

How I Did It: Tony Hsieh, CEO, Zappos.com (2006) - byrneseyeview
http://www.inc.com/magazine/20060901/hidi-hsieh.html

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Luc
Zappos publishes a 'culture book' every year. It's meant for employees, but
you can also order it on their website. They only ship it to the US though, so
since I live in Europe I emailed the CEO (got his email address from some
presentation slides) and asked if they would ship it to me.

The result was quite amusing. Two assistants practically fought it out to ask
for my address and mail me the book. Then the CEO replied and offered the
same. Two days later, I received the book, sent by courier, for free.

They're really not kidding about customer service, especially considering that
I can't even BE a customer because of where I live (also, I buy shoes every 2
years).

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aditya
Thanks fluff article... now, only if he told us how he really did it. Everyone
knows zappos is obsessive about customer service!

~~~
mkull
I know.. I spent a non-insignificant amount of time looking/hoping for the
'next page' link

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slpsys
"We interview people for culture fit. We want people who are passionate about
what Zappos is about--service. I don't care if they're passionate about
shoes."

I'm not entirely sure how accurate that is. Perhaps I'm used to software--in
which jobs aren't [hopefully!] excessively tedious--but I'm sure lots of us
participate in non-work-related forums and mailing lists, helping others for
free, just because we are passionate about the subject matter.

~~~
chris11
I imagine that some jobs could be tedious there, for example working at their
call center. And I am sure a lot of other people would find that job tedious.
But Zappos pays new employees $1000 to quit. That has to be at least 50x to
100x their hourly wage. About 10% take it. So Zappos does a fair amount to
weed out the unmotivated.

If I was looking for a job, and the offer included 100x my hourly wage not to
show up, I would think about it and make sure that the job was something I was
passionate about.

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jpwagner
"A customer is the most important visitor on our premises. he is not dependent
on us. We are dependent on him. He is not an interruption in our work. He is
the purpose of it. He is not an outsider in our business. He is part of it. We
are not doing him a favor by serving him. He is doing us a favor by giving us
an opportunity to do so." \- Gandhi

~~~
gruseom
That doesn't sound right. It's a pastiche of things Gandhi might have said,
except that he would surely not have used the word "customer" in this way.
That comes from the language of 20th century capitalism, which Gandhi
abhorred.

~~~
jpwagner
I think you are misunderstanding Gandhi's philosophy. I was just reading that
this quote fits perfectly in what he calls "Seva" or service.

~~~
gruseom
I don't know what you were just reading, but I'll bet it has little to do with
what Gandhi actually thought, said, or did.

Googling the quote yields no citation, just reams of quotespam of the sort
that surrounds this kind of bogus attribution. It's an old trick: put the best
lines into the mouths of the most famous guys and people will more likely
repeat them. A Russian once told me that the funniest jokes were all
attributed to Pushkin.

The most common claim is that the line comes from a speech Gandhi gave in
South Africa in 1890. Hmm: in 1890 Gandhi was a 20-year old law student in
England. He took a job in South Africa in 1893. Maybe the date was rounded
down? But any speeches that survive from that period would surely be from the
anti-racist campaign that made him infamous, not pep talks to local
businessmen.

The real problem, though, is with the language of the quote. How likely was an
Indian lawyer in his early 20s in South Africa to dash off homilies about
customer service that sound just like inspirational American business
literature of several generations later? Amusingly, the internet can't seem to
make up its mind whether Gandhi said it or L.L. Bean did.

If anyone can dig up a real reference, though, I'm happy to be proven wrong.

~~~
jpwagner
You have some good arguments.

I couldn't find a transcription of the speech they are referencing.

But to be totally clear, referring to him as a 20-year-old law student is a
bit misleading. In 1890 he joined the executive team at the Vegetarian society
(a charity that had an international presence.) So the idea that he may travel
and give a speech is not far-fetched. Additionally as you point out, the year
may not be correctly cited.

