
Bureaucracy Isn’t Inevitable – How Airbnb Beat It - kanamekun
http://firstround.com/review/bureaucracy-isnt-inevitable-heres-how-airbnb-beat-it/
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SixSigma
It isn't "is the organisation a bureaucracy" it is "how bureaucrasised is the
organisation" \- Cole, Management: Theory and Practice.

His words in the article reflect the last 20 years of management theory.
Notice he uses the phrase "unproductive bureaucracy". Weber introduced the
word in 1947.

Drucker: Business is driven by marketing and innovation, everything else is a
cost.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

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digi_owl
These days it feels like it is 99% marketing...

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SixSigma
It is, but I think you mean advertising shenanigans.

Marketing starts with deciding what to produce.

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toolz
> Marketing starts with deciding what to produce.

Sounds like a one liner intended to boost the self-worth of marketers. There's
nothing wrong with what the average marketer does, so no need to make it into
something it isn't.

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jknightco
Too many people view marketing as what you do _after_ you've built the
product. Any company worth its salt understands that its also crucial _before_
you've built the product.

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digi_owl
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZazEM8cgt0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZazEM8cgt0)

The first part should be fitting...

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neuro_imager
I thought this would be an article about getting through regulatory
bureaucracy - which is one of Uber's greatest strengths IMHO.

This article mostly regurgitates old advice about good hiring and company
cultural policies. I'm disappointed.

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hartator
I think the only point to remember: Build a team of trustworthy people.

It's way harder than it seems to hire the best...

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makeitsuckless
Indeed the _only_ point. I've worked in, for and with many different
organisations in the past 30 years, and I've only seen two real patterns: A)
hire great people, or B) create the perfect bureaucracy.

Everything else is just running around putting out fires, no matter what label
you put on it.

Now you will of course never be 100% successful with either A) or B), but pick
one and aim for it, and don't get distracted by miracle management method
#99999 just because you don't get it perfect.

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sremani
There are no numbers on the size and scale of the team or the organization,
would have put a better context.

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mikecurtis
Good point. A lot of this is based on growing the engineering org from ~40 =>
~200 over the last couple years.

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CurtMonash
I first heard that description of why bureaucracy occurs in the 1980s, from
Jim Huff, who was both an EDS executive and a reserve Naval officer.

