Four Valuable Experiences Of Zappos

A few months ago, when I met Tony Semyon, the chief executive of Zappos in California, we talked about how his corporate culture came into being and that last summer he sold the company to Amason for $850 million (the stock of Amason, which is now worth more than $1 billion).

Here are four experiences I got from one of the great entrepreneurs of our time.

First, corporate culture originates from internal factors and long established needs rather than reverse arrangements.

From a cultural perspective, the ultimate goal of a company is to create a place for yourself in addition to salary, a place where you can work free if you can afford it.

In order to understand why Toni and his team are so crazy about this lofty cultural goal, it is important to understand what they did before Zappos.

After graduating from college, Xie and his friends set up LinkExchange. In 1998, they sold it to Microsoft for $265 million.

After selling the company, Toni began investing in young companies, including Zappos, and soon found himself missing the company's business and entrepreneurial side.

"Slowly I was involved in Zappos and spent all the time in Zappos in a year."

Toni shared how he worried about the mistakes he made in LinkExchange: it's too late to focus on culture.

He wants to work with people he likes, emphasizing the company's big goals, meaningful roles and friendships.

Xie said: "eliminate money as part of the power or balance, so it's all about working with people, and you will like to stick with it even if you don't work together."

I also believe in optimizing the operation of the company and driving the culture as an internal factor (such as the meaningful role of learning and development) rather than external factors, such as compensation.

Before and after, I wrote about how to make employees happier.

External motivation, such as salary and status, is of course necessary (after all, people need to eat), but driving goals and long-term commitments are intrinsic motivation.

Two. The starting point for quality customer service comes from a high-end commitment that must live in the hearts of every employee.

Zappos started as a shoe store, but always had a bigger ambition and became a leader in customer experience.

Toni pointed out: "one day we asked ourselves," when we grow up, what do we want to be, do we want to engage in shoes or do we want to do something larger and more meaningful? "That is when we decide that we really want to build Zappos brand and engage in the best customer service and customer experience.

"I hope that 10 years from now, people will not even realize that we started selling shoes online."

Tony Semyon said.

Customers even wrote letters asking Zappos to open a route.

In Toni's mind, it is very clear that Zappos is engaged in customer service business. It just starts with shoes.

Their outstanding customer service naturally comes from this type of person who wants to work in Zappos and is further strengthened through the company's core philosophy.

As Toni explains, "do you want people who are not satisfied with their work to show and embrace these values on the phone? There is no need to spend millions of dollars in training for the right employment practices and corporate culture: our hope is that if the culture we get is just superfluous, it will naturally happen to them."

Three. Core values are the tools that have not been fully utilized.

Together and really use them to make them self discipline.

For the core values of the definition, Toni said, "I slightly resist this idea simply because it seems to be one of the practices of those big companies.

For us, the difference is that we should put forward core values that can be entrusted to us, which means that we actually employ and dismiss employees as the criterion, whether or not depending on their work contracts.

In the core values of Zappos, the eleventh point -- humility and fourth points -- adventure, innovation and modesty is based on the input of everyone in the company.

They define the company's interpersonal relationship and philosophy of life, which makes it stand out in customer service.

Four. Finally, people and their self belief.

Zappos has an unusual hiring process.

"One of our interview questions is," what is your lucky value from 1 to 10? "We want to hire lucky people who bring more luck to Zappos.

Toni said.

The inspiration of this approach is from a study, in which self reported lucky people are more likely to get clues to help them complete a task assigned to them, and their temper helps them do better than those who feel they are born unlucky.

Zappos is not afraid of weird, nor is he afraid of being direct.

After a week's work, the new company will provide him with $2000 for his resignation.

"The initial motivation for doing this is to make sure that those who stay here are motivated by the exception of a short-term salary."

Interestingly, the biggest benefit of this approach is the impact on people who refuse: "they still have to go home, and at weekends, think about it, talk to friends and family, ask yourself, is this a company that I can really trust? Is it a company that I trust for a long time?" when they return to work on Monday, they will be more loyal to the company and full of enthusiasm for the company.