Certainty or initiative? Zoho's Sridhar Vembu says trying to have both creates the 'worst of both worlds'

Zoho founder Sridhar Vembu has sparked a fresh debate on workplace culture by highlighting a fundamental trade-off organisations face: the comfort of certainty versus the energy of initiative. 

'Wait for Instructions' vs 'Seize the Initiative'

In a post on X, Vembu asked, "On org culture: Do people wait for instructions from the top? Or do they seize the initiative and run?” He argued that highly metric-driven organisations tend to produce a “wait for instructions from the top” culture, which offers predictability and certainty.

“Unless the top always knows how to set the right course, the org can be lost,” Vembu warned, pointing out the risk when leadership direction is flawed but employees are conditioned to follow orders without question.

By contrast, an initiative-driven culture encourages employees to act independently, identify problems, and propose solutions without waiting for senior approval. But this comes with its own challenges.

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Chaos, Disagreements, and Market Discipline

Vembu described initiative-led environments as often feeling chaotic, marked by frequent internal disagreements and a persistent sense of “not good enough". “In a chaotic initiative-driven culture, the external environment (market) may have to provide the occasional discipline,” he wrote.

The entrepreneur said that people who are full of energy and initiative often vehemently disagree with other. "I joke about this: every smart programmer looks at another programmer's code and thinks 'it sucks, I can do better'."

The Worst of Both Worlds?

Vembu framed this as an unavoidable trade-off: organisations can either provide comfortable certainty and lose initiative or embrace initiative and accept ongoing discomfort.

Crucially, he cautioned against trying to engineer a hybrid. “In my experience, trying to square this circle – ‘we will have a highly disciplined culture of seizing the initiative' – produces the worst of both worlds,” Vembu said.

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His comments come as companies globally grapple with balancing structure and innovation, especially amid rising costs and AI-driven pressures. For leaders, Vembu’s message is clear: pick your culture consciously, understand its costs, and avoid forcing contradictory ideals into one system.