Real Communication An Introduction

Where did you get those shoes? If they arrived on your doorstep

just thirty-six hours after you clicked on them, chances are they came from

Zappos.com. The company, founded in 1999, has earned a reputation for not

just offering customers a huge selection of clothing and accessories but also

for providing a user-friendly at-home shopping experience, complete with free

returns. So, when your favorite classic black Chuck Taylors start wearing out,

you don’t need to leave the house: just go back to Zappos, click a few buttons,

and a fresh new pair is on its way to you. That’s one reason Zappos CEO Tony

Hsieh called his management book Delivering Happiness.

But it’s not the only reason. The company’s core business, Hsieh says, has been

rooted in what he calls the “Three Cs”: clothing, customer service, and company

culture. And it’s the last item on the list that Hsieh feels is the most important:

“Our belief is that if we get the culture right, most of the other stuff—like deliver-

ing great customer service or building a long-term enduring brand or business—

will just be a natural by-product” (Hsieh, 2013, para. 2). For Zappos, the challenge

was taking what started as a small, family-like culture to scale as the company grew

into a large, thriving organization with close to fifteen thousand employees. That

meant formulating a list of core values—such as “Build a Positive Team and Fam-

ily Spirit” (#7), “Create Fun and a Little Weirdness” (#3), and “Pursue Growth

and Learning” (#5)—and using those values as a framework for decision making

at every level (Zappos, 2014). Those values, developed with input from Zappos

employees, have served as an articulation of the spirit of the company; Hseih notes

that he has hired and fired employees based on those core values (Nisen, 2013).

Hseih’s commitment to culture doesn’t end at the corporate office.

Zappos recently unveiled a new corporate headquarters in downtown Las Vegas

that is designed not to rival the sprawling, city-unto-itself model of the famed

Googleplex or Apple campuses, but to become a vital part of the surrounding

community.

chapter

Communicating

in Organizations

11

Approaches

to Managing

Organizations

Communicating

Organizational

Culture

Relational Contexts

in Organizations

Challenges

Facing Today’s

Organizations

IN THIS CHAPTER

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