By: Tony Hsieh
Reviewed By: Glain Roberts-McCabe
The Premise: In an honest and candid ride-along, Tony Hseih describes his journey from enterprising & optimistic youngster surviving several failed attempts at entrepreneurship before arguably achieving the ultimate in financial success in 1998, at the age of 24, by selling the company he co-founded to Microsoft for $265million. However, the story really begins with the realisation by this CEO that financial success alone fails to satisfy the human spirit for growth, challenge and accomplishment. Ultimately, this book is about finding personal and professional success beyond the dollars of business through culture, values, relationships and life-long learning. “We are all human at the core, and it can be so easy to lose sight of that in a world ruled by business, politics and social status” – Tony Hseih
The Bottom-line: Sharing the good, the bad and the ugly of his experience, Tony Hseih shows that there are no shortcuts to true success. Passion, faith, nerves of steel and total accountability for your actions are what make Tony Hseih such an inspiring role-model. He’s even shared the darker side of his journey, through gut wrenching anxiety, cash flow crises and heartbreaking layoffs. Far from being a journal of events rewound and reframed with hindsight, this book is a call to action to learn from the people you meet and the events that unfold to take more and give more from life. This book describes the unique culture of Zappos in detail, and provides great examples of the lengths they will go to achieve customer satisfaction and the wow factor. My one wish would have been that Hseih include more examples of how the customer service ethic and core values are embedded in new members of the team, and how the culture is nurtured and allowed freedom to evolve as required.
