Top 89 Quotes & Sayings by Tony Hsieh

Our customers call and e-mail us to say that's how it feels when a Zappos box arrives. And that's how we view this company.

A bigger business is like a cruise ship: There are lots of amenities and you can go a lot further, but it's harder to turn quickly.

Businesses often forget about the culture, and ultimately, they suffer for it because you can't deliver good service from unhappy employees.

For me, my role is about unleashing what people already have inside them that is maybe suppressed in most work environments.

We asked ourselves what we wanted this company to stand for. We didn't want to just sell shoes. I wasn't even into shoes - but I was passionate about customer service.

I view my role more as trying to set up an environment where the personalities, creativity and individuality of all the different employees come out and can shine.

For me, the most fun is change or growth. There are definitely elements of both that I like. Launching a business is kind of like a motorboat: You can go very quickly and turn fast.

Problems are just mile markers. Each one we pass means we've gotten better.

Most companies are very quick to hire and slow to fire, when really it should be the other way around.

...the best leaders are servant leaders - they serve those they lead.

I thought about how easily we are all brainwashed by our society and culture to stop thinking and just assume by default that more money equals more success and more happiness, when ultimately happiness is really just about enjoying life.

I'd rather spend money on things that improve the customer experience than on marketing.

Your personal core values define who you are, and a company's core values ultimately define the company's character and brand. For individuals, character is destiny. For organizations, culture is destiny.

Don't be cocky. Don't be flashy. There's always someone better than you.

Your culture is your brand.

Happiness is really just about four things: perceived control, perceived progress, connectedness (number and depth of your relationships), and vision/meaning (being part of something bigger than yourself).

At Zappos, one of our core values is to Pursue Growth and Learning. In the lobby of our headquarters, we have a giving library where we give away books to employees and visitors that we think will help with their growth, both personally and professionally. I can't wait to add The Compound Effect to our library.

Have fun. The game is a lot more enjoyable when you're trying to do more than just make money.

Success is getting to a point where you'd be truly OK with losing everything you have and starting over.

Whatever you are thinking, think bigger.

Rather than focus on trying to get a lot of customers to market yourself, really focus more on the actual product or service itself and existing users to, like, what would make them happier, what would make them come back more and more times or in our case buy more often.

The problem when someone feels burned out, bored, unchallenged, or stifled by their work is not the job itself but rather the environment and playground rules given to them to do the job at hand.

I think the most important thing is just if you hire people whose personal values match the corporate core values - and not just the stated ones.

Money alone isn't enough to bring happiness... happiness is when you're actually truly ok with losing everything you have.

If there are too many competitors, even if you're the best it's a lot harder to win.

Studies find top 3 most stressful moments in people's lives: death, divorce, and properly pronouncing "Worcestershire sauce."

I think when people say they dread going into work on Monday morning, it's because they know they are leaving a piece of themselves at home. Why not see what happens when you challenge your employees to bring all of their talents to their job and reward them not for doing it just like everyone else, but for pushing the envelope, being adventurous, creative, and open-minded, and trying new things?

Learn by doing. Theory is nice, but nothing replaces actual experience.

To WOW, you must differentiate yourself, which means do something a little unconventional and innovative. You must do something that’s above and beyond what’s expected. And whatever you do must have an emotional impact on the receiver.

The best businesses are really ones that can combine passion, profits, and purpose.

Get the culture right, and everything else just falls into place.

Don't play games that you don't understand, even if you see lots of other people making money from them.

Open, honest communication is the best foundation for any relationship, but remember that at the end of the day it's not what you say or what you do, but how you make people feel that matters the most.

A great brand is a story that never stops unfolding.

To never forget that the most important thing in life is the quality of life we lead.

Without conscious and deliberate effort, inertia always wins

The ultimate definition of success is: you could lose everything that you have and truly be okay with it. Your happiness isn't based on external factors.

I think maybe 50 years ago people and businesses felt like they had to choose between maximizing profits and making customers happy or making employees happy, and I think we're actually living in a special time where everyone's hyperconnected, whether through Twitter or blogs and so on. Information travels so quickly that it's actually possible to have it all, to make customers happy through customer service, to make employees happy through strong company cultures, and have that actually drive growth and profits.

Be true to yourself. If you follow that principle, a lot of decisions are actually pretty easy.

Most innovation comes from outside your industry applied to your own

You've gotta love the game. To become really good, you need to live it and sleep it.

SEO expertise is a core need for today's online businesses.

My advice is to stop trying to "network" in the traditional business sense, and instead just try to build up the number and depth of your friendships, where the friendship itself is its own reward. The more diverse your set of friendships are, the more likely you'll derive both personal and business benefits from your friendship later down the road. You won't know exactly what those benefits will be, but if your friendships are genuine, those benefits will magically appear 2-3 years later down the road.

Customer service shouldn't just be A department, it should be the entire company.

Stop chasing the money and start chasing the passion.

Whatever you're thinking, think bigger.

I believe that there's something interesting about anyone and everyone - you just have to figure out what that something is.

Just figure out what your personal values are then just make those the corporate values.

What’s the best way to build a brand for the long term? In a word: culture.

Envision, create, and believe in your own universe, and the universe will form around you.

Launching a business is kind of like a motorboat: You can go very quickly and turn fast.

For individuals, character is destiny. For organizations, culture is destiny.

Chase the vision, not the money, the money will end up following you.

I made a list of the happiest periods in my life, and I realized that none of them involved money. I realized that building stuff and being creative and inventive made me happy. Connecting with a friend and talking through the entire night until the sun rose made me happy. Trick-or-treating in middle school with a group of my closest friends made me happy. Eating a baked potato after a swim meet made me happy. Pickles made me happy.

Help shape the stories that people are telling about you.

There's a big difference between motivation and inspiration: Inspire through values and motivation takes care of itself.

Never accept or be too comfortable with the status quo, because the companies that get into trouble are historically the ones that aren't able to adapt to change and respond quickly enough.

If someone is self-aware, then they can always continue to grow. If they're not self-aware, I think it's harder for them to evolve or adapt beyond who they already are.

The biggest (and hardest) lesson I've learned in life is that the external world is just a reflection of the world within.

Usually my 'a-ha' moments are when I'm not trying to think of how to solve a particular problem.