Corporate Eye

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Ed Konczal

Ed Konczal

Customer Service — Kudos To Zappos

On the bottom of Zappos, an online retailer, website is a random display of one of their ten core values. When you click on it, you see a full display of all ten values.

Note the number one item “Deliver WOW Through Service”. An interesting, and on its face, a laudable statement. Ah, but do they really deliver WOW customer service? Many companies boast of superior customer service. Based on a recent purchase made by my son, the answer for Zappos is a resounding Yes.

The incident involved my son entering incorrect order information. He realized this when the order was received. He contacted Zappos customer service and was told to sent the item back and they paid postage. The correct item was sent by overnight delivery at no cost.

This would have been enough, but a few days later he received a post card with a hand written note.

I knew about Zappos but I wanted to learn more. I found an interesting commentary about them on Harvard Business Publishing – Discussion Leaders (access video). In fact they have an interesting customer service approach —

This company is fanatical about great service—not just satisfying customers, but amazing them. The company promises free, four-day delivery. That’s pretty good. But most of the time it delivers next-day service, a surprise that leaves a lasting impression on customers: “You said four days, but I got them the next morning.”

Zappos has also mastered the art of telephone service—a black hole for most Internet retailers. Zappos publishes its 1-800 number on every single page of the site—and its smart and entertaining call-center employees are free to do whatever it takes to make you happy. There are no scripts, no time limits on calls, no robotic behavior

But there is more. Zappos “bribes” new employees to quit. After about one week on the job Zappo’s offers the new employee pay earned plus $1000 (USD) to quit. WHY?

Because if you’re willing to take the company up on the offer, you obviously don’t have the sense of commitment they are looking for. It’s hard to describe the level of energy in the Zappos culture—which means, by definition, it’s not for everybody. Zappos wants to learn if there’s a bad fit between what makes the organization tick and what makes individual employees tick—and it’s willing to pay to learn sooner rather than later. (About ten percent of new call-center employees take the money and run.)

Brilliant!

College Students Craiglists

It all started with Craigslist. It is one of the top ten internet properties and a widely known place to buy and sell just about anything. The founder Craig Newmark — whose official title is “Founder, Chairman, Customer Service Representative”, is an interesting businessman. He doesn’t want to change his somewhat antiquated text-based website, is against placing advertising on the site and is happy with the rather modest financial performance of his business. The only sales sources are charges for placing job ads and real-estate listings in only three cities. Some analysts estimate total yearly sales of only $10 million (USD).

Because of its popularity, Craigslist has an ever growing number of competitors. Perhaps its most prominent competitor is eBay who already owns about 25% of Craigslist and is trying to acquire it. Ebay launched Kijiji a Graigslist-like site with bells and whistles. Another competitor is OLX which received an additional $13.5M in Series B funding from General Catalyst, Bessemer Venture Partners, Founders Fund, and DN Capital. Then there is publicly traded LiveDeal.

While these “catch all” classifieds sites are noteworthy, what is interesting is a growing number of Craigslist-like websites targeted toward college students. The main driver is the price of textbooks. A recently launched site CollegeMedium started with books and expanded into other items, jobs, housing and chat.

But wait, there’s more —

SITE

FEATURES

UloopRequires an .edu e-mail address, takes you to full classifieds site for your school
CampustradeNot limited to your school, full classifieds
CampusxFull classifieds, college reviews, scholarship information
CampusclassifiedsFocus on books but offers free classifieds. Accepts business advertising

This is only a sampling. There are more and because of the market potential additional sites are likely to be launched. It will be interesting to observe who will survive.

Watch Movies, Learn Leadership

The leadership development industry is estimated by some to be as large as $15 billion (USD). There are many University courses, seminars, books and articles, all trying to convey leadership principles, and many fail. A reason is that leadership is best learned by experiencing it and the many leadership teaching products and services are lacking here.

The primary source of learning to lead, to the extent that leadership can be learned, is experience. Leadership development through experience.
Morgan W. McCall, Jr.

Unless you are on the fast track at your organization you don’t get the opportunity to be mentored by senior managers who will mentor and guide you.

There is an alternative learning method that some enlightened professors are using and that you can use yourself — Business Cases using movies. Movies are stories and stories can be a surrogate for experience.

a knowledge-sharing story offers a surrogate experience. When one reads a novel, one often feels as if one is living the experience described in the novel. So too when a story is recounted, the narrative form offers the listener an opportunity to experience in a surrogate fashion the situation that was experienced by the storyteller.
Storytelling in Organizations: The power and traps of using stories to share knowledge in organizations
Deborah Sole, LILA Harvard University
Daniel Gray Wilson, LILA Harvard University

OK, got the logic? Leadership is best learned by experience, stories can be an alternative for experience and movies are stories.

One of the best sites that offers movie leadership case studies is the Hartwick Institute. You can purchase the case study and teaching notes at reasonable prices.

This site has a scholarly approach and describes how to use the selected movies to teach and learn leadership skills.

Another, less scholarly but still worthy of a visit, is MoviesForBusiness.

The concept is the same but it takes a more entertaining approach. There is a free lesson based on the Wizard of Oz and you can even get an MBA (Master of Bijou Advice), obviously not accredited.

Here are some additional resources —

Now you have another reason to go to the movies.

Good Corporate Governance – Ethics Hotlines, But…

BusinessWeek published its Best Corporate Practices in January. I noted with some interest that the #6 best practice was an Ethics Hotline.

All employers talk about ethics, but the ones who provide a way to report misdeeds are the ones most likely to catch problems. Confidential ethics hotlines allow employees to anonymously report bad actors without taking their chances on the dreaded “chain of command.”

This has implications for Corporate Governance.

Most discoveries of fraud are by employees. Since Sarbanes-Oxley there has been much interest in Ethics Hotlines. You might think that there would be an increased employee use of these Hotlines. Well no, according to the Ethics Resource Centers’ 2007 NATIONAL BUSINESS ETHICS SURVEY, employees seem to be reluctant to use these Hotlines.

Reasons why employees avoid hotlines include cultural taboos on “snitching” and lack of awareness. However the main reason is fear of retaliation. Even when the hotline is outsourced, there might still be the fear that anonymity cannot be completely guaranteed.

The key learning is that Ethics Hotlines must be viewed as one alternative in a menu of practices to report ethics violations. Companies should not think that once a hotline is in place that nothing else needs to be done.

Best Company Leader Development Programs

Companies can survive poor leaders but thrive with good leaders. That’s why Bersin Associates estimates that companies spend 30% of their trainings budgets on leadership development. Many companies have their own signature programs. Let’s take a look at the best rated programs.

Leadership Excellence performs one of the most comprehensive ratings across a broad range of programs, large and medium sized companies, non-profits and government programs. I will focus on the top large corporations.

Let’s take a look at some of the internal practices of the best rated companies.

Southwest Arlines

Be seen. I have recommended this in my book and articles. People need to see their leaders. In larger companies there is a greater tendency toward isolation of senior managers.

Take an example from Herb Kelleher former CEO of Southwest Airlines; he routinely visited everyone in his organization from baggage handlers and ticket agents and pilots to flight attendants. Meet the people you support often. Don’t wait for the special events. Invite small groups to neutral area, the cafeteria during off peak hours is good. If this doesn’t work, your office is OK, but be sure that your desk is not a barrier. Move your chair to the front of your desk. Have people speak first and listen. Ask what their suggestions are to do things differently.

Capital One

Kudos to Capital One. They understand that the best leadership educators are their own senior management. They understand the context the company operates within and they have a storehouse of experience regarding how they made it to the top.

At Capital One, we have designed a leaders-as-teachers program to help develop the leadership capabilities of managers and junior-level executives, the pool from which many of our company’s future leaders will emerge. Our program generally functions on the following two platforms:

  • The Executive Speaker Series
  • Leadership Workshops.

The Executive Speaker Series consists of formal, didactic, 90-minute presentations to an audience of several hundred members, covering a broad range of topic areas. Presenters, or teachers, are drawn from the company’s resident “leadership trust” and include the CEO, president, senior vice-presidents and other C-Level executives. During the lecture segment, there is no dialogue. In short, this is an opportunity; in one hour, to tell one’s story and to paint a self-portrait in broad, and sometimes colorfully bold, strokes that says, “This is who I am, how I got here.” Lisa M. Meadows is vice president of executive leadership development at Capital One

Caterpillar

Another company that sees leaders as teachers.

One of the components of Caterpillar‘s Leadership Quest program involves participants presenting to the CEO their strategy for the organization in the year 2020. In October 2005, the Strategic Planning Committee launched Vision 2020 and rewrote the Code of Conduct. The College of Leadership, in partnership with key corporate organizations, rolled out the new strategy and code down through the organization using a leaders-as-teachers approach. Learning sessions designed to achieve divisional alignment were conducted around the world. All leaders were involved in communicating the essence of the new strategy to their subordinates and helping them see their roles in achieving the organization’s strategic goals. (Adapted from Alex Goldsmith “Evolving Leadership, Procter & Gamble’s Distinct Approach to Recruiting”)

Procter & Gamble

Procter & Gamble’s Global Leadership Council, talks about the changing archetype of a leadership. It also shares with students ways they could evoke loyalty from coworkers and distinguish themselves from their peers. There is also a message from Procter & Gamble’s Chief Operating Officer which he emphasizes the importance of values and integrity in decision making.

Additional Resources

Bersin Associates Awards

OPTIMIZING YOUR LEADERSHIP PIPELINE from DDI, Inc. (PDF)

Must Visit Business Information Sites

Anyone who uses the Internet for research knows that there is lots of fluff in search results. However there are some real gems and I’d like to share a few.

The first is ManyWorlds

Topics include the full spectrum of business issues — planning, marketing, organization issues and more. The content is delivered in a variety of formats — whitepapers, presentations, tools, blogs and articles.

Some example topics, “Where is advertising going?”, “When benchmarks don’t work.” To obtain full access registration is needed, but well worth it.

Here is another great site ChangeThis–” We’re on a mission to spread important ideas and change minds.”

Here is a sample of topics —

  • How can you tap the transformational power of the truth? How can you use it to turn ordinary relationships into extraordinary ones?
  • Business Improvisation: The Diving Catch of the Corporate World
  • People Don’t Hate Change, They Hate How You’re Trying to Change Them
  • Seinfeld on Marketing: 7 Marketing Lessons from the Cast of the Show About Nothing

How can you resist a visit? There is a wide range of subject areas. Definitely unique and thought provoking. No registration, but you can sign up for news updates.

Here are a few more —

Need Marketing Information try the MarketingTeacher covers just about anything about Marketing including Bowman’s Strategy Clock.

Another unique site is ConceptSpace from the London Business School. It is a visual search tool. Gives you basic information on virtually any business topic.

Finally this site is the KitchenSink of links to anything you need to know about business and more. It has many external links and spreadsheets and whitepapers to download.

Now you may get through the fluff and find what you need.