Lessons from a Billion Dollar CEO

I recently had the pleasure of having Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos.com, a billion dollar company speak at our recent speaker and author networking group event in Las Vegas. I know Tony is brilliant – but I wanted to share insights from an attendee. Here is an excerpt of some of the points that Greg Habstritt took away from Tony’s presentation.

At the recent SANG meetings in Las Vegas, we had a very cool presentation by Tony Hseih, CEO of Zappos.com – a billion dollar online retailer with an incredible story.

Tony is an amazing entrepreneur. In 1998, he sold LinkExchange to Microsoft for over $240 million, when he was 24 years old. It’s not hard to see how brilliant this guy is, and he shared some incredible insight into how he’s been able to build a huge, profitable business in a niche that you’d think would never work on the internet — the primary niche they’re in is selling shoes online.

Zappos.com is now doing over a BILLION dollars a year (he’s only 35 years old by the way), and Tony shared with us his 7 Steps To Building A World Class Company. There are over 12 pages of notes from his presentation, but I’m going to share Tony’s 7 Steps with you over the next 2 posts.

7 Steps To Building A World Class Company
by Tony Hseih, CEO of Zappos.com

Step #1:
DECIDE If You’re Willing To Build a Sustainable, World Class Company.

Tony’s view was that until you truly make the decision, it’s useless to try and build something when you’re not fully committed to it. As I often teach (from Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill), the power of making a DECISION is significant. It requires a lot of patience to make this decision, because it means you MUST remained focused, and maintain discipline in working towards your goal.

Once the decision is made, the REAL work begins. However, making that DECISION is what most entrepreneurs never do, and explains why most are never successful. Make the decision, and the rest falls into place.

Step #2:
Get Clear On Your Core Values

This step really resonating with me personally, because it was when I got really clear on what my personal core values are when things really start to go in my life. Tony outlined how he was very clear on what his own personal core values were, as well as those of their company. Once you know what values the company stands for, it becomes a guiding force for you. For example, it’s easy to decide who to hire when you consider core values.

For me personally, I discovered several years ago that my 5 personal core values were Accountability, Growth, Contribution, Integrity and Freedom. Now, it’s easy for me to determine what direction to take in business, what relationships to nurture, and what kind of people I want to have in my organization — I simply check them against my core values.

I operate my company with these same 5 core values, and the results speak for themselves. This is a tremendously powerful step, and Tony went to great lengths to emphasize how this was one of the key factors in the success with Zappos.com – because it has been entirely around the culture of the organization, which is driven by the core values.

Tony also made the point that discovering your core values is NOT an easy task, but worth the effort and time that it takes. Once you know what they are, the goal is simply to live in alignment with those core values, and to live them in every way through the decisions the organization makes.

Step #3:
Commit To Transparency

One of the most powerful things that Tony said was, “be real about who you are, and then you have nothing to fear“.

Most organizations (and people) spend a lot of their time making up stories and trying to be something that they’re really not. Tony’s perspective is that unique is good, and the best thing you can do is embrace who or what you are, and live it all the time. Doing so means you don’t have to try and remember what your story is, and that you don’t need to pretend with people -you just be yourself.

He also pointed out with regard to transparency that “your culture IS your brand“, and that you simply cannot pretend to be something you’re not. Customers are too smart these days, and the ability for people to talk and provide feedback is simply too powerful — you can’t hide what you really are for long.

For example, if you over-promise what you sell and leave customers unhappy, it won’t be long before they begin to voice their unhappiness on the internet. We’re in the age of instant feedback, so if you try to be something you’re not, someone will quickly call you on it.

The bottom line is, decide WHAT and WHO you are, and simply BE that in the market place. Even if not everyone loves you, people will appreciate and respect the alignment and honesty in the message.

.. Tune in tomorrow for the remaining 4 Steps in a blog entry tomorrow.

Thank you Greg for your insights – you can read more of Greg at his blog