Jun 7
What's the Big Deal with Delivering Happiness?
Imagine going to the grocery store to buy a can of Mandarin oranges. You walk down the aisle that says “Fruits and Vegetables”, pick out a can with bright, juicy Mandarines on the label, buy it and drive home.
Then, opening the can to add its contents to a fruit salad you’ve been dreaming about, you look inside and find corn. Ugly, shriveled, pale yellow corn. You stare at the can in disbelief and see an asterisk with fine print on the label that reads, “Does not actually contain Mandarin oranges.”
You’ve been burned again by slick advertising!
According to Delivering Happiness by Zappos’ CEO Tony Hsieh, these days are fading fast. As a business blogger I was given a copy of Delivering Happiness by Tony’s team to honestly review it the day of its debut, which happens to be today.
“Building a brand today is very different that building a brand 50 years ago,” Tony writes. “It used to be that a few people got together in a room, decided what the brand positioning was going to be, and then spent a lot of money buying advertising telling people what their brand was. And if you were able to spend enough money, then you were able to build your brand.
“It’s a very different world today. With the Internet connecting everyone together, companies are becoming more and more transparent whether they like it or not. An unhappy customer or disgruntled employee can blog about a bad experience with a company, and the story can spread like wildfire by email or Twitter.”
In other words, you better make sure that the advertising label on the outside of your company is completely congruent with the actual experience people have with your company on the inside.
“Over time, as we focused more and more on culture,” Tony continues, “we ultimately came to the realization that a company’s culture and a company’s brand are really just two sides of the same coin. The brand is just a lagging indicator of a company’s culture.”
Zappos defines their culture with ten core values. Don’t roll your eyes at this! I know we’ve all seen corporate values statements that were nothing more that empty words on a wall that in no way reflected what actually went on within the company (Corn instead of Mandarin oranges. Are you listening BP?).
First, the core values Zappos chose uniquely defined them. As they narrowed the list from 37 to 10, they made sure that each value truly represented who they wanted to be. Secondly, and even more importantly, they followed them. They were committed to actually doing these things, not just talking about them. This commitment meant that Zappos would hire and fire based on their values. End of discussion. Tony concluded, “If we weren’t willing to do that, then they weren’t really values.”
Here are Zappos’ ten core values:
- Deliver WOW Through Service
- Embrace and Drive Change
- Create Fun and A Little Weirdness
- Be Adventurous, Creative, and Open-Minded
- Pursue Growth and Learning
- Build Open and Honest Relationships With Communication
- Build a Positive Team and Family Spirit
- Do More With Less
- Be Passionate and Determined
- Be Humble
As an internet start-up AFTER the dot-com bust, Zappos was under-capitalized and living on the edge. Yet they succeeded wildly with this one mandate: being true to their core values. Zappos consistently delighted their customers, at times wildly exceeding expectations. In doing so, Zappos has re-written the rules for business success, internally and externally.
Are you playing by these new rules? Is what you say you’ll do as a company what you actually do? Have you clearly defined your core values and follow them consistently? With instant Internet access and social media ubiquity, there’s no hiding behind a fancy label and fine print any more.
Finally, because this is a book review, here are a few words of critique: over two-thirds of Delivering Happiness is backstory leading up to Zappos’ success. As entertaining as all these stories were, I would have preferred more content than backstory. In the final chapter Tony devotes a few pages on his philosophy of business leadership, which I found fascinating. I would have enjoyed more content here as well.
What are YOUR next steps? Here are two:
1. Look into to how to create a set of core values for your company: Core Values at Zappos
2. Order a copy of Delivering Happiness and read it for yourself at Delivering Happiness at Amazon
The section on culture as brand was my favorite part in the book. I found lots of other inspiring nuggets hidden in there to. But there was quite a bit of redundancy and personal back story that felt self-indulgent. The book should have started around P. 90 and cut out a couple dozen pages in between.
Still, I really enjoyed it and plan on writing my own positive review. Thanks for the advanced copy Bill!
— Matt Riopelle · Jun 8, 08:21 AM
I disagree Matt. I actually really enjoyed the backstory. If anything it illustrated Tony’s pursuit of happiness, something that I think actually truly eludes him even today. Tony will become bored even with Zappos soon and will be after the new thing. Story is everything when understanding motives and drives. Tony’s, (even if self indulgent) stories, lend reason to his need for community and success.
— John · Jun 8, 08:47 AM
Maybe the best core value I can think of is last on the list: Be Humble.
With true humility, so many of the other values will fall into place. This might also be the most difficult for a business person — it sometimes feels like if you don’t blow your own horn it might not get blown at all. But if you truly build your business that way, the rewards may be a bit slower in coming, but I believe they’ll come with a vengeance.
Zappos didn’t become an overnight success, but their brand is so strong now, it would take a lot for them to become an overnight failure.
— Ryan · Jun 8, 02:43 PM
Very, very true Ryan. Zappos is now the second company I’ve run into over the last month that has chosen HUMILITY as one of its core values (the other is The Table Group led by Patrick Lencioni). Maybe the days of chest-thumping bravado in business are over!
— Bill Zipp · Jun 8, 02:52 PM