A new book, released this week, is an inspiration for any business that believes what they do is hard work. Delivering Happiness is a true story of how perseverance, focus and a little irreverence for the status quo pay off when you also treat people right. I was invited to review an advance copy of the book penned by Zappos chief, Tony Hsieh (pronounced: Shay). I highly recommend that you read this first-hand account of how Zappos, an online etailer, grew from zero to over $1 billion in gross merchandise sales in less than ten years. The book, subtitled A Path to Profits, Passion and Purpose, offers clear and distinct models anyone can use to build or improve upon a culture-sustainable business. Learn how Zappos transformed into a billion dollar enterprise when they decided to brand through customer service.
The end game, as Hsieh calls it, is Happiness. He’s passionate when he talks about customer happiness, employee happiness, and [leadership] happiness—“the goals of happiness aren’t mutually exclusive.”
Indeed, it is refreshing to read about a company (in a business book) so obsessed with its culture. We have all bragged about “our people” at some point in our careers but Zappos demonstrates how you can take that idea to the bank. Every employee seems to live and share what is a very well honed list of ten core values that they believe define their culture. These values seem to extend to their personal lives as well. “Hire slowly and fire quickly” is one of their secrets. And if a new recruit doesn’t believe in [the core values] they are offered $2,000 to leave.
Zappos’ goal is simple: have the best customer service in the world. Under Hsieh’s direction, they abolished the idea of a customer service department and instead, built customer service into a kind of central nervous system that permeates every aspect of the business. By doing this they say they avoid the marketing expense “letting our customers do the marketing for us.”
They didn’t just think this stuff up overnight. More than half of the book is devoted to their dealings with unusual, seemingly insurmountable, challenges and setbacks they faced along their short journey. But there’s always an upshot. Tony Hsieh, a Harvard graduate, learns well from experience and is able to reflect with amazing keenness of thought and insight. This next quote is not particularly a good example of that statement but, nonetheless, illustrates the importance the CEO places on vision.
“In business, one of the most important decisions for an entrepreneur or a CEO to make is what business to be in. It doesn’t matter how flawlessly a business is executed if it’s the wrong business or if it’s too small a market.”
In this passage, Mr. Hsieh doesn’t mean to suggest that you necessarily need to run from your coatings business. Instead, consider changing your vision or definition of the business you’re already in. He insists, “there [is] always a bigger vision that could make the table bigger” referring to another passage in the book where he makes an insightful comparison to the game of poker and its striking similarities to business.
But his message is fresh, unexpected and very inspiring. It is not the usual adapt or die ultimatum familiarized by the oft-used story of the buggy-whip industry, which missed its opportunity to expand upon vision and redefine its business as [in] “transportation.” Instead the industry focused on making better whips and, very quickly, got run over by the auto industry.
I often lament about leaders who proudly use the phrase “we’ve always done it that way” —it is such a destructive mentality. Well, you will notice in the book that the Zappos brand promise changed 5 times in 10 years! Like it’s leader, the company had to evolve in order to arrive. Here’s a look at the evolution of Zappos brand promise over the years:
1999—Largest Selection of Shoes
2003—Customer Service
2005—Culture and Core Values as Our Platform
2007—Personal Emotional Connection
2009—Delivering Happiness
In a relatively short time Zappos made many difficult, very disruptive, decisions to ensure that they could ultimately deliver on their promise of happiness. In one instance they moved the company, and most of its employees, from San Francisco to Las Vegas in order to grow a brand that would require a much larger pool of service-oriented employees. In another instance, they took equally dramatic action after eLogistics failed to deliver (literally) on their promise.
After a short engagement with the subcontractor, Zappos leased their own warehouse, located strategically in Kentucky, near the central UPS hub, and built their own proprietary inventory system. The lesson: “never outsource your core competency.” Zappos learned that a third party could never care about their customers as much as they would. “If we hadn’t reacted quickly, it would have eventually destroyed Zappos.”
Delivering Happiness >http://www.deliveringhappinessbook.com< deserves a space on your shelf next to your favorite business books. As always, let me know your thoughts.
Take action, here is the link to Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/deliveringhappiness
Legalese: I, David Stahl, received free advanced copies of this book. My statements are unbiased, honest opinions.