FRED Friday...Meet Augusta Scott, the Zappos Coach

FRED Friday…Meet Coach Augusta Scott, the Zappos Coach

Left to Right: Augusta Scott (no relation), Me, & Robbie Richman

Zappos.com is changing the game…

They’re in their 13^th year of wowing Guests/Customers/Clients with their exceptional service levels and the www.Zappos.com experience.  They do it by first and foremost creating a culture of happiness among their employees.

What I love most about their company is not only what they’re doing or how they’re doing it…but I also really love why they’re doing it and the who behind the why….the people that are doing what they do.  They’re all a bunch of Freds…

Zappos.com’s corporate culture, story, and Tony Hsieh’s book – Delivering Happiness – is literally sweeping the nation, especially in corporate America.  Companies are falling all over themselves, trying to learn more and more about how they can achieve Zappos-esque levels of employee satisfaction, customer satisfaction, and most of all, profitability. 

Most companies, once they find their niche, and begin to crush it…they keep everything close to their vest so as not to give away their secrets.  Not Zappos.com.  THEY GIVE AWAY ALL THEIR SECRETS!!!  Tony Hsieh, the CEO, wrote a NY Times Best Selling book about the why’s and how’s, and Zappos literally gives the book away at the conclusion of their FREE tour of their corporate headquarters in Henderson, NV, where they also showcase, display, and tell more stories all about how they do what they do. 

They know that culture can never really be duplicated…and as Robbie Richman, the culture architect who helped create the Zappos Insights arm of the company, told me, “we should share what we want to keep.”   Zappos truly shares the love…and love is everywhere in the Zappos family.

Why?  Because they simply believe they can inspire a culture within their own company that can inspire other cultures and people in other companies…that can and will literally change the world.  Powerful, awesome, fun, intriguing, and to all of that I say, WHY NOT!

Augusta Scott is the Zappos Coach.  She is the internal, on-site company “coach”.  She helps Zapponians with…anything…yes…anything they would like to improve in their lives; personally or professionally.  This is just another way Zappos shows love to their team members. 

The program is designed to keep the employees happy, feeling productive; feeling like they matter, and feeling significant both at work and in their personal lives.  The idea is that if Zappos team members can work through some of their trials, tribulations, issues, and/or personal/professional goals with Augusta, that will free up their mental capacity to really crush it, in their roles at work.  As an added bonus, they get to achieve (or at least work toward) making their dreams come true…personally & professionally.  That…is truly a happy thought.

After meeting Augusta Scott, in person, I am truly inspired.  The coaching program is great.  The Zappos company culture is game-changing, and I’m truly fascinated by their business model.  However, I’m inspired by the love, passion, and commitment with which Augusta Scott, the Zappos Coach, approaches her craft, her trade, her calling, as a life coach…to be such a positive influence to her team members. 

She cares.  She takes an interest.  She holds them accountable.  She pushes them.  She takes pride in leading others in their own self-discovery journey, which allows them to truly reinvent themselves. 

Augusta makes it clear…her role as the Zappos Coach isn’t about her at all (despite her charisma, charm, and innate ability to inspire).  It’s all about everyone else.  We can all learn from Zappos and Augusta, that in order for a company or organization to grow, its people, the individuals that make up the organization, must first be given the opportunity to grow. 

Just as we learn from Mark Sanborn’s book The Fred Factor, the story of Fred the Postman - we all have the ability to reinvent ourselves every day.  If Fred the Postman can put that much creativity and passion into putting mail in a box…how much could you and I reinvent our businesses?  How much could you and I reinvent our lives?

Augusta Scott, the Zappos Coach, helps her fellow team members at Zappos.com reinvent themselves personally and professionally, every single day.  As a result, Zappos.com is doing what their CEO, Tony Hsieh, set out to do…they’re reinventing corporate America by first creating a culture of happiness among their team.

We can all unleash the extraordinary potential that resides in us, as ordinary people.  That is the essence of The Fred Factor…and nobody can keep us from being extraordinary, and that's the beauty of going OneMoreStep at home, at work, and in our communities. 

I asked Augusta why she and Zappos share so much of their why’s & how’s of their culture with other companies…and why she loves her role as the Zappos Coach.

She said, “I’m here…I’m just here for them…to make a positive difference for one person at a time, one day at a time…”

Thanks to Augusta Scott, Robbie Richman, and Tony Hsieh of Zappos.com, for inspiring us to not only reinvent ourselves, but to also inspire others to do so…

Have a great day.

Taylor

“For me, my role is about unleashing what people already have inside them that is maybe suppressed in most work environments.” – Tony Hsieh, CEO, Zappos.com

What is FRED Friday?

In my favorite book, The Fred Factor, Mark Sanborn tells an inspiring story of how a man named Fred goes OneMoreStep after OneMoreStep in his role as a Postman for the United States Postal Service.  I love this book.  Since my mom sent it to me in 2004, I've purchased the book for friends, coworkers, and girlfriends...I've even purchased and hand delivered copies of the book to several executives at both Wynn Las Vegas and The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas.

Fred Friday is a series in which the OneMoreStepRevolution blog will showcase a real life "Fred" on select Fridays.   Reading The Fred Factor definitely leaves us with a desire to to be more Fred-like ourselves, but I also love looking for Freds.  Freds are everywhere. I love it when I experience a real life Fred.  I'm inspired just as I am every time I re-read the book.  I thought it would be fun to spread the magic of Fred to our OneMoreStepRevolution community.  Enjoy...