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How has the company managed to stay nimble, not stuck struggling to find common ground, as happens with most companies of such size? The answer lies in an Amazon innovation called “single-threaded leadership,” in which a single person, unencumbered by competing responsibilities, owns a single major initiative and heads up a separable, largely autonomous team to deliver its goals. In this chapter we’ll explain what these terms mean, how they came to be, and why they lie at the heart of the Amazon approach to innovation and high-velocity decision-making. The single-threaded leadership model emerged at the tail end of a long, zigzag journey of well-informed trial and error. We asked ourselves a difficult question, then responded with bold critical thinking, experimentation, and relentless self-critique that helped us double down on successful ideas and jettison the failures. You won’t find an “aha moment” in this chapter. The path from that first hard question to single-threaded leadership took almost a decade, in large part because it required that we first untangle our monolithic software architecture and the organizational structures that had grown alongside it, then replace both, step by step, with systems designed to support rapid innovation.
Working Backwards
Colin Bryar and Bill Carr
But by any standard he had won an astounding victory, recognized as such in both North and South. Without Longstreet and with little more than half as many men as an enemy that had initially outmaneuvered him, Lee had grasped the initiative, gone over to the attack, and had repeatedly divided and maneuvered his forces in such a way as to give them superiority or equality of numbers at the point of attack. Like a rabbit mesmerized by the gray fox, Hooker was frozen into immobility and did not use half his power at any time in the battle. The triumph at Chancellorsville, however, came at great cost. The Confederates suffered 13,000 casualties, 22 percent of their force (the Union figures were 17,000 and 15 percent). The most grievous loss was Jackson, who had done so much to make the victory possible. And the boost that the battle gave to southern morale proved in the end harmful, for it bred an overconfidence in their own prowess and a contempt for the enemy that led to disaster. Believing his troops invincible, Lee was about to ask them to do the impossible.
The Illustrated Battle Cry of Freedom
James M. McPherson
Even if you know exactly what you want to work on, even if you’re eager to begin, you might find yourself a little lost. We may know we want to paint or dance or sing, but starting can feel as awkward as signing your name with your nondominant hand. Picking up a camera or a guitar feels weird and uncomfortable. It’s effortless to fantasize about what you might do when you don’t have the time or space, but now that you’re out of excuses, the anxiety of the first step can be very real.
Creative Calling
Chase Jarvis
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