The world's largest companies often require the world's biggest personalities to lead them.
Take, for example, Tesla's. (TSLA) – Get a free report Elon Musk. The $785 billion company splits its time with its leader at Twitter (now X) and SpaceX, to name a few.
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Amazon (AMZN) – Get a free reportSimilarly, it was run for years by its founder Jeff Bezos, who now spends much of his time on his 417-foot yacht Koru and launching celebrities into space.
However, for more than 20 years, Bezos grew Amazon from an online bookstore to the global warehouse it is today. It led him to become a billionaire more than 100 times over (he's worth $176.3 billion, to be exact). And you don't get to that level of fortune without taking a few right steps along the way.
Jeff Bezos reveals his best meeting tips
While Jeff Bezos hasn't run Amazon since 2021, he recently went on “The Lex Fridman Podcast” to discuss some of his best business advice.
One of those topics was meetings and how to make them more pragmatic in an increasingly remote time.
“I like neat documents and messy meetings,” Bezos told Fridman when asked about his preferred style of brainstorming.
“In every meeting I attend, I always speak last,” he added.
Bezos also added that he avoids PowerPoint slideshows at all costs. Instead, he encourages his employees to ask tough questions instead of “burying a lot of sloppy thoughts between bullet points.”
“We have in our society and within companies a series of mechanisms that we use to resolve these types of disputes,” Bezos added. “I think a lot of them are really bad. An example of a really bad way to reach an agreement is compromise.”
He is also known for enforcing a “two pizza rule” at his meetings. This means that if two standard-sized pizzas are not enough to feed everyone in attendance, the meeting is too large. This helps keep meeting sizes to a minimum and give everyone a chance to speak, rather than aligning themselves with what the general consensus or mood of the room might think.
Another way you avoid groupthink: speak last.
“Every meeting I go to, I always speak last,” he told Fridman. “I know from experience that if I speak first, even very strong-willed, very intelligent, very judgmental participants in that meeting will wonder, 'Does Jeff think that? I came into this meeting thinking one thing, but maybe I am not well.”
“If you're the highest-ranking person in the room, go last. Let everyone else go first. Ideally, the lowest-ranking person should go first (try to go in order of seniority) so you can hear everyone else's opinion. all unfiltered.” way,” she said.