Latest Book Review: Happiness, by Tony Hsieh

One of my favourite topics to engage with clients on is organisational and team culture. And one of the standout companies to reference when talking about culture is Zappos.

Its a common reference point for anyone talking about culture as Tony Hsieh (its CEO) created one of the most revered organisational cultures of all time. And business results benefited as a result. Its annual revenues reached over a billion dollars - and in less than ten years at that.

Hsieh has an interesting story and it doesn't end well. For someone who was set on creating something built on happiness, sadly he ended up lonely and isolated. The very opposite of what he wanted for his organisation.

There are multiple books about Hsieh and his business philosophy, from Wonder Boy to Happy At Any Cost, but it goes to show that without purpose - which Hsieh perhaps lost after selling Zappos to Amazon in 2009 - humans can be drawn to all number of vices.

Accounts of Hsieh’s final years describe chronic substance misuse, rapidly declining mental health exacerbated by the pandemic, and people around him who appeared more interested in spending his money than protecting his wellbeing. His life tragically ended in 2020.

There is a tragic irony in the fact that Hsieh writes in his book the importance of genuine relationships.

"Stop trying to “network” in the traditional business sense and instead just try to build up the number and depth of your friendships, where the friendship itself is its own reward. The more diverse your set of friendships are, the more likely you’ll derive both personal and business benefits from your friendships down the road."

Sadly, not everyone sees the world the same way and a generous-by-default person seems to have been taken advantage of by people all too happy to spend his money but not willing or able to intervene when the moment really mattered.

All that said, Zappos still goes down as one of the stand out case studies of organisational culture. A place built on happiness, yes, but with a culture built on customer service first.

What makes this such a great example of cultural success is the lengths Hsieh was willing to go to in putting customers at the heart of everything.

"We believe that customer service shouldn’t be just a department, it should be the entire company" as he says in the book and the numerous talks you can still find by him on the internet today.

I lost track of the number of times Hsieh uses the phrase "believe" or "belief" in his writing.

And that's what culture is all about. A set of fundamental beliefs that shape how you work and operate day to day. The things you value above all else and are willing to "sacrifice for" as Brené Brown would put it - another solid voice on values and beliefs.

Hsieh genuinely believed that if you get the culture right everything else follows. And he was right, performance follows purpose or as Hsieh put it in his book, "Passion and determination are contagious."