Netflix

This essay examines the multimedia space in the face of the Netflix company. It aims to study this particular type of companies and search the evidences that could clearly define the similar characteristics with a learning organization. In addition, the paper analyzes the role of Reed Hastings, the head of the company, in its development and technical changes that he has introduced during his leadership. Finally, the essay considers the complex relationship between Netflix and Amazon companies, as well as the risks, which the first one is facing within this relationship.

Without a doubt, Netflix at the current moment is one of the most popular companies in the United States, and it is rapidly conquering Europe, Australian and New Zealand markets (Grabb, 2015). Moreover, the company has announced the launch of a large-scale advertising campaign and has started to provide content to Japan. About a thousand of high-qualified engineers work for the benefit of the organization’s development, spending a lot of time analyzing the resource. Thus, Netflix can undeniably be categorized as a  learning organization. This term has many interpretations, but in any way Netflix has outstripped all the types of its versatility, as well as millions of Internet resources. At first, a learning organization facilitates the development not only of its own employees, but also of the company as a whole by achieving a high level of competence and evolution from hour to hour. In this case, Netflix is superior to any of the existing companies, since its activity includes the constant analysis, improvement, focus on customer needs and preferences, mathematical calculations and other important aspects. The contest announced by the company in 2011 has allowed it to hire the best staff, which reflects the second quality of the learning organization – the personal mastery (Smith, 2014). In addition, Netflix is in the constant interaction with the audience, and shown by the study. Moreover, every night, its staff monitors the popularity of certain programs, and the next day launches the relevant traffic.

Team learning is a fundamental element of such organizations, where the structure and content of the collective workshop is no different from the working process and, therefore, it turns into one big lesson. Thus, the acquired shared vision operates in the company as the catalyst, accelerating all the actions. At a certain moment, namely in 2009, Reed Hastings has become such a catalyst. As a board member of the company, he wrote a letter to Amazon’s CEO Jeff Bezos, in which he reported about the company’s experiments with the cloud services. He proposed the idea of using their resources, with which Bezos agreed. This event was crucial for Netflix, and to some extent it has defined its future.

However, despite the insight of Reed Hastings, he performed many hasty decisions that later caused problems to the entire organization. Thus, in 2011, the company’s shares have fallen from $ 298 till to $ 52.81, due to the fact that Reed Hastings and the executive team have decided to split the company into two – Qwikster, a DVD mailer, and Netflix, a stream resource (Phillips, 2011). Because of this decision, Netflix lost millions of users and have suffered great losses. In addition, the head of the company is known by a wide range of people as a rather extraordinary personality. Reed Hastings does not have his own office and holds the meetings almost in the lobby of the main company’s building. In addition, he often expresses provocative statements and is known for his eccentric behavior. Thus, one day, in the midst of Christmas, he took a two-week vacation, eliminating the monitoring of any company’s news. However, the global organizations require the risk and creativities, which such people as Hastings possess.

Nowadays, Netflix is the largest provider of Internet traffic in North America, which takes one third among the entire total stream. The company works with a wide range of devices, and instantly converts video, providing its services to more than 36 million subscribers. Due to this, it has a complex relationship with Amazon, being in the dependence of it and becoming vulnerable to a certain extent. Working in the Amazon’s cloud space, Netflix operates from 10,000 to 20,000 of servers, and, according to the chief architect of the organization, they make it even more effective than the Amazon itself. On the other hand, Amazon has the largest and most profitable client base in the entire history of its existence, and it provides Netflix with the necessary software when the organization needs it. Andy Jassy, the head of the cloud business of Amazon, confesses that such collaboration has strengthened their platform from the functional and performance standpoints. However, the great cooperation can turn into a disaster if Amazon’s software system will fail or, for example, the management will no longer see the sense in collaboration. However, it should be said that, due to the number of years of joint efforts, it is hard to imagine this. Losing Netflix, Amazon will lose the millions of their customers and the great technical support. Therefore, the interdependence is beneficial to both sides. 

All in all, this essay has examined the company Netflix in terms of the educational organization, giving arguments for such status. In addition, it has studied the role of CEO Reed Hastings in the technical development and changes that the company has faced. Finally, the paper has explored the uneasy relationship between the organization and Amazon, and the possible difficulties in their further development.