The fabled 14 Leadership Principles formulated by Amazon executives are dissected and explained in detail by two former insiders. See if these management tenets are what you need to get ahead and into the boardroom.
After being reported on in an ad-hoc basis of the years, long-time Amazon insiders Colin Bryar and Bill Carr finally share the stories that led to the adoption of Amazon's Leadership Principles (known colloquially as 'LPs' within the company and we'll refer likewise to them here). There've been countless blogs, articles and even videos that attempt to de-mystify the LPs but these have always been on the outside and mis-guided due to critique bias or just lack of context. When news of this book came out, we jumped on the opportunity to review it.
We weren't disappointed.
The duo's book explains it matter-of-factly from the how it all began. The LPs stem from the massive growth that Amazon experienced in the early 2000s. Jeff Bezos, while clearly one of the business world's geniuses and revolutionary thinkers, clearly knew he couldn't oversee every single aspect of running Amazon. From this insight came the need to align the company on the drivers for success and to ensure they were diligently practised and improved on by the organisation. Many came from his own thinking and were adopted and refined by senior management as Amazon grew.
Some of the LPs are already 'givens' in today's consumer-centric world and espoused by many of Amazon's competitors: like customer-centricity. But Amazon goes deeper with it into all levels of the company with it's 'customer-obsession' principle. Others are game-changers that will shock many companies to the core (if they haven't already), including the belief that leaders should be ruthlessly humble. Bryar and Carr also take great pains to illustrate how these LPs were put into practised and refined, leading them to where they are today - business tenets that companies can also adopt. Along the way you'll realize how intuitive these LPs are and wonder how your C-suites can benefit from it it.
'Working Backwards' consists of two parts. In part one, it breaks down each of the main LPs into real-life situations or case-studies in its own chapter, to show how Amazon benefitted from these being put into action. In the actual 'working backwards' chapter for example, the Kindle launch is dissected from the actual conception of the product as Amazon's first device offering to it's launch in market. In the 'hire and develop the best' chapter, Amazon's incredible growth surge caused issues in employee retention, specifically in the 'right' employee. The introduction of the Bar Raiser solution makes for a fascinating read into how this evolved. The Bar Raiser has been talked about more often today in public than any LP but it the book gives context into how it evolved and why it's necessary (according to Amazon) when recruiting new talent.
Part Two devotes specific air time to Amazon's pillar products and how the LPs worked together to make their launches pivotal in the company's growth. The Amazon Prime Video chapter is another page-turner. Seen through Carr's perspective, it charts early mis-steps and the company's subsequent journey as a streaming juggernaut in its own right. The Kindle chapter, the genesis of the device's launched is prefaced with an amazing anecdote involving Bryar, Bezos and another Amazon executive visiting Steve Jobs to get a first-hand look at the pending iTunes application. This meeting showed them the potential that the Kindle had to shake up the book publishing world.
Bryar and Carr present their stories in a simple, straight-forward manner. What we love about 'Working Backwards' is its immediate benefit of being able to take the book's principles and start sharing it with others. Looking to develop a completely new product? Read the chapter on the 'working backwards' LP and give it a try.
New CEO Andy Jassy and the senior team have since added two more principles since this book came out. There'll likely be more as time goes by but we think this book still merits reading by any business leader or manager at some stage. TBR does not have an annual list of best books (yet) but we have a trailing 12-month index of the best that we keep within our editorial conversations. 'Working Backwards' keeps topping the list each time we revisit it.
Summary
Readability: 9/10
Relevance: 9/10
Applicability: 10/10