The Secret to a Great Planning Process — Lessons from Airbnb and Eventbrite

TL;DR: Lenny Rachitsky (Airbnb) and Nels Gilbreth (Eventbrite) share their W Framework for company planning, developed after years of seeing messy planning processes. The framework addresses the root cause of bad planning: unclear roles and responsibilities. The process involves four steps: (1) Leadership provides context through a draft strategic plan including mission, vision, goals, and 3-5 strategic pillars; (2) Teams respond with detailed execution plans; (3) Leadership integrates all plans and makes prioritization decisions; (4) Teams provide feedback, confirm buy-in, and roll out the final plan. Key insights include: good planning requires top-down guidance to prevent misaligned team strategies; a good company strategy contains mission, vision, goal, strategy narrative, and 3-5 strategic pillars; teams should challenge leadership assumptions and propose better approaches; resources should be concentrated behind a small number of bets (3-5 max) rather than spread thin. The framework emphasizes that planning is inherently different from day-to-day execution—it requires aligning on a single future from many possibilities. The authors stress that your org structure should follow your strategy, not the other way around, citing Airbnb's creation of a dedicated Experiences team.