Ben Horowitz, a leading venture capitalist and combines lessons both from history and from modern organizational practice with practical and often surprising advice to help business leaders build cultures that can weather both good and bad times.
What I have taken away from this book is that culture is how a company makes decisions. It is the set of assumptions employees use to resolve everyday problems: should I stay at the Red Roof Inn, or the Four Seasons? Should we discuss the color of this product for five minutes or thirty hours? If culture is not purposeful, it will be an accident or a mistake.
Horowitz connects historical leadership examples to modern case-studies of cultural techniques to those used by modern companies to successfully influence their culture to be in line with the direction they wish their company to head.
Who you are is not the values you list on the wall. It’s not what you say in company-wide meeting. It’s not your marketing campaign. It’s not even what you believe. Who you are is what you do. This book aims to help you do the things you need to become the kind of leader you want to be―and others want to follow.
The following information contains Tom’s personal notes and opinions/ key takeaways that he gained whilst reading ‘What You Do Is Who You Are’, and also valued statements and examples that Ben Horowitz has used in his writing.