Book Review: What You Do Is Who You Are: How to Create Your Business Culture

Have you ever read about a company’s values? And later come to discover that they are nothing like they should be. This is what Ben Horowitz’s book, What You Do Is Who You Are: How to Create Your Business Culture, is all about. I learned about this book while listening to some podcasts and thought it was worth reading. I have worked in organizations that espouse noble values and goals but fail to live up to them. In his book, Horowitz shared how to create alignment with what is desired and what is truly happening.

What You Do Is Who You Are is 273 pages long. Horowitz arranged the book into 10 chapters along with an introduction.

Horowitz presents his case through a number of stories. The primary stories focused on Toussaint Louverture, Shaka Senghor, and Genghis Khan. After each story, Horowitz highlighted the lesson learned as well as instruction for applying the lessons.

I found the stories and lessons to be quite fascinating. They highlight the importance of organizational culture. As Horowitz noted, “Your culture is how your company makes decisions when you’re not there” (Horowitz, 2019, p. 3). As we can see in the news, there are many unhealthy cultures across famous organizations. Unfortunately, I can see this creeping into the military. The leadership is turning a blind eye to bad behavior and destroying the culture. Horowitz shared that “If you see something below standard and do nothing, then you’ve set a new standard” (Horowitz, 2019, p. 5).

The last few chapters focus on what a leader can do to put the right culture in place. It starts with understanding what culture you want to have. Horowitz wrote in length about the difference between values and virtues. He noted that virtues were more important because they were the values in practice. The trick is how to put virtues in motion.

I recommend that organizational leaders read What You Do Is Who You Are. Many organizations talk a good talk but they don’t walk the talk.

Additional Reading

• Book Review: Leaders Eat Last: Why Some Teams Pull Together and Others Don’t
• Book Review: Choosing Change: How Leaders and Organizations Drive Results One Person at a Time
• Book Review: Measure What Matters: How Google, Bono, and the Gates Foundation Rock the World With OKRs

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