Transforming project management visibility at Netflix

Netflix is the world’s leading streaming entertainment service — but you probably know that. But did you know about their Production Innovation team? There, they empower content creators — through new and emerging technologies — to tell stories in impactful new ways. This department needed a project management solution to plan, track, and create visibility across hundreds of initiatives.

Challenge

• Each team within Production Innovation was tracking their progress and initiatives using their own disparate tool: Google Sheets, Airtable, Monday, Asana, etc.
• Their operations were growing increasingly global and they faced hurdles with collaborating across timezones and offices.
• Leadership struggled with visibility into initiatives and couldn’t provide the clear direction, guidance, or course correction to the org.

Solution

• Coda and Netflix co-created a Project Hub doc ecosystem to increase collaboration and enhance visibility across departments and leadership.
• Each team designed their own project management hubs that synched up across the org. This allowed teams to retain their unique way of operating while surfacing key progress insights up to leadership.

Impact

“Coda as a platform for visibility — with flexible team spaces is so aligned with Netflix’s culture of Freedom & Responsibility. By focusing on people over structure, we gave leadership exactly what they needed while each unique team could run their own way. Going with any off-the-shelf “Project Management” apps wouldn’t have worked.”

• Camille Nussbaum, Manager of Project Management

Now, leadership can see and address redundancies, so they can quickly consolidate efforts across teams, saving hours of misaligned project time. Netflix is starting to see patterns of current project efforts, and with this visibility, prioritizing work that more closely aligns with their objectives.