The Swedish CEO Who Runs His Company Like a CrossFit Gym

Thanks Viki for sharing this article. I love this.

Work hard and you’ll see results. For many in today’s knowledge economy, this feeling is elusive. They struggle to see how their labor contributes directly to the performance of the corporation, or how it helps the progress of their career. While there’s often increased pressure to be more productive in the office, it’s sometimes hard not to wonder, “What’s the point?” Whether in marketing or sales, it often feels like jobs are contingent on external circumstances, the whims of executives, strategic pivots, and shareholder demands. What happened to being rewarded for consistent, quality work over the long-term?

There is perhaps one place where this paradigm still exists: the gym. Here, all are equal before the law of the squat rack. There is a straightforward relationship between input and output: Those who put in the hours are handsomely rewarded, and progress can be neatly tracked through the kind of upward-sloping curves that companies and executives can only dream of. No wonder that the simple rules (but not the simple acronyms) of CrossFit or SoulCycle have become so appealing and satisfying to many.