Pixar's work culture

Ed Catmull, President of Pixar, receives a Technical Academy Award. Below he speaks about leadership and managing Pixar's work culture (photo source: zimbio.com)

Following up on yesterday's post, here's more from Pixar president, Ed Catmull. In the video shown yesterday, Ed emphasized the importance of having a good team. In this interview, he elaborates further about what he means.

In case you can't watch the video, here is the essence of what he says and what Pixar strives to inculcate:

• Cultivate an air of open and honest communication: The basic work culture at Pixar is that movie production is a team effort. Everyone is needed and important, and everyone has the right to speak and be heard. Ed says that the Pixar team works constantly on keeping communication lines open. There is also a significant emphasis put on trusting each other. This comes from attracting high quality people, and maintaining a high level of open communication.
  

• Keep it egalitarian: Artists and engineers work together; one is in no way above the other. And it is management's job to emphasize this.

• Keep your eye on the ball: At Pixar, the bottomline is making a good movie. Everything else is a means to that end.

• Maintain your quality: Get the best people you know on board, as they will not only deliver a good product, but also bring in better talent.

• Trust the artists: Ed strongly believes that the creative people need to drive the innovation, not the technical people or management. Given this high level of trust, the creative workforce works hard to include everyone else in their decisionmaking, and deliver a high quality product

If you are further interested in Catmull's take on running successful companies, I would also recommend watching this lecture that he gave at the Stanford Graduate School of Business in 2007.

happiness vs success

photo source: https://jspivey.wikispaces.com/file/view/inequality_flyer.png

I came a quote by Bertrand Russell recently that really made me ponder:

"If there were in the world today any large number of people who desired their own happiness more than they desired the unhappiness of others, we could have paradise in a few years."

So true, and so sad. One of my old grad school professors had a theory that explained the cause of unhappiness, that was based on a series of surveys he had done. He believed that unhappiness came from inequality; that people felt most unhappy when there was great inequality in their community, particularly when they were lower down in society. Yet, given the chance and the choice, most of these same people chose to be on top thereby perpetuating the issue further.

My prof then ran the survey across a few campuses in Boston. His questions gauged how much people were willing to give up in order to create a sense of equality. Eg: if the company was doing well thanks to the surveyee's effort, would he/she take a salary cut so that everyone else could get a raise thereby closing the gap between the two groups?? He asked the question AFTER explaining his theory of happiness. He found that the Harvard students were the strongest propagators of inequality; MIT students on the other hand preferred equality. Can't say I'm too surprised. I've met and worked with both sides...not too surprisingly, the Harvard people get further ahead in the business world. BUT, in the world of personal relationships and happiness, I wonder if MIT alums rate higher... I actually think so based on the few I know; particularly from the business schools.

just something to think about...