Netflix's approach to innovation, get out of the way

Isn't it funny how many company's answer to innovation is to make it an objective and goal of the company.  IBM has even created an event called Innovate.

An entertaining post on innovation is by Netflix's Adrian Cockcroft where he uses Netflix streaming media shows as slides.

How Netflix gets out of the way of innovation

 

#defrag 2011 presentation script.

I'm the cloud architect for Netflix, but rather than tell you about why we moved Netflix to a cloud architecture or how we built our cloud architecture, I'm going to tell you what we do differently at Netflix to create a culture that supports innovation.

What is it that lets us get things done very quickly. Sometimes a bit too qwikly…. but how did we keep making big strategic moves, from DVD to streaming, from Datacenter to Public Cloud, from USA only to International, all in very short timescales with a fairly small team of engineers.

My presentation slides are just box-shots of movies and TV shows that are available on Netflix streaming. This script is based on the notes I made to figure out what I was going to say for each box shot. If some of you see a show you didn't know we had and want to watch that would make me happy, you can click on the box shot to visit that movie at Netflix, they were all available for streaming in the USA at the time of writing.

The post is long, so let me help you to the part I found useful.

What I found out over the next few years is that the culture is what enables innovation, so that Netflix can get things done quickly that other companies are too scared or too slow to try. The rest of this talk is about the key things that we do differently at Netflix.

And Andrian's warns this guidance is most likely not useful for a large established company.

Before I get into them I want to warn you that even with a roadmap and a guide, you probably won't be able to follow this path if you are in a large established company. Your existing culture won't let you. However if you are creating a new company from scratch, I hope you can join me in what I hope is the future of cool places to work.

Here's the key insight. It's the things you don't do that make the difference. You don't add innovation to a company culture, you get out of its way.

Building a Room to Think, high ceilings work

After three days in the bay area it is nice to get home.  Home is a place to reflect on the week's activities. To meditate.

Meditation is thought of as a self improvement, but I also use the technique of meditation to think of the data center industry.

Meditation is any form of a family of practices in which practitioners train their minds or self-induce a mode of consciousness to realize some benefit.^[1][2][3] 

Last week with the DCD Seattle event I got a chance to chat with a bunch of folks who were in town and it turns out some were in town longer than they expected as they flew out from the East Coast and where then going to Uptime Symposium. Fieldview Solutions's John Consoli was one of those who was sticking around so we decided to grab lunch on Friday.  I told him to take a cab over to my house, and we could go to lunch and i would give him a ride back to his hotel.  I gave Fred the 3 minute tour as a complete tour of the house, office, and beach house can take an hour, and is a workout walking down the 200 steps to the beach and back.

When I ran into Fieldview Solutions's CEO Fred Dirla in Santa Clara, he heard about my house and 30ft ceilings.  Actually the ceiling is 13ft, not 30. 

I spend more time than I expected in this room, even choosing to work in the room.  Why? I think being in a tall ceiling feels good.  WSJ has a post on the concept.

Today, it turns out, the real cutting edge of architecture has to do with the psychology of buildings, not just their appearance. Recently, scientists have begun to focus on how architecture and design can influence our moods, thoughts and health. They've discovered that everything—from the quality of a view to the height of a ceiling, from the wall color to the furniture—shapes how we think. 

...

It's not just color. A similar effect seems to hold for any light, airy space. In 2006, Joan Meyers-Levy, a marketing professor at the University of Minnesota's school of management, studied the relationship between ceiling height and thinking style. She demonstrated that, when people are in a high-ceilinged room, they're significantly better at seeing the connections between seemingly unrelated subjects. In one experiment, undergraduates came up with nearly 25% more connections between different sports, such as chess and basketball, when sitting in a loft-like space than in a room with an 8-foot ceiling. Instead of focusing on particulars, they were better able to zoom out and see what various things had in common.

I found the research paper by Joan Meyers-Levy on ceiling height.

...

We believe that the effects produced by high or low ceilings actually occur because such ceiling heights increase or
decrease vertical room volume, which in turn stimulates
alternative concepts and types of processing. Indeed, this
logic corresponds with Hall’s (1966, 77) earlier discussed
thesis that chapels versus cathedrals communicate our theorized (i.e., confinement vs. freedom-related) associations
“by virtue of the space they enclose.”

FYI, we did not specify 13ft ceilings.  It was the height we needed to make the garage above us be level with the road.  We have no regets having little choice, and made the height one of the main features of the room, and a great place to think.

Who will be the new Carbon Data Center target for Greenpeace?

I take it for granted that the Green Data Center idea has caught on.  DatacenterDynamics published an article about Interxion being powered by 100% green energy.

Interxion purchases 100% green energy for Zurich data center

Increases reductions in emissions by purchasing elecricity generated by renewables

Published 8th July, 2011 by Penny Jones

Interxion has chosen to use 100% ‘green energy’ for its Zurich data center, signing up to receive electricity produced by solar and hydroelectric power from energy provider Energie Opfikon.

The colocation provider was already using some hydroeclectric-generated energy from the company, but had recently undergone an expansion which led it to take on the 100% offering.

But that doesn't mean everyone thinks having a green (low carbon) data center is important.  Some have said the cloud is greener, but Greenpeace pointed out cloud data centers have carbon impacts.

I have some ideas who would be the next potential targets for Greenpeace identifying a high carbon data center.  We'll see if I can figure out who the next Greenpeace data center target is.

I wrote two years ago, thinking the targets where Apple, Google, or Microsoft, but Facebook surprised us all as the data center target for Greenpeace.

My guess is it is going to be someone who we wouldn't expect as all the big data center operators have low carbon data center strategies.