Netflix as a company constantly says it is a strong advocate for diversity and inclusion, and do not tolerate “brilliant jerks”, or bullies. Unfortunately this is something that they talk about very often but when situations arises, they would often side with the individual of higher rank.
In my 2 years at Netflix, I’ve noticed that you don’t have to be the brightest and smartest person in the room to excel in this company, you just have to be the loudest, and made your presence known in meetings especially the high visibility ones.
Directors are often bullies and brilliant jerks, somethings sans brilliant - they are great at politicking and making themselves sound and look good.
The director I am working for for example, often makes me solve director level problems. When guidance is needed the answer we get very often is “not my problem”. However if the problem was successfully solved, they would be quick to claim the credit for it as the inspiration that lead the team to the breakthrough.
Netflix encourages weekly 1:1s with your cross functional partners and direct managers/directors, and encourages free sharing of ideas and respectful feedback during these sessions. My director however for example would use these sessions to threaten the staff, if too many questions were asked, they would be threatened with termination.
Another issue is Netflix loves hiring very young professionals either fresh out of school or individuals on the second job. Hiring of dynamic individuals is great, however it is essential to provide young individuals with the necessary coaching to set them up for success especially when working in a high performance environment where once needs to excel and be able to separate professional and personal feelings. No coaching is provided for these young professionally immature individuals, on top of that they pay them a lot of money that probably warrants more than 10 years of experience. What happens is that these young individuals develop an inflated ego, play politics, gossip, and take everything too personally. The lack of coaching and allowing them to run amok, results in a very apparent bullying millennial mean girls/boys culture.
HR is very aware of these problems but employees are often told that they are working on it, but nothing ever gets done. In fact, employees have stopped going to HR for any work issues, because more than often HR would side with the upper management, brand the victimized employee a “trouble employee” and eventually they will be let go. And the reason given to the entire office for their dismissal is that they are no longer excelling in their work, which most of the time is completely false. It’s almost always politics and power play involved.
I have witness this happen to many times to so many of my brilliant, hardworking and true stunning colleagues. A few of these unfortunate colleagues were also told by HR upon being let go that even though they are aware of what is happening, their hands are tied and they should just treat it as they are collateral damage.
How much you get paid also depends on who you know, and how much you know how to “charm” your bosses and the leadership team. I know of managers who are getting paid 3 x more than directors, because they are great with charming their bosses. How they determine how much each person gets paid, does not depend on experience, skill. It depends on friendships, and how well you sell yourself.
The money and benefits are great, but they also come at a very high cost. If you feel you are able to tolerate such an abusive environment, then this is the company for you.
