

Tags: culture

Great teams are made when things are hard. Great teams are made when you have to dig deep. When I’m hiring, I look for someone who gets really excited about the problems we have to solve. You want them to wake up in the morning thinking, God, this is hard. (Location 192)

Tags: teambuilding

Neil Blumenthal and Dave Gilboa, cofounders of Warby Parker, told me that it’s especially fun building the company now because it’s getting really complicated as they launch brick-and-mortar stores. (Location 196)

Note: Complicated = fun haha

because of the “hunger to climb a mountain.” He said, “I feel sometimes like I’m going to lose a limb doing this, but it will be worth it because I’m doing something important and adding something to the world, and that is what drives people.” (Location 208)