The stiff competition in the corporate world requires good organizational leadership to strive and gain competitive advantages. Leadership qualities positively impact business success and turnover. Effective leadership accounts for principles and conceptual frameworks to address the internal and external factors affecting a business. Poor leadership can result in a plunge in the bottom line and poor employee relations and is caused by poor decision-making and lapse in behavior by the leaders. Reed Hastings, the CEO of Netflix, is a perfect example of a good leader whose skills have impacted significant changes and growth in the company. In contradiction, Bobby Kotick, the C.E.O for Activision Blizzard, represents ineffective leadership that has caused negative impacts on the company. Good leaders, unlike bad leaders, have a strong sense of purpose to their roles and actively acknowledge business challenges to foster corporate success and growth.
Reed Hastings founded Netflix along with Marc Randolph in 1997 and evolved the business to a global media leader. Reed Hastings is well known for innovative leadership, evident in the culture at Netflix under his command (Netflix Culture, n.d). Hastings has a record of overseeing and tapping into a business niche for the growth of Netflix, overriding the stiff competition. Good employee relationships through understanding, inclusion, and empathy have also favored the success of Netflix. Hastings also has a clear direction for the company and a shared vision with the employees, creating a well-defined plan for growth, innovation, and business culture. Transparency and taking responsibility in internal and external management have increased employee satisfaction and consumer trust for Netflix. Worker empowerment, innovation, transparency, direct and honest feedback, and teamwork are the core values at Netflix.
Hastings has insisted on transparency to establish a high level of trust by employees, consumers, and shareholders. Information at Netflix is equally accessible to all employees regardless of their rank or position. For instance, financial reports, strategic decisions, and memos are accessible to all employees in the company (Netflix Culture, n.d). Additionally, transparency between the employees is encouraged in a process called ‘sun shining’ where the workers can share their mistakes in their career, and the other employees learn from the moral lesson. The latest move to improve consumer transparency is the suggestion by Hastings to publicize viewership data of its television shows and films. Consumer transparency improves company ratings essential for brand image and customer loyalty (Wilder, 2018). Transparency is vital to eliminate the information gap, facilitating trust, informed decision-making, and enhanced performance. Laissez-faire leadership embraced at Netflix has fostered trust to improve brand image.
Through intellectual stimulation, personalized attention, encouraging motivation, and idealized influence, transformational leadership has developed employee skills and encouraged innovation at Netflix. Intellectual stimulation focuses on worker development to improve skills and promote creativity (McAndrew, 2021). Netflix has a policy of incentivizing high-talent workers, independent decision-making, and sharing information among workers to inspire creative thinking. Personalized attention to identifying employees’ strengths and weaknesses has enabled Netflix to leverage its human capital by tapping on the strengths and improving its weaknesses. According to McAndrew (2021), Hastings has achieved individualized influence by serving as a role model to the other employees. Speech and actions to improve motivation have supported employees personal development and decision-making skills at Netflix. Transformational leadership has enabled Hastings to engage the workforce in a way that influences meaningful change.
Teamwork and cooperation between employees at all levels to work on shared goals and vision have improved performance at Netflix. Hastings and the Board of Directors guide the overall concept, yet it is the responsibility of the employees to work collectively towards the vision. For instance, in his speech at T.E.D., he announced, “I pride myself on making a few decisions as possible in a quarter” (Wilder, 2018). Teamwork enables workers to thrive on each other and share ideas to improve workers’ morale and overcome obstacles.
Innovational growth and expansion have enabled Hastings to uphold radical change and active coping at Netflix to identify and leverage hidden opportunities. Netflix started as a DVD shipping company and gradually evolved from an internet provider and content developer to the most extensive global media company. Evaluating market convenience and flexibility is a healthy concept for responding to shifting customer preferences and changing market environments (Scandura, 2019). Netflix also conducts a market feasibility study to identify new markets to get insights on multiple perspectives and avoid blind spots in investment decisions.
Good leadership demonstrated by Reed Hastings has enabled Netflix to make significant strides to succeed in the media business. Contrastingly, poor leadership behaviors, principles, and concepts are resultant of corporate failure. Bobby Kotick is the C.E.O of Activision Blizzard (ATVI), whose leadership concepts, behaviors, and directions are detrimental, resulting in significant losses and corporate failure. ATVI is a gaming development company that has recently been spotlighted for poor leadership. Several employees at ATVI have come forward to lodge inappropriate behavior characterized by sexual harassment, drunkenness at work, and rape. Bobby Kotick was apprehensive of the immoralities but did not take any action in response (Materns, 2021). The expose followed a 35% decline in stock and poor performance, notwithstanding the hike in the gaming industry amidst the pandemic. The maltreatment of employees also resulted in worker walkouts, demonstrations, and a high turnover rate. Poor behavior, retroactive management, and poor employee relations are cases of poor leadership at ATV1 that resulted in corporate failure.
Multiple cases of employee harassment, forced employee arbitration, and raping are destructive behaviors eminent at ATV1. Toxic working conditions allowed sexual harassment of female workers at ATV1. Lack of policy to curb sexual harassment, such as gender equality measures and worker complaints, encouraged hostility and misconduct against women. The victims lodged objections to the H.R., and the leadership at ATV1 responded by discriminating against the complainants rather than taking appropriate action to reverse the issue (Materns, 2021). For instance, some of the victims were demoted, and their cases were disregarded. In some complaints, Bobby Kotick participated in the harassment. Despite rife sexual harassment complaints, Bobby did not investigate and resolve the matter.
Bobby’s retroactive management exaggerated the situation resulting in numerous lawsuits against the company and a dramatic fall in capital and revenues. There were complaints of drunkenness at work, especially by management workers violating the working policy, but no action was taken. Policy failure is caused by inactive governance and poor administration structure to oversee ethics and compliance (Lee, 2018). Bobby Kotick also failed to address the board on issues of sexual harassment hence lessening board regulation and administration. The board should access all information relating to a company, especially red flags, to make the necessary decisions and changes.
Poor employee relations characterized by worker criticism, poor motivation, and inequality are lousy leadership demonstrated at ATVI. For instance, one employee Jessica Gonzales faced high and unethical criticism from the leaders, making her quit the job. Criticism and lack of motivation make employees seem less valuable, resulting in high turnover (Mills et al., 2019). Unfair labor practices are common in ATVI, demonstrated by gender-based wage disparity. Poor motivation, inequality, and worker criticism lower employees’ sense of belonging, resulting in employee dissatisfaction and high turnover at ATVI.
Acting as C.E.O., Bobby Kotick should have practiced active management and espoused worker satisfaction. Active management would result in an investigation and immediate action to disallow unacceptable behavior in ATVI. Underactive management employee behavior is thoroughly monitored to prohibit bleaching of employment policy. Active management also enables leaders to oversee problems and take the corrective measures necessary (Scandura, 2019). Bobby is also responsible for discrimination, molestation, and oppression of workers. Transformational leadership and a worker protection blueprint would have fostered increased job satisfaction and organizational commitment.
Leadership style and behaviors are consistent with organizational performance. Reed Hastings is an example of a good leader who leverages active management, transformational leadership, and proper employee relations to stimulate growth and profitability at Netflix. Netflix has set guidelines to empower employees and maximize performance to monitor employee response, performance, and decision-making. Contrastingly, Bobby Kotick illustrates poor leadership, distinguished by poor worker relations, poor behavior, and retroactive management. Bobby Kotick should participate in active administration to create a conducive working environment and good relations with workers.
References
Lee, J. (2018). Passive leadership and sexual harassment: Roles of observed hostility and workplace gender ratio. Personnel Review. Web.
Materns, T. (2021). Activision Blizzard will be forever stained if current leadership stays in place.Los Angeles Times. Web.
McAndrew, N. (2021). Assessing leadership in business–marketing: A critical investigation of Reed Hastings. [Honors Thesis, University of Connecticut]. UCONN Library. Web.
Mills, C. B., Keller, M., Chilcutt, A., & Nelson, M. D. (2019). No laughing matter: Workplace bullying, humor orientation, and leadership styles.Workplace Health & Safety, 67(4), 159-167. Web.
Netflix Culture. (n.d). Web.
Scandura, T. A. (2019) Essentials of organizational behavior: An evidence-based approach. (3rd ed.) Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
Wilder, J. (2018). Bureaucracy sucks. 2 things your company needs to fight. Medium. Web.