Delivering Happiness: A Book Review

I’ve been a Zappos fangirl since 2005 — first as a customer, then as a student of all things social media and marketing. In fact, I became a huge fan of Tony Hsieh, Zappos’ CEO, when he sent me a personal message on Twitter, right after I joined. A personal message, y’all!

So when I saw that Tony had written a book — part memoir, part textbook — I jumped at the chance to review an advance copy of “Delivering Happiness.”

Disclosure: I applied for, and was accepted to, a special program for bloggers and journalists. I received my advance copy of the book for free, but the review is an honest evaluation and all opinions are my own and I was not compensated in any way. If you want to see other reviews, you can visit the “Delivering Happiness” website here, and also find resources for ordering your own copy or learning more about Zappos.

It’s actually not the first book about Zappos that I’ve read. I have a copy of the 2008 (and need to get the updated version!) Zappos Culture Book, which is one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen. It’s basically a series of e-mails, photos, messages and more from people who work at the company. You can flip to any page of that book to see how much fun the employees have, even though they’re working incredibly hard. That book alone had me adding a Zappos Tour and meeting Tony to my bucket list.

The Culture Book is the WHAT. “Delivering Happiness” is the HOW.

The first thing you should know — this book is a blast to read. I read most of it by the pool one afternoon, with a cold drink and a stack of post-its nearby for marking sections that stood out. An hour into the book, my drink had gotten warm and I’d used up most of the post-its:

The second thing you should know is that this is the furthest thing from a stodgy, preachy book on business that you’ll ever find. Tony writes in a conversational tone, sharing personal stories of both struggle and success, and he’s not shy about telling you how you can change your future. I honestly think he roots for passionate people to succeed, and is willing to give away some of his secrets to see that happen.

What else should you know? Here are just some of the things I marked:

• Tony got his start by buying (and trying to resell, with tragic results — tragic for the earthworms, anyway) earthworms. This alone seems like an indicator that he was willing to think outside the box and follow his entrepreneurial dreams.
• After being suspended for a breach of the rules that he didn’t commit, Tony says: “Sometimes the truth alone isn’t enough, and that the presentation of the truth was just as important as the truth.”
• He’s a hustler: While at Harvard, he found himself unmotivated to study or go to classes. When he realized he was about to fail an exam, he got students at Harvard to pool their studying so he didn’t have to crack a book himself.
• On standing out as a leader in customer service from the very beginning (while at his first company, pre-Zappos): “We were religious about trying to answer every e-mail that came in as quickly as possible. Usually we were able to answer them within ten minutes, and people were amazed at our responsiveness.”
• At one point, he hit his alarm clock snooze button six times — and realized he was dreading going into work (at his own company!) This actually happened when the company was having huge business, and it helped him see that despite the success, he wasn’t happy.
• What he learned from playing poker: it’s never too late to change tables. “Without conscious and deliberate effort, inertia always wins.”
• When it comes to business, be real. Be transparent. And don’t have a motive.

“So my advice is to 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 [sic], the more likely you’ll derive both personal and professional benefits from your friendships down the road.

• A lesson learned during a HUGE party: “Envision, create and believe in your own universe.”
• On struggles (of which he’s had many, despite multi-million dollar success stories!): “The need to survive and figure things out had an unintended consequence. It brought all of us together because we all shared the same goal of not going out of business. Even though we were going through some tough times, we were going through everything together, and we were all fiercely passionate about what we were doing. We had all made sacrifices in our own way because we all believed in the potential and future of the company.”

A lot of those bullet points have to do with his personal journey, and I think that says a lot. I found myself nodding my head at page after page, silently agreeing with something Tony had written or enjoying an “aha!” moment. When it comes to his Zappos experience, I thought these nuggets were especially interesting:

• “The Face Game” — employees try and match up random employee picture with a name when they log into their computers (very cool way of making sure that relationships are not lost when the company expands)
• All employees go through Customer Loyalty Training, and at the end, they’re offered $2,000 to quit (Zappos only wants people who are passionate about the products and about the experience, and if they’re not the right fit, no harm; no foul)
• One of the core values is “Fun and a Little Weird” and I found the Live Chat example to be especially thought-provoking
• The e-mail Tony sent to employees after the Amazon acquisition — could other CEOs be as transparent and friendly as him?

All that being said, some of my post-its were to mark sections of the book I found to be a bit weak:

I didn’t like the example used to illustrate the Core Value of “Be Passionate and Determined.” It felt shoehorned in (ha! I didn’t realize how punny that was until I was done typing it), because all of the other values had such great examples. Next to those, this one felt really out of place.

Tony also stopped sharing as many personal stories toward the end of the book, when I think they’re what helped this book stand apart from the rest. I wish he’d shared more about what he felt when Amazon approached him and what he feared when he told employees. I wish he talked more about his own friendships and relationships. I wish he’d talked more about conquering personal goals (like he did when he talked about mountain climbing and marathon training).

As weaknesses go, that’s not too bad.

All in all, I give this book an A-, and highly recommend it. If nothing else, you should checking out the Delivering Happiness website as well as the Zappos site. If you have questions, send a tweet to Zappos (Tony) or DHbook — you’ll get an answer!