In Japan, where X (formerly Twitter) boasts an overwhelming user share, “HARD THINGS” has become something of an internet meme. Ben Horowitz’s story of how to confront difficult situations (“hard things”) for which no one knows the answers in his own entrepreneurial and management endeavors in “HARD THINGS” has captured the hearts of many people, even in Japan, far from Silicon Valley. This is likely due to the fact that many people in Japan are acutely aware of the difficulty of surviving in an era of unpredictability and rapid change. However, I would like to urge today’s business leaders not just to finish ‘HARD THINGS,’ but to read all the way through to ‘WHO YOU ARE’ to appreciate the complete picture.
From HARD THINGS (individual struggles) to WHO YOU ARE (organizational culture)
At the end of “HARD THINGS,” Ben Horowitz writes, “Love your background. Love your unique personality. Love your intuition. Therein lies the key to success.” I believe that when business leaders become aware of who they are and masters all of these things (self-acceptance), they will truly awaken and become a true leader. The mission of true leaders is to “motivate and motivate their team or organization” and “build a corporate culture that enables this.” Ben Horowitz’s “WHO YOU ARE” clearly outlines the next step for an awakened manager to take: fulfilling their mission.
I was surprised that Ben Horowitz chose “Bushido”
The essential teachings of “HARD THINGS” are: 1) Business leaders’ actions are their true character, 2) How to design a truly functional corporate culture that no one can imitate, and 3) How to deal with the risks of collapsing a corporate culture. 1) is the introduction and foundation for developing the discussion into 2) and 3), but I was very surprised when Ben used the Japanese “Bushido” as an example.
To be more precise, I was surprised that Ben had such a deep knowledge of Bushido that he even mentioned Hagakure, which is not well known even in Japan. This is because, although Hagakure is one of the schools of Bushido and many Japanese people are aware of the famous passage from Hagakure, “Bushido is to find death,” they are not familiar with the details of Hagakure (they have never read it).
The Bushido of Steve Jobs and the Bushido of Ben Horowitz
Steve Jobs’ famous line from his 2005 Stanford University commencement speech, “If today were the last day of your life, would you really want to be doing what you are doing today?” is resonant with the spirit of Bushido, which is always conscious of death. However, what resonated most deeply with Ben Horowitz about Bushido was the idea of ”building a culture by comprehensively systematizing virtue (good behavior) rather than values.”
Although both were based on Bushido, Jobs’s Bushido was centered on “exploration” and developed into a maniacal perfectionism that aimed to hone products, companies, and corporate culture like swords in order to achieve excellence, while Ben’s Bushido was centered on “the mechanisms for building organizational culture” and placed the utmost importance on “behavior as a leader,” using somewhat radical language such as “When it comes to building a culture, it doesn’t matter what you believe. What matters is what you do.” I found the difference between the two to be very interesting.
The heart of corporate culture design
Ben emphasizes that corporate culture is the most important issue and the importance of leaders’ commitment to it. While he doesn’t discuss how to build a corporate culture, he does explain the common mistakes business leaders make when focusing on building a corporate culture, such as trying to be liked by everyone or losing their individuality in an attempt to look cool, and why these mistakes are so wrong. This helps leaders correct their behavior. While building a corporate culture, he also acknowledges that salespeople, who “keep work and personal lives separate and are motivated by performance-based compensation,” and engineers, who “love creating things and want to code whenever they want, are motivated by an environment where they can immerse themselves in their work and talented colleagues,” naturally have different cultures. He also offers tips on how to prevent corporate culture from becoming a mere formality by establishing appropriate “subcultures” for each department. This practical advice is extremely useful and helpful for modern business leaders.
Ben also states, “In a sense, the type of culture you want and the people you want to hire are the same question,” and bravely reveals some somewhat radical but true facts that all business leaders want to know, such as “what kind of people you should not hire” and “signs that your corporate culture is broken.”
WHO YOU ARE is a practical bible for business leaders, covering not only what actions they should take to fulfill their mission, but also what actions they should avoid. It is a must-read for them who are serious about recruiting, team building, and building a corporate culture.