Case study: Zappos, based in Las Vegas, is an online retailer with the initial goal of trying to be the best website for buying shoes by offering a wide variety of brands, styles, colors, sizes, and widths. The Zappos.com brand has grown to offer shoes, handbags, eyewear, watches, and accessories for online purchase. The company’s goal is to provide the best service online, not just in shoes but in any product category. Zappos believes that the speed with which a customer receives an online purchase plays a critical role in how that customer thinks about shopping online again in the future, so the company is focusing on making sure the items get delivered to its customers as quickly as possible. Zappos has received many awards for its workplace culture and practices, including being recognized for six years in a row by Fortune magazine on its Best Company to Work For list. Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh has shaped the company’s culture, brand, and business strategy around 10 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 More with Less Be Passionate and Determined Be Humble The job of human resources at Zappos is more than just a rule enforcer. HR’s job is to protect the culture and to educate employees. HR focuses on interactions with managers and employees to understand what they need from HR (HR is even invited to attend work teams’ happy hours). Zappos’s employment practices help perpetuate its company culture. Only about 1 out of 100 applicants passes a hiring process that is equally weighted on job skills and on the potential to work in Zappos’s culture. Zappos provides free lunch in the cafeteria (cold cuts) and a full-time life coach (employees have to sit on a red velvet throne to complain), managers are encouraged to spend time with employees outside of the office, and any employee can reward another employee with a $50 bonus for good performance. Call center employees can use an online scheduling tool that allows them to set their own hours, and they can earn more pay if they work during hours with greater customer demand. Most of the over 1,500 employees at Zappos are hourly. Every new hire undergoes four weeks of training, during which the company culture must be committed to memory, and spends two weeks dealing with customers by working the telephones. New recruits are offered $2,000 to leave the company during training to weed out individuals who will not be happy working at the company. Zappos provides free breakfast, lunch, snacks, coffee, tea, and vending machine snacks. Work is characterized by constant change; a loud, open office environment; and team interactions. Zappos also believes in helping others understand what inspired the company culture. The company created the Zappos.com library, which provides a collection of books about creating a passion for customer service, products, and local communities. These books can be found in the front lobby of Zappos offices and are widely read and discussed by company employees. Corporate culture is more than a set of values, and it is maintained by a complex web of human interactions. To keep the company vibrant, CEO Tony Hsieh spent $350 million to develop a neighborhood in downtown Las Vegas, which is the home of Zappos.com’s new headquarters. Hsieh wants to provide employees with a great place to work as well as to live and socialize. Recently, Zappos adopted a management philosophy, holacracy, which gives employees the freedom and responsibility to decide how to get their work done and eliminates people managers. Hsieh’s intent was to allow employees to act more like entrepreneurs and help stimulate new ideas, bring their full selves to work, and have a purpose beyond making money, all of which he believes will benefit the business. In all, 210 employees found the new philosophy so dissatisfying that they took three months of severance pay and left the company. Zappos is changing its recruitment process to ensure that its new hires are comfortable with holacracy’s self-management style. Despite this setback, other companies are trying to learn from Zappos’s practices. Zappos Insights is a department within Zappos created to share the Zappos culture with other companies. Zappos Insights provides programs about building a culture (3-Day Culture Camp), its WOW service philosophy (School of WOW), the power of a coaching-based culture (Coaching Event), how the HR function protects the culture and how its programs support it (People Academy), and custom programs. The cost to attend these programs ranges from $2,000 to $6,000 for each attendee. Question : Discuss what topics should training emphasize for new employees to understand and work effectively in the holocracy management philosophy?
Case study:
Zappos, based in Las Vegas, is an online retailer with the initial goal of trying to be the best website for buying shoes by offering a wide variety of brands, styles, colors, sizes, and widths. The Zappos.com brand has grown to offer shoes, handbags, eyewear, watches, and accessories for online purchase. The company’s goal is to provide the best service online, not just in shoes but in any product category. Zappos believes that the speed with which a customer receives an online purchase plays a critical role in how that customer thinks about shopping online again in the future, so the company is focusing on making sure the items get delivered to its customers as quickly as possible. Zappos has received many awards for its workplace culture and practices, including being recognized for six years in a row by Fortune magazine on its Best Company to Work For list.
Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh has shaped the company’s culture, brand, and business strategy around 10 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
- More with Less
- Be Passionate and Determined
- Be Humble
The job of human resources at Zappos is more than just a rule enforcer. HR’s job is to protect the culture and to educate employees. HR focuses on interactions with managers and employees to understand what they need from HR (HR is even invited to attend work teams’ happy hours). Zappos’s employment practices help perpetuate its company culture. Only about 1 out of 100 applicants passes a hiring process that is equally weighted on job skills and on the potential to work in Zappos’s culture.
Zappos provides free lunch in the cafeteria (cold cuts) and a full-time life coach (employees have to sit on a red velvet throne to complain), managers are encouraged to spend time with employees outside of the office, and any employee can reward another employee with a $50 bonus for good performance. Call center employees can use an online
Zappos also believes in helping others understand what inspired the company culture. The company created the Zappos.com library, which provides a collection of books about creating a passion for customer service, products, and local communities. These books can be found in the front lobby of Zappos offices and are widely read and discussed by company employees. Corporate culture is more than a set of values, and it is maintained by a complex web of human interactions.
To keep the company vibrant, CEO Tony Hsieh spent $350 million to develop a neighborhood in downtown Las Vegas, which is the home of Zappos.com’s new headquarters. Hsieh wants to provide employees with a great place to work as well as to live and socialize. Recently, Zappos adopted a management philosophy, holacracy, which gives employees the freedom and responsibility to decide how to get their work done and eliminates people managers. Hsieh’s intent was to allow employees to act more like entrepreneurs and help stimulate new ideas, bring their full selves to work, and have a purpose beyond making money, all of which he believes will benefit the business. In all, 210 employees found the new philosophy so dissatisfying that they took three months of severance pay and left the company. Zappos is changing its recruitment process to ensure that its new hires are comfortable with holacracy’s self-management style. Despite this setback, other companies are trying to learn from Zappos’s practices. Zappos Insights is a department within Zappos created to share the Zappos culture with other companies. Zappos Insights provides programs about building a culture (3-Day Culture Camp), its WOW service philosophy (School of WOW), the power of a coaching-based culture (Coaching Event), how the HR function protects the culture and how its programs support it (People Academy), and custom programs. The cost to attend these programs ranges from $2,000 to $6,000 for each attendee.
Question : Discuss what topics should training emphasize for new employees to understand and work effectively in the holocracy management philosophy?
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