I thought them to be refreshing honest and clear (but have not yet read all slides).
I mean, it is also not attractive for me, because I would not put what is good for Netflix, over what is good for me - but otherwise I do not think a professional, internal competing sports team as a goal, is necessarily toxic.
That said, I personally feel like the mentality of "We will fire you if you aren't doing an _exceptional_ job" reads as a serious red flag. The implication here is that you should expect to work overtime and prioritize your job over all else. Even then, we might still fire you.
Of course I'd rather have a company being open and upfront about their unsustainable expectations, but I'd still prefer a company that values work/live balance of their employees. Would I say that Netflix's approach is toxic? Honestly, yes. But I do understand that this is just my own opinion.
I don't think that's right. The slide says:
"""
Hard Work — Not Relevant
We don't measure people by how many hours they work or how much they are in the office
[...]
Sustained B-level performance despite effort generates severance
Sustained A-level performance despite minimal effort is rewarded
"""
The message seems to be that you don't have to work hard. They seem to say they want lazy employees that have a good work life balance, because they finish work early.
Whether that's toxic or not, that's another question. But I don't think they value overtime at all.
But they do value putting the company over yourself (and your real family).
This can probably have very toxic effects, if you are having problems at home for example (sick kids or whatever) and all they allways care about, is your performance right now. So definitely not the place for me - as I would never put a company over my children (and it sounds like this is expected, even though they would likely never phrase it this way), but there are people without family, who have their work as top priority, so this might work out for them.
There are a handful of people that are capable of producing "Sustained A-level performance" and for them this workplace probably seems ideal.
Even for the engineers that could reach this bar, it's a very high standard to apply constantly. There's another slide that gives a slight allowance for temporary performance issues, but that lack of security is hard for most people.
Slide 34 to be exact says this about Loyalty. "People who have been stars for us, and hit a bad patch, get a near term pass because we think they are likely to become stars for us again."
"A bad patch" is pretty loosely defined, if you burn out achieving something, or are assigned a problem that is particularly difficult, how much leeway do you have?
I don't think it would be an environment I would particularly enjoy, but I think to the original post's point this is a pretty great set of values because it really clearly articulates the trade-offs. If you are a 10x engineer and hate working at $current_company because they care about hard work and that's frustrating because you work smart not hard and you are comfortable with your career being contingent on consistent high performance, then Netflix is the place for you. If you work hard but think this would burn you out, look somewhere else. And that's what values should do, declare the trade-offs and take a firm stance on which things you value.
I mean, as long as this is a individual decision, that would be allright with me - but pay does not negate toxic. It only makes it bearable.
But like stated above, I do not say that Netflix culture is toxic, as they are clear about what they expect: top performance above everything else. That this can lead to toxic situations, as we all are not only having good times - should be clear to anyone applying. But I suppose even at netflix they are aware of this and hopefully have plans to deal with temporary burn outs, other than instantly firing those underperformers.
Does Netflix actually have such a cutthroat culture? I have no idea.
The slides are a bit contradictory. They talk about only keeping top talent but then also mention a major/minor league analogy. So what's the culture, really?
I'm not excusing it, but I can see people putting off firing under-performers just to avoid feeling like shit.
Now, it is toxic if a mediocre organization tries to fire a particular good performer because they aren't exceptional, when clearly the rest of the organization also isn't exceptional. That is dishonest, delusional, etc.
