Deliving Happiness is a fascinating book about how to grow and nurture a company. It is written by Tony Hsieh who is the early investor and the current CEO of Zappos- online company that started out selling shoes and has now branched out to selling clothes, watches, and eyewear. Unlike most CEO, he does not see the sole purpose of the business is to maximize profits for its owners. In this book he talks about how he got be where he is today and how he learned important values and lessons.
Before Zappos, he had founded LinkExchange which he sold to Microsoft for $265 million. The reason he gave for selling was LinkExchange was as it grew, it lost culture and felt like it was a different company and it get to the point he dreaded getting out of the bed in the morning to go to the office. After this, he started venture fund from which he funded Zappos’s founder. Initially, Zappos struggle because it fulfilled orders with drop shipments which did not worked well because it did not have accurate information about vendors’ inventory, and because their warehouses were all over the country, delivery times weren’t predictable. Later, he began buying inventory from manufacturers, which was freezing its capital and also relying on a third party to manage its warehouse. He recalled that it never makes sense to outsource call center and warehousing because Zappos’s higher purpose is to provide the best customer service which is only possible when it has pulse of what customer want. He felt that trusting a third party would care about its customers as much as Zappos would was one of our biggest mistakes.
In the book, he talks about when Zappos was losing money and could not get any more money to run its operation, they figure out that while cutting marketing expense, only thing they can do is to focusing on the customer service. He sees his company offering the best customer services possible. He eluded couple times that Zappos could get in to many other areas including offering the airline services. Later he talks about how reading book; he learned that great company has a greater purpose and bigger vision beyond just making money or being number one in a market. He would later create a book club where each employee would read a book and discuss about it and apply lesson learned at Zappos. Unlike many businesses that put the need of the investors as the center of the business, he put the need of the customer as the core, yet believes that he needs to meet the needs and desires of all stakeholders. Tony put the best customer service at his end goal, for which he put making his employee happy as his primary target. He believes that his effort to make his employee happy will in turn make his customer happy.
Tony Hsieh saw his role as the philosopher. He sold his first company LinkExchange to Microsoft, because he felt that it lost its soul and reach to where he dreaded getting out of the bed in the morning to go to the office. When he invested on Zappos, and then become involved in it, he knew the culture was important. From early on, he develops a culture that he likes. As a CEO, he does not have authority like in the typical American organization. At Zappos, he saw his role as the gardener that allows everybody around him to flourish. Hsieh put the customer’s interest as his end goal. Employees are trained to have lifelong relationship with a customer. And there are growing list of CEO who toured Zappos to learn from Zappos insight and bought his idea and have implemented at their organization.
In this book, he talks about creating a culture that would outlast him. He believe that if it get the culture right, then most of the other stuff like delivering great customer service or building a long-term enduring brand or business will be a natural byproduct. Culture starts with the hiring. Zappos uses two sets of interview: one by the hiring manager for the job specific role; and second by HR which is purely for the culture fit. To hire, a prospective candidate has to be pass both. It also fires employee if they are bad for the culture even though they are doing well on their job specific role. At Zappos, they hired only people they would enjoy hanging out with after hours.
This book talks about meritocracy system which Hsieh implemented in 2012. It allows employees to self-organize to complete work in a way that increases productivity, foster innovation and empowers anyone in the company with the ability to make decisions that push the company forward. All employees are part of one or more circle. People on the circle can fire another people on the circle. All employees can remove themselves from a circle and move to another circle. As a CEO, Hsieh cannot hire or fire his employee. This kind of system requires trust first. He was able to build trust by developing a culture that stems from intrinsic motivation rather than extrinsic motivation. He frees his call center employee in many ways to build a lifelong relationship. One way he empowers customer service reps is by not measuring call times, not allowing them to upsell, and not using a script.
It talks about how leader can affect an organization’s future by sharing his values. When things are changing fast, employees need a vision of the destination that lies beyond the horizon; they also need to understand the principles by which they must navigate their course. Without the strong value that is shared and engrained to the culture, an organization will probably lose their direction and fail. Unlike many other companies that may take only senior leadership to retreat to develop company value, he email to all his employees about their input. From all employees’ input, Zappos developed 10 core values. Since all employees have contributed to this value, they embody the company value. One value is to be adventurous, creative and open-minded which displays how his employees have embodied Zappos value.
Another value he talks about is to “deliver wow through service”. To WOW, employee must differentiate themselves, which means do something a little unconventional and innovative. Once a year, Zappos ask its employee to write what Zappos cultures mean to them and publish them as a “Culture book” which is an employee review of a company and is a great way to communicate with its employee.
That book is fantastic read for all MBA students and those who wants to learn how to manage team.
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Top reviews from other countries
book reader
Educatief en ook nog hilarisch.
Reviewed in the Netherlands on November 4, 2022
Areeb Shafqat
Solid read, highly recommend for those starting new businesses
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 10, 2023johnbgood
Un libro da cui trarre qualche buona ispirazione
Reviewed in Italy on August 30, 2023Alejandro Calderon
Easy to read, very interesting book
Reviewed in Germany on October 16, 2023
