‘The Social Network’ is a biography of the co-founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg. The movie is basically based on the book written by Ben Mezrich in 2009. The name of the book was ‘The Accidental Billionaires’. The movie was directed by Aaron Sorkin and released in 2010. The movie got very popular and being nominated for many awards. The movie gives the reflection of incidents happen in Mark Zuckerberg life. When he was studying in Harvard University, he created an application called FaceMash, but unfortunately the university did not accept this application because it was inappropriate and violated the rules and privacy of the university. After this incident his friends told him to develop a website called Harvard Edu. Firstly, he was agreed but then he decided to make his own website named Facebook, which cross more than 550 million users to the date. From this we can see that he is very genuine person he is never jealous of anyone. Even he made his friend Eduardo Saverin a 30 percent partner in his company who has no contribution in developing the website. He was never after money instead of this he wants to create a social network on which people from different countries and belong to different community become friends and get to know each other. He always works hard and even motivates his team to work hard and help each other while having any issue. Based on this movie, I am going to describe the vision, motivation, dilemma, ethics and leadership effectiveness of Mark Zuckerberg. Even I will learn lesson from this movie and can apply in my own life to develop personality development.
Vision and Motivation
The messaging and principal of future of the website is very important. According to Mark Zuckerberg himself, his idea behind Facebook was to create a social network on which student can talk with each other and it is secured. Further he wants that his vision should be expand and people all over the world can talk with each other. Initially, the website was developed for Harvard University student, so that they can talk with each other and get to know everyone because some students are introvert and share their views and ideas with each other. But later he expands his website and now people all over the globe from every community can talk with each share their views, communicate with each other what is happening all around the universe.
Based on this movie, it can be said that the applied story of the movie are Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Herzberg’s Two Factor Theory and Gregor’s Theory X and Theory Y. It can be proved by following points:
Mark Zuckerberg motivates his team by taking care of their needs what they want in their daily life. Instead of this Facebook headquarters are designed in such a way that all facilities are provided to employees like restaurants, coffee shop and gyms. This gives the employees a feeling of relatedness.
Facebook gives priority to the safety of their workers who are working for the company. It created Q&A safety group in which employees can express their feeling with each other and also creates the safe environment for work.
More than 98% of employees working in the Facebook love Mark Zuckerberg because he meets each and every employee working for the Facebook and gives them respect and he does not assign any work to any employee based on his age or experience but on capability of the employee.
Mark has broken traditional behavior between employee at higher level or employee at lower level. He never makes any difference between them and treated them equally with a direct approach.
Ethics
Ethics play a major role in everyone life like in behavior of Mark Zuckerberg. When his friends told him to make a website for named Harvard Edu, he was agreed at that time but suddenly he dropped that idea and came with his own social networking website named Facebook, he did not steal their codes and ideas. He was fair on his part. When he was in frustration when his girlfriend left him and when he saw his girlfriend at party, he went to her and apologized her. Even when his best friend and co-founder of his company Eduardo Saverin, froze his bank account to stop Mark using money from the account, he did not say anything to him, instead him to sign the contract. When his friend accused him, he settles the things in very calm way and ask him to remain the co-founder of the company. Also, when another friend Shawn suggested him that he can take revenge from his girlfriend that she is not good from him, while making some cards that she is not perfect from him, his mind was in dilemma that whether this is the right approach or not so he left that idea. These incidents suggest that he does not use unethical methods in his life.
Leadership Effectiveness
Mark Zuckerberg is an effective leader. More than 98% percent of his employees gave him respect and love his behavior and leadership style because of following reasons:
Clear vision: a leader can have people behind him only when he shows them a clear path ahead like when he is developing Facebook, he knows that he wants to develop such a strong social networking on which people all around the globe can talk with each other and get to know other well. He had a high score in agreeableness because of his clear vision.
Motivation to team: Mark Zuckerberg motivates his team by working with them and encourage them to work hard by giving verbal encouragement. The Facebook was very developed with may facilities are provided to the employees like they have restaurants inside and coffee shop when they feel tired of work they can go and take some rest and feel good and work hard to achieve the goal. This shows the emotional intelligence of Mark Zuckerberg.
Legitimacy: Mark Zuckerberg is known all around the world each and every person knows him because he is a legitimate person, he lived his dream and fulfill it by doing a lot of hard work, his dedication and concentration finally get success when Facebook make a success. He faced many barriers along the way, but his dedication and bravery has overcome these barriers. He was accused number of times, but nothing stops him to fulfill his dream. He got the best employees all around the world who work for his Billion-dollar company.
No traditional hierarchies: Mark Zuckerberg broke the traditional behavior between employees and other members at higher level. In his office, employees directly approach him in his office. He usually assigns work based on capabilities and abilities of the employees not on age and experience. He had many experience in his life and face many challenges during his project but he learns new things from these experiences.
No useless workplace traditions: Mark is a very simple and genuine person. He never judges any employee based on dress so he does set any dress code at workplace. He judges his employees based on quality of work. So, we can say that he had practical intelligence because he values practical skills.
Contingency Theory
Mark Zuckerberg first develop FaceMash theory, where two people have to compare two pictures select the most attractive picture out of two. He wanted to use his emotional intelligence skills to understand what people exactly want in life. He discovered that many people were not interested to know whom they don’t know but more interested in people known to them. It proves that Mark Zuckerberg reads and capable of monitoring the emotions of other people, He inspired his fellow friends and they were very curious to take part with him, that’s why so many people took part in the hacking competition which was organized by him and they could see the capability of Mark Zuckerberg despite of the fact that Facebook was very new, no one has idea whether it would get huge success or not. But his unusual vision inspired many people to share the same vision and help him to complete his goal and finally Facebook was renowned all over the world.
Personal Leadership Development
‘The Social Network’ is an inspirational movie and character of Mark Zuckerberg has given us many lessons of life. Firstly, if we want to achieve success in life, we should have a clear vision in our life. We should work hard and concentrate on our work what we are doing, no, matters what barriers come in our way we have to solve these huddles in a clam way without getting stress. While making Facebook website he was not aware of it may or may not get success in future. But still he was concentrated and dedicated towards his work and hope that it will get success all around the world. Secondly, he was accused many times in his life but he handles the situation in positive way and get success in his life. So, we have to learn that we should not react every situation in a negative way and try to solve every problem in a calm way to get success.
Reference
https://www.biography.com/business-figure/mark-zuckerberg