Tony Hsieh: Why Zappos Core Values Are Vital

Watch an interview with Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh as he discusses the importance of developing his company’s core values.

Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh says that if he could “do one thing differently,” he would have set the company’s core values from day one.

In a brief video interview at Inc., Tony Hsieh discusses his company’s well-documented policy of hiring and firing “based on whether employees live up to the company’s core values, independent of how they do their jobs.”

But it wasn’t until five years after launching Zappos that Hsieh and his team “came up with list of 10 ‘committable’ core values.” He says that he resisted building his company’s culture and core values, because it felt like “a big, corporate thing to do,” and that “they become a meaningless plaque on the lobby wall.” But Hsieh says that he and his team spent over a year deciding on their values, and that they have made all the difference in setting Zappos apart.