Reed Hastings reveals marriage counselor advice "was the best coach I've ever had as CEO": this helped him profile Netflix's famous culture of honesty - Netflix CEO Reed Hastings has pulled leadership advice from some unexpected places. In particular, Hastings attributes much of his successful leadership style to his marriage counselor.

"He turned out to be the best coach I've had as CEO," Hastings told CNN last Thursday, saying he learned from him about total honesty and its benefits not only in his marriage, but when it comes to focusing leadership on the streaming platform.

As a manager, Hastings is anything but conventional. When it unveiled the germ of what would be Netlflix and its values in 2009, the neophyte company sparked a huge controversy over its brutally honest approach to hiring and lack of firm policies for employees.

This same controversial approach is what has allowed Hastings to turn his company, which was a DVD rental business, into an entertainment giant with a market capitalization of 220 billion dollars (170 billion euros). Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook's Chief Operating Officer (COO), argues that Netflix's slide presentation "could be the most important document ever to come out of Silicon Valley."

It is therefore worth noting how Hastings came to develop his leadership style. So, the CEO of Netflix shares the best advice from his marriage counselor in his latest book, here are no rules: Netflix and the culture of reinvention, published a few days ago.

The biggest advantage of this learning process, he points out, was learning to apply honesty to each situation. Both at home and in the office. Here's what the Netflix CEO learned from his marriage counselor: how to use honesty to be a more effective executive.

Hastings claims that honesty was one of the main things that helped repair his relationship with his wife after 29 years of marriage. In his book, The manager describes how he argued that "family was the most important thing to me" to his wife while, almost without realizing it, working at night and not even arriving in time to have dinner with her.

"What the marriage counselor showed me was that he was a systematic liar," he confessed.

Reed Hastings reveals marriage counselor advice

Hastings claims that marriage therapy allowed him to realize that his actions did not coincide with his words. And that not only made him a liar, but also damaged his marriage.

After understanding what was going on, Hastings "became a fanatic of exploring the conflict and being able to say exactly what he thought." Over time, he brought that same approach to the office.

Marriage counseling inspired Hastings to apply a similar honesty culture in the office. Hastings began not only to provide frank feedback to his employees, but also to set an example by encouraging employees to give him feedback.

"Getting feedback had an added benefit," Hastings writes. "It pushed performance to new heights."

Instead of circling around a problem, Netflix employees are encouraged to speak directly and confront people whose ideas they disagree with. After firing an employee, Netflix even explains to the staff the reasons.

For Hastings, this culture can be positive for all parties involved, because clear explanations can avoid rumors and suspicions in the office: "it reduces back stabbing and allows us to be faster."

According to Hastings, leaders should be especially responsible for the feedback from their colleagues. It is not enough to encourage such feedback at the employee level: you need to examine your own performance.

People working in positions of responsibility are often less likely to receive feedback than their subordinates. "This is not only dysfunctional but dangerous," Hastings believes. "If an office assistant makes a mistake and no one tells him, it's no big deal. If the CFO screws up the accounts and no one dares to tell the truth, he's sending the company into a crisis."

The co-author of the book, Erin Meyer, points out that Hastings himself probably gets the most negative reaction of all in the company and takes it as a positive signal.

For this reason, Hastings recommends that leaders explicitly devote time on the agendas of meetings to seek criticism from their own. To do this, he says, it is necessary to ensure that the employee is comfortable speaking frankly, responding to criticism with gratitude and appreciating his courage to speak freely.

End of Reed Hastings reveals marriage counselor advice

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They detect a massive campaign of fraudulent emails that try to impersonate the Tax Agency to steal your personal data

The National Institute of cybersecurity (Incibe) has detected a campaign of sending fraudulent emails that try to impersonate the State Tax Administration Agency (AEAT) with the intention of distributing malware or malicious software.

Recently, the National Cybersecurity Institute has also detected another campaign that attempts to impersonate Vodafone for the same purpose as the previous one.

In this sense, the alert is addressed to any worker or self-employed person who has received an e–mail with the subject "AEAT-Notification notice (random numbers)".

The body of the message indicates to the user that a complaint has been filed against him by the AEAT on the basis of a complaint by a company about an undeclared invoice.

They then demand an urgent response with the 3-day rush for an alleged meeting with the AEAT.

The mail prompts you to download an attachment in the format xlsm (Microsoft Excel file), in which you will allegedly find more information related to the complaint and invoice.

When the user clicks on the file with the name " administrative notification.xlsm", automatically downloads a Trojan-which is a seemingly legitimate and harmless program, but which, when executed, gives the attacker remote access to the infected computer -.​​

According to the National Institute of Cybersecurity, this malware is hidden in commonly used files, such as Excel, and compromises the security of the computer, since it facilitates the cybercriminal the theft of personal data.

In addition, the Trojan can perform covert tasks to prepare the computer for further attacks.

By double-clicking the downloaded file, the malware is installed on the computer, causing the computer to become infected.

To avoid being a victim of this type of Deception, The National Institute of cybersecurity recommends that you carefully analyze emails that reach your inbox, especially if they are unknown users or you have not requested. In this case, one option is always to remove them directly.

Also, avoid replying to these emails and check the links before clicking, even if they come from known contacts.

As additional advice, the National Institute of cybersecurity recommends to be wary of shortened links and attached files.

In addition, always keep your operating system and antivirus up to date. And, in the case of the antivirus, it checks that it is active.

Similarly, make sure that your employees ' user accounts have strong passwords and that they do not have administrator permissions.

It is important that you make backups from time to time because, if you are affected by some type of cyber deception, you will be able to recover your data quickly and effectively.

In case you have downloaded and run the file, perform a scan of the entire computer with the antivirus and follow the instructions I tell you to remove the malware.