Zappos, the Amazon-owned
online retailer, confirmed with the Las Vegas Sun that 210 of its 1,503
employees (nearly 14% of the company) took a buyout deal after CEO Tony Hsieh
announced the company was completely ridding itself of manager roles and job titles.
In 2013, Zappos implemented Holacracy, a system
that removes traditional managerial hierarchies allowing employees to self-organize
to complete work in a way that increases productivity, fosters innovation and
empowers anyone in the company with the ability to make decisions that push the
company forward.
Here is more information and the
memo Tony
Hsieh. Portion included the
following: “As of 4/30/15, in order to eliminate the legacy management
hierarchy, there will be effectively be no more people managers. In addition,
we will begin the process of breaking down our legacy silo’ed structure/circles
of merchandising, finance, tech, marketing, and other functions and create
self-organizing and self-managing business-centric circles instead by starting
to fund this new model with the appropriate resources needed to flourish.
Functions that were previously silo’ed will be embedded inside these
business-centric circles instead — this structure will require fewer roles that
primarily manage expectations and drive alignment across legacy silos. We will
continue using Holacracy's systems and processes for prioritization and resource
allocation, so it’ll be extremely important for all of us to keep Glass Frog up
to date.”
They are on the road to, “self-organization,
self-management, increased autonomy, and increased efficiency, we are going to
take a "rip the bandaid" approach to accelerate progress towards
becoming a Teal organization (as described in the book Reinventing Organizations).
“
Teal organizations attempt to
minimize service provider groups and lean more towards creating self-organizing
and self-managing business-centric groups instead.
What is a “Teal
Organization”? Frédéric Laloux, in Reinventing Organizations, uses a colour
scheme, based on Integral Theory, to describe the historical development of
human organizations: Red > Orange > Green > Teal.
Laloux lists three
breakthroughs of Teal organizations:
1. Self-management: driven by peer relationships
2. Wholeness: involving the whole person at work
3. Evolutionary purpose: let the organization
adapt and grow, not be driven
Are the Zappos employees
taking the buyout because they believe the company has lost their minds? In all honesty, it does sound like they are
having a rather extreme makeover. How it
will work out for Zappos, only time will tell.
Do you believe in the Teal
organization method for Zappos? Or do
you think they should stick to a traditional business model and worry about fashion colors
instead of organizational colors.
Zappos is a division of Amazon. Learn more about Amazon in the fashion company profile section on Apparel Search.
Zappos is a division of Amazon. Learn more about Amazon in the fashion company profile section on Apparel Search.