Case Study 3: Zappos: Delivering Customer Satisfaction

Ruby Holmes

Strayer University

Ethics and Advocacy for Human Resource Professional

(HRM 522)

June 7, 2015

Dr. Leslie Wills

Case Study 3: Zappos: Delivering Customer Satisfaction 1. [Analyze the manner in which Zappos’ leadership has fostered a culture of ethicalness in the company. Zappos was able to capture the uniqueness of talented individuals by cultivating a craving to welcome an enhance way of culture’s that is like a running river that can’t stop running. To date Zappos efforts to strategize well defined plan’s has been amazing in terms of employing innovative, creative minds that continue to develop new products and categories. Zappos cornered the market of offering a kid friendly web site to shop via the internet or better known as on-line shopping. Zappos has made a toast to the innovative cyber shopping experience that is capped off with a fine taste of rare champagne by offering exceptional customer service. Zappos corporation is so knowledge and confident in their product line that their motto state the policy of easy return without any hassles. In the event that your merchandise that you order on-line does not exceeds your exceptional Zappos is willing to return the item(s) at no additional charge to the customer. Zappos continues the quest for exemplarily customer service. Mr. Nick Swinmurn founded Zappos after a frustrating day at the mall looking for shoes that he never found. The shoes he found were either too big, too small, or the wrong color and material. The frustrations lead Mr. Swinmurn to start a shoe website that offered the best selection and best service. Tony Hsieh was an early investor whom soon accepted the role of the CEO of Zappos whom sold to Microsoft in 1998. Suggest two (2) actions that other companies can take in order to mimic this culture. Zappos have fostered a culture of ethicalness in the corporation also by. The ethical process centered approach does not mean a complete lack of interest in overt acts but the major concern is now the process generate. What would be the character of an ethical individual and unethical consequences? It simply means that interest is now in developing and establishing a moral climate, not in enforcing an act centered moral code. Secondly, in the process centered approach no behavior can be regarded as beyond moral concern. Lastly, everyone is somehow responsibility involved in any process centered moral and ethical situation. Continue to seek out talented and creative individuals to take their corporation to the next level of success and conduct market research and analyze those results to forecast the next latest trend that customer are willing able to utilize their purchasing power capabilities. To understand how an individual gifts and abilities can be used productively to further the vision of the organization. 2. Determine the major impacts that Zappos’ leadership and ethical practices philosophy have had on its stakeholders. The Zappos business model is built around developing long-term customer relationships. Zappos has built a proven record that it does not have to compete in the price war. With that being said its outstanding cyber record speaks volume of the corporation and its quality of customer service and quantity of profitable margin. Zappo have strategically and tactically invented a corporation that lives and breathe to create a stress free internet merchandise total shopping experience. Zappos currently out sales their competitors of on-line vendors. Zappos has the capabilities to offer a variety of cyber selections such as unthinkable items of shoes, apparel, accessories, and home products, with every shopper dream of free shipping and full refunds within five business days of your returns date. Zappos willingness to think outside of the box has made a name for the corporations by employing a phenomenal innovative and creative diverse group of visionary individuals whom have made a cutting edge cyber industry. Zappos corporation make a personally commitment to serve the customers and employees has made them one of the most desirable places to work national and internationally that rewards with internal promotions. Unlike other corporations Zappos have been able to maintain its unique culture and continues efforts in developing innovative categories such as clothing and merchandise markets. 3. Examine three (3) of the ethical challenges that Zappos faces. Zappos ethical challenges includes; every company, responsible or not, faces ethical challenges. Zappos has addressed some critical challenges, handling them with agility, strength, and precision. 1. The first ethical challenge was the 2008 Layoff. Due to economic times Zappos had to lay off eight percent of their highly valued employees. This hard decision as the corporation cherished each and every staff member. They were completely honest and open about the financial concerns that they were experiencing in and the employees understood what and why they needed to take these actions. In the end, all the employees that were laid off received and an amazing package to include six months of Cobra health insurance coverage, paid in full courtesy of Zappos. 2. The second ethical challenge was the merger with Amazon in 2009. Customers were confused on why Zappos had decided to unite with Amazon, and instead of leaving their loyal consumers wondering they publicly expressed the situation. The CEO Tony Hsieh shared the reasons on why Zappos made this decision, assuring that this merger was for the benefit of their customers. The current board of directors did not want the corporation to focus on their clients but to shift focus exclusively to product sales. Mr. Hsieh did not approve of abandoning the customer centric model that Zappos was founded upon and made the decision based on his personal feelings. In order to buy out the board, Zappos needed to unite with Amazon, a business that not only accepted but promoted their value to customers. In the end, both Zapppos and its customers benefited from the highly talked about merger with Amazon. [pic]. The third biggest ethical challenge involved the technical difficulties and the theft of customer information. In October 2011, one of the processing systems encountered complication and problems quickly escalated. Orders were deleted, delayed to the wrong locations, and a glitch on a website listed a set price for every item resulting in a $1.6 million loss for the corporation. Despite knowing that they would encounter a large deficit, they humbly accepted their mistake and followed by the false price on the internet. Globalization increasingly closer integration of countries and individuals of the world brought about by the large amount of reduction of transportation and communication costs and the breakdown of barriers to the flow of goods, services, capital and knowledge. Globalization can be compared to the wave pool at the Space and Rocket Center in my local town that has brought about the impact of new technologies. Television, the internet and other forms of rapid communication have no doubt increased mobility and commercialization of ideas. However, different aspects of globalization include free movement of capital, trade, cultural and political differences. With that being said these changes have brought about many problems with cross national boundaries; such as terrorism, disease, refugees, environment problems, and rapid flow of capital. To date no nation is exempt. In recent news article there have been reports that many people that reside in small areas. Some individuals never went further than twenty miles from their homes however, there were reports of genocide in Rwanda and Darfur, or suicide bomber in Jerusalem, that stories have crossed across our television screens, to inform the world that we live more and more in a global community, and we are experiencing a global economic order. Recommend three (3) actions that Zappos’ leadership should take in order to address these ethical challenges. Communicate in terms conducting external training experts, Enforce he social responsibility of business and how these responsibilities could be implemented by corporate leaders, and stress the accountability act. Highly consider adapting Confucian first, do no harm, provided guidance in applying the difficult task of ethics to social responsibility. 4. Evaluate the effectiveness of the core values in relation to developing a culture of ethicalness. The effectiveness of the core value in relation to developing a culture of ethicalness begins with the inspired Zappo and its affiliates cultures and phrase: POWEED by SERVICE, which is short for one way that Zappo so equivalently display on a daily basis, is to share the culture with the customers through the Zappos library. All Zappos employees are given the option as an employee to assist in molding the efforts of implementing the meaning of Core Value #5 of Pursue Growth and Learning We thought Why not offer them to the customers as well. The ten core values that Zappos employees live by are; I. Deliver WOW Through Service II. Embrace and Drive Change III. Create Fun and A Little Weirdness IV. Be Adventures, Creativity, and Open Minded V. Pursue Growth and Learning VI. Build Open and Honest Relationships With Communication VII. Build a Positive Team and Family Spirit VIII. Do More With Less IX. Be Humble The concepts of integrity, ethics morality, and honor are closely related, but they are not the same. Integrity means adherence to a moral code as well as standards of ethics and moral value. Ethics in the context of leadership has to do with rules or standards governing the conduct of an individual or members of a profession. Morality concerns conformity to the rules of right conduct. Most often we define honor as demonstrable integrity and honesty, adding that an honorable man stood by his principles. Laws and ethics are distinctive different in terms of Slavery being legal in the United States however, not all African Americans could become citizens, and they were afforded no constitutional protection. With that being said, the law and ethics were the same, in the slavery days if you attempted to subvert the law to give constitutional rights to African Americans, you would not only be violating the law, you would be unethical. 5. Analyze the major ethical challenges that Zappos has faced. In January of 2012 Zappos database was hacked and millions of customer’s personal information was taken. Although the data of credit numbers were not stolen, information regarding full names, addresses, phone numbers, and the last four digits of credit cards were compromised. In response to these situation Zappos contacted each customer informing them of the predicament they were in. Despite the fact that these actions are not easy to address and could be extremely costly, Zappos were responsible and accountable for their actions. And guaranteed that customer’s personal credit card numbers were safe. Despite the fact that these actions are not easy to address and could be extremely costly, Zappos accepted the blame and guaranteed that their customer’s personal credit card numbers were safe. Determine whether or not you would have resolved these challenges differently than Zappos’ management. Zappos has carved out a space in cyber retail world. Way Sequoia Capital, a venture capital firm that was a controlling investor of Zappos, called a town hall meeting with the executive team to discuss and render solutions on the economic downturn and its negative barring on the portfolio corporations. Sequoia Capital provided Zappos guidance to reduce their expenses and make a cash flow positive. With that being said Mr. Hsieh made the executive decision to downsize his employee head count to reflect a reduction of eight percent of the entire Zappos total corporation staff members. I will commend Zappo for easing most of the employees concerns about downsizing traumatic ordeal. The employees whom were directly affected by the downsizing were notified by email and twitter. Mr. Hsieh was able to offer the individuals whom were layoff an honest and upfront explanation as well as offer a generous severance package to include six months of paid COBRA health insurance coverage. I can personally speak for myself and state that when employers such as Zappos are truthful and transparent about downsizing most employees are able to accept the reasoning and positive side of a stressful situation. Provide a rationale for your response. Employ innovative, talented technology savvy individuals to detect cyber fraud and bullying. Develop and intense cyber verifications check points. Install a computer generated program to digitally confirm credit card numbers, user’s name-address and contact the user via email or text prior to packages being mailed for secure verification and completion of sale. ] Use at least three (3) quality academic resources in this assignment. Note: Wikipedia and other similar Websites do not qualify as academic resources.

References
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