How Did Jeff Bezos Scale Amazon Without Destroying Its Entrepreneurial Culture?

Running a start-up is profoundly different than running a big company. When you’re small, founders are close to the action and can make sure all the important things happen. But as a start-up scales, founders can’t have their hands in everything: many companies lose focus on the customer; decisions get bogged down; and there are hiring mistakes. We’ve all seen these things happen to good start-ups.

Amazon’s magic is that it’s a behemoth of a company that still operates like a founder-driven start-up in several key areas. This is partly because Bezos has a strong cultural influence throughout the company. But, he also developed some unique tools to institutionalize his core values in the company.