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No help at all.  He must be resting up for his trip to Club K-9 this weekend.

Golf this morning, then dropping him off, then work, then heading to the airport for another quick trip to Seattle.

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They picked me up at the airport in a Zappos Escalade and we made the short trip to Henderson.  There I was greeted by my Affiliate Manager / Tour Guide, Ned Farra.  As we walked around the building through the marketing, merchandising, buying, and customer service departments, it was easy to see that all the positive press about the company is true.  Even though there are roughly 700 employees in that location (another 700 work at the warehouse facility in Kentucky), everyone seemed to know each other and they were all happy to be there.

Amongst the piles of shoes and wildly decorated cubicle rows and conference rooms, we found the on-site nap room, company-funded cafeteria, and the office of the full-time Zappos life coach, complete with a VIP throne and crown to make visitors feel like royalty.  Well-rested, well-fed, and well-rounded employees are happy employees!  It’s cool how they’re able to maintain so many of the fun and exciting qualities of a start-up company even though their growth has slowed and the business matured.

I got to chat with the affiliate team about some upcoming changes to their program and growth opportunities for the rest of 2009 and beyond, making it a legitimate business trip.  On my way out I was given a copy of the 2008 Zappos Culture Book, a 450 page tome in which every year each employee contributes a short essay on what the Zappos culture means to them.  In addition, they gave me two more books from their business-book-library lobby: Made to Stick by brothers Chip and Dan Heath, and Peak by Chip Conley.  So in the Zappos spirit of continued learning and self-improvement, I’ve got some reading to do.

Then it was back in the Escalade and off the Wynn to get the non-business trip part of the weekend started.

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The owner, Sam Han, was something of an entrepreneurial inspiration for me.  I don’t remember all the details of the story, but he talked about how he and his wife met for lunch at a similar restaurant and thought, “How hard could it be?”  Sam quit his job and opened the first Khan’s Mongolian Grill.  Now I think they have three locations in the Seattle area and were pursuing franchise opportunities.  The restaurant business is hard and he and his family put in long hours, but at least at the end of the day they’re doing it for themselves.  His reasoning was that since he was going to work hard anyway, why spend that energy at a job making money for someone else’s company?  Words to live by.

Probably the more impressive thing is I didn’t get tired of eating the same food every day for 3 months, and I still try to make a stop there each time I’m back in Issaquah.  Most of the familiar faces are gone but the food is still delicious.  I recommend the spicy mongolian and the spicy peanut sauces.  I’ve tried a few other mongolian grills across the country and nothing compares to Khan’s for me.

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Now I have a minimum of 6 tabs open at all times, and have been known to run Firefox, IE, and Chrome simultaneously for serious business.  But thanks to the tabs, my task bar is not the cluttered mess it once was.

It’s the little things.

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Every other weekend I would don my blue shirt and name badge with pride, and help educate Seattle’s youth in the ways of science.  I worked the tide pool, the virtual reality basketball, and Bubblefest, all in exchange for one free soda per day from the cafe.  One time, not while volunteering, I accidentally swallowed my gum during the Bubblefest bubble-gum blowing competetion.  Embarrassing!

One of the best places to work was the high ride bike.  The high ride bike is a bike on a rail about 30 ft above the ground (and later, above water).  It’s anchored by a long hanging weight that makes it impossible to tip over.  But it’s still scary for most people, and they put a net below to catch whoever “might” fall.  During slow times I would do laps forward and backwards to try and attract customers.  One time I get yelled at for going backwards by a manager who that was unsafe.  Shouldn’t a manager at the science center understand that the physics involved were the same backwards or forwards?  Either way, good times on the high bike.

The other good spot to work was the toy test, specifically the video game part.  This was a once-a-year event so you had to plan ahead, and then you had to be sure to only sign up for half-days so you could spend the other half of the day testing the games for yourself.  They had dozens of video game consoles set up with not-yet-released games, so you got to play the latest games before anyone else and just fill out a quick form on what you liked and disliked.

The Science Center also put on a haunted-house over Halloween, and staffed it with volunteers.  We dressed in black and put black face paint on to make ourselves scary and hard to see.  It was all good fun until it came time to take the black face paint off.  I had the stuff stuck around my eyes for days.  I thought it looked a little goth, but people at school were asking if I was wearing eyeliner.  Just what a freshman needs.  That might actually have been my last time volunteering there…

Still, the Science Center gig was the best job ever because it continued to pay dividends even years after I’d left.  I held on to my name badge, which apparently they haven’t changed in years, and that granted us free admission and free IMAX movie tickets on more than one occasion.   Thank you, PSC!

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What do managers do?

“Good management consists in showing average people how to do the work of superior people.” –John D. Rockefeller

“Whenever there is a hard job to be done, I assign it to a lazy man.  He is sure to find an easy way of doing it.”  –Walter Chrysler

“Management is nothing more than motivating other people.” –Lee Iacocca

OK, so how do you define a leader?

“A leader is a dealer in hope.” –Napoleon Bonaparte

“If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader.”  –John Quincy Adams

“Two characteristics of a leader: he knows where he’s going, and he has people following him.”

What is the difference between management and leadership?

“Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.”  –Peter Drucker

“Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall.” –Stephen Covey

“The leader innovates; the manager administrates.  The leader focuses on people; the manager focuses on systems and structure.  The leader inspires; the manager controls.  The leader sees the long-term; the manager sees the short-term.  The leader asks what and why?  The manager asks how and when?” –Warren Bennis

I think it’s easy to confuse managers for leaders because of their titles and their positions.  Sometimes it’s frustrating being self-employed, knowing that nothing is going to get done without some internal direction and motivation.  There is no boss to tell me what the priorities are this week.  There is no leader determining the direction of the company.  And then I wake up, thankful for the great opportunity and freedom I have working for myself.

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After moving from Seattle to Virginia to Atlanta to here over the course of just 20 months, it’s kind of nice to be somewhat “settled.”  And thanks to the real estate market, we’re not going anywhere for a looooong time.

Looking back, moving in with your significant other was built up to be a major life decision.  But even after a year and a half of long-distance relationship, it was a huge non-event.  Like moving in with your best friend.  And thankfully, two years later, we still get along ok.

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I worked part-time during high school at the Bellevue Library.  The hours were flexible, you could arrange trades among your co-workers to cover shifts if you couldn’t make it, and you earned paid vacation and sick leave for every hour you worked.  I don’t imagine there are many part-time gigs that let you earn paid time off like that!

On Sundays, I got paid time-and-a-half, which ended up being like $13/hr –it was huge in High School when gas was $1.20.  On top of that, the job mostly just entailed working independently and re-shelving books.  Very easy stuff; if you knew your ABCs and could count to 100, you were qualified for this position.

All those reasons are why working at the library was the best job ever.

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