7 ms·

I think the idea with Zappos is that they're supposed to be such a great place to work that you wouldn't want to leave. And in Zappos' case, I get why they off

by exelius 12y ago

I think the idea with Zappos is that they're supposed to be such a great place to work that you wouldn't want to leave. And in Zappos' case, I get why they offered severance deals. They were embarking on a radical experiment in organizational structure, and not everyone is going to be on board with it. Rather than having a bunch of people at the water cooler talking shit about the changes, you offer them money to leave so that people who aren't on board with the changes get out of the way. I would guess that many of the people at Zappos who took the deal were managers themselves. If you're a middle manager, you have skills around managing people but maybe not so much with doing the actual work. If your skill set doesn't align with the new job you're being asked to do (which is effectively a demotion), and the company offers you a buyout to leave, what would you do?

bunderbunder 12y ago
I imagine that people in management positions have reason to take the package even if their skill set is perfectly aligned to the new job. If you're on a career path where one of the major measures of your success is how many people are under you, then you better be pretty committed to the Zappos vision if you're staying on. A long stint of not having anyone reporting through you might be a bit of a black spot on your resume if you ever end up for a position elsewhere.
- latj 12y ago
  The list of people who took the offer was posted internally. I imagine it must be out in the wild somewhere by now as well. Besides managers who are looking to jump ship and pretend to do work somewhere else, a lot of professionals are on the list- lawyers, accounting people. I imagine some of these people will show up on Amazon's roster in the near future.
  - manigandham 12y ago
    > "Pretend to do work" Little presumptuous isn't it?
- liquidcool 12y ago
  Yes, even the title change from something like "Senior Manager" to "Employee" might hurt your chances. With IT/dev it's not so bad, as some very good organizations list both grads and greybeards as "Member of Technical Staff." I have to imagine that those who remain plan to retire from there.
- lsc 12y ago
  > If you're on a career path where one of the major measures of your success is how many people are under you, My assumption would be that those are the people that this move is attempting to push out.
Spooky23 12y ago
I'm surprised the number of people taking the deal isn't higher. If I need religious zeal, I'll go join a religion.
- dingbat 12y ago
  well another way to look at it is that there is already a fundamentalist organizational religion that most people adhere to, they're just unaware of being part of one already
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - kzhahou 12y ago
    Please explain.
  - some1else 12y ago
    Please identify this "fundamentalist organizational religion" a bit clearer. Did you mean capitalism, b-school, emergent hierarchical organizations.. tribes?
    - honeybooboo123 12y ago
      My guess would be "statism". It could be defined as the belief that political power should be used to fix societal problems, even though they were caused by it in the first place.
    - dingbat 12y ago
      its pretty simple, there is obviously a very ingrained faith in the standard organizational structure w/ management, staff. its so obvious that is how things should be (its "fundamental"), that its difficult to consider that belief is possibly also a matter of faith, even if that standard structure was itself emergent in some respects. its possible the commenter i was responding to was referring more to the "rah rah" aspect of zappos as a whole, rather than religious zeal re: this new organizational concept. those are different things in my mind, also both are exhibited by the directive "to all employees: read this book and indicate you have done so". anyway it isnt a comment on whether or not the zappos idea itself is useful and/or just another fad coated with new terminology (i have no idea). just that when you can identify someone else as engaging in religious zealotry, its fun to consider what that zealotry is being compared to, which probably turns out to be something like "everybody knows its supposed to be this way", aka. some sorta implicit religion.
lmg643 12y ago
it's easy to forget that zappos was acquired by amazon. i am interested to what extent sales growth or lack thereof, would be a driver of radical restructuring.
- exelius 12y ago
  I think that Amazon is content to let Zappos experiment. If Zappos loses customers, statistically most of them will end up at Amazon anyway. Tony Hsieh is pretty out there, and a lot of his ideas sound kind of crazy, but I think Bezos believes in him and is willing to let him try. Even though everyone says "Oh, that won't work" you don't know until you try. If Zappos can experiment with a new leadership style, maybe it produces desirable results that can be replicated elsewhere. Maybe it fails miserably. What's likely to happen is that there will be things that work and things that don't, and I guarantee Amazon is interested in that. Because of all the things I've heard about Amazon (many of them good), I've never heard that it's a great place to work. Their turnover is high, so maybe they're looking for ways to reduce it while not losing the culture of urgency (though some would say fear) that makes them so good at executing on things. Of course, if it's a total failure, Bezos will likely fire Tony and trash the entire idea.
  - eclipxe 12y ago
    It's a great place to work. There, you can no longer say "you never heard it's a great place to work". Sample size of 1, but I love it.
    - jevanish 12y ago
      That's great to hear, but how much did that change for you or others when the holocracy processes were added? I can see where that could totally change how I feel about a job even if I still love my coworkers, the job perks, etc.
      - eclipxe 12y ago
        Sorry I should have clarified - I meant Amazon is.
keithpeter 12y ago
"Rather than having a bunch of people at the water cooler talking shit about the changes, you offer them money to leave so that people who aren't on board with the changes get out of the way." Each change creates winners and losers. The losers will be around that water cooler. You can't manage this before the trajectory is flown. Best of luck to all involved.
teammatters 12y ago
Personally, I don't care too much about company culture in regards to the rat race of working in office(work remotely for a large company). I would take the money and find another gig; preferably a remote job. On a different note more employers need to offer remote working options. You wake up, rollover and start working without needing to shower right away, drive/get stuck in traffic, pay a lot for gas ... remote working if more and more allow it/offer it is a solution to the traffic on our highways. Yet there goes many construction jobs ... an example of the Internet killing tons of jobs in that field. Well im off track, but feel passionate about working remotely, not needing to are about office culture/politics and the huge benefits to society if more companies allowed/forced remote working.
sokoloff 12y ago
Rather than having a bunch of people at the water cooler talking shit about the changes, you offer them money to leave so that people who aren't on board with the changes get out of the way. There's that element directly, but I think even more powerful is the sense to the employees that they are consciously opting in to staying. They are literally passing up a (small) pot of gold in order to stay in the new structure. The mere fact of choosing in such a way (even if that's the default choice) will tend to increase commitment in the inevitable dark moments of the transition.
- sopooneo 12y ago
  Doesn't Zappos make a similar offer to everyone that finishes their new employee training program?
  - MetaCosm 12y ago
    Yep, 3k -- and for the same reason. http://bigthink.com/inside-employees-minds/zappos-will-give-you-3000-to-get-your-priorities-straight http://bigthink.com/inside-employees-minds/zappos-will-give-...

by exelius 12y ago

bunderbunder 12y ago

I imagine that people in management positions have reason to take the package even if their skill set is perfectly aligned to the new job. If you're on a career path where one of the major measures of your success is how many people are under you, then you better be pretty committed to the Zappos vision if you're staying on. A long stint of not having anyone reporting through you might be a bit of a black spot on your resume if you ever end up for a position elsewhere.

latj 12y ago
The list of people who took the offer was posted internally. I imagine it must be out in the wild somewhere by now as well. Besides managers who are looking to jump ship and pretend to do work somewhere else, a lot of professionals are on the list- lawyers, accounting people. I imagine some of these people will show up on Amazon's roster in the near future.
- manigandham 12y ago
  > "Pretend to do work" Little presumptuous isn't it?
liquidcool 12y ago
Yes, even the title change from something like "Senior Manager" to "Employee" might hurt your chances. With IT/dev it's not so bad, as some very good organizations list both grads and greybeards as "Member of Technical Staff." I have to imagine that those who remain plan to retire from there.
lsc 12y ago
> If you're on a career path where one of the major measures of your success is how many people are under you, My assumption would be that those are the people that this move is attempting to push out.

Spooky23 12y ago

I'm surprised the number of people taking the deal isn't higher. If I need religious zeal, I'll go join a religion.

dingbat 12y ago
well another way to look at it is that there is already a fundamentalist organizational religion that most people adhere to, they're just unaware of being part of one already
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- kzhahou 12y ago
  Please explain.
- some1else 12y ago
  Please identify this "fundamentalist organizational religion" a bit clearer. Did you mean capitalism, b-school, emergent hierarchical organizations.. tribes?
  - honeybooboo123 12y ago
    My guess would be "statism". It could be defined as the belief that political power should be used to fix societal problems, even though they were caused by it in the first place.
  - dingbat 12y ago
    its pretty simple, there is obviously a very ingrained faith in the standard organizational structure w/ management, staff. its so obvious that is how things should be (its "fundamental"), that its difficult to consider that belief is possibly also a matter of faith, even if that standard structure was itself emergent in some respects. its possible the commenter i was responding to was referring more to the "rah rah" aspect of zappos as a whole, rather than religious zeal re: this new organizational concept. those are different things in my mind, also both are exhibited by the directive "to all employees: read this book and indicate you have done so". anyway it isnt a comment on whether or not the zappos idea itself is useful and/or just another fad coated with new terminology (i have no idea). just that when you can identify someone else as engaging in religious zealotry, its fun to consider what that zealotry is being compared to, which probably turns out to be something like "everybody knows its supposed to be this way", aka. some sorta implicit religion.

lmg643 12y ago

it's easy to forget that zappos was acquired by amazon. i am interested to what extent sales growth or lack thereof, would be a driver of radical restructuring.

exelius 12y ago
I think that Amazon is content to let Zappos experiment. If Zappos loses customers, statistically most of them will end up at Amazon anyway. Tony Hsieh is pretty out there, and a lot of his ideas sound kind of crazy, but I think Bezos believes in him and is willing to let him try. Even though everyone says "Oh, that won't work" you don't know until you try. If Zappos can experiment with a new leadership style, maybe it produces desirable results that can be replicated elsewhere. Maybe it fails miserably. What's likely to happen is that there will be things that work and things that don't, and I guarantee Amazon is interested in that. Because of all the things I've heard about Amazon (many of them good), I've never heard that it's a great place to work. Their turnover is high, so maybe they're looking for ways to reduce it while not losing the culture of urgency (though some would say fear) that makes them so good at executing on things. Of course, if it's a total failure, Bezos will likely fire Tony and trash the entire idea.
- eclipxe 12y ago
  It's a great place to work. There, you can no longer say "you never heard it's a great place to work". Sample size of 1, but I love it.
  - jevanish 12y ago
    That's great to hear, but how much did that change for you or others when the holocracy processes were added? I can see where that could totally change how I feel about a job even if I still love my coworkers, the job perks, etc.
    - eclipxe 12y ago
      Sorry I should have clarified - I meant Amazon is.

keithpeter 12y ago

"Rather than having a bunch of people at the water cooler talking shit about the changes, you offer them money to leave so that people who aren't on board with the changes get out of the way." Each change creates winners and losers. The losers will be around that water cooler. You can't manage this before the trajectory is flown. Best of luck to all involved.

teammatters 12y ago

Personally, I don't care too much about company culture in regards to the rat race of working in office(work remotely for a large company). I would take the money and find another gig; preferably a remote job. On a different note more employers need to offer remote working options. You wake up, rollover and start working without needing to shower right away, drive/get stuck in traffic, pay a lot for gas ... remote working if more and more allow it/offer it is a solution to the traffic on our highways. Yet there goes many construction jobs ... an example of the Internet killing tons of jobs in that field. Well im off track, but feel passionate about working remotely, not needing to are about office culture/politics and the huge benefits to society if more companies allowed/forced remote working.

sokoloff 12y ago

Rather than having a bunch of people at the water cooler talking shit about the changes, you offer them money to leave so that people who aren't on board with the changes get out of the way. There's that element directly, but I think even more powerful is the sense to the employees that they are consciously opting in to staying. They are literally passing up a (small) pot of gold in order to stay in the new structure. The mere fact of choosing in such a way (even if that's the default choice) will tend to increase commitment in the inevitable dark moments of the transition.

sopooneo 12y ago
Doesn't Zappos make a similar offer to everyone that finishes their new employee training program?
- MetaCosm 12y ago
  Yep, 3k -- and for the same reason. http://bigthink.com/inside-employees-minds/zappos-will-give-you-3000-to-get-your-priorities-straight http://bigthink.com/inside-employees-minds/zappos-will-give-...