Bharat Khandelwal
We Are Not a Family
Work like a Pro Sports Team — a guide to sustained success
Netflix Culture Deck, 2009
We're a team, not a family.
We're like a pro sports team,
not a kid's recreational team.
Organizations don't behave like families — and more importantly, they shouldn't. We are born into families and bound together with no choice. Teams are different: people self-select into them, bound by purpose, goals, rules, and incentives. This book draws on coaches and managers across sports who have sustained success over long periods, identifying the common themes that make teams work.
System×Squad×Stamina=Sustained Success
Table of Contents
4 components of sustained success.
1. System
1.1Develop Process Power
1.2Discipline and Detail
1.3Preparation and Patience
1.4Deliberate Practice
1.5Engage at the Gemba
1.6Anticipating the Unexpected
1.7Constraints into Creativity
1.8Aggregation of Marginal Gains
1.9Root Causes
1.10The System Outlives the Coach
2. Squad
2.1Not a Family
2.2The Players Nobody Saw
2.3Role of the Veteran
2.4Crowded Tables
2.5Building Under the Cap
2.6Cutting Well
2.7Aging, Dismantling, Rebuilding
3. Stamina
3.1The Capacity to Endure
3.2The Body as the Foundation
3.3The Mind Under Pressure
3.4The Discipline of Subtraction
3.5Effortless is a Myth
3.6When the Capacity Breaks
3.7The Long Career
4. Success
4.1The Race
4.2The Two Traps
4.3Infinite Games
4.4Memento Mori
4.5The Tatas
4.6Effortless Action