Sam Walton: Made In America

by Sam Walton

That’s why we at Wal-Mart are just absolute fanatics about our managers and buyers getting off their chairs here in Bentonville and getting out into those stores. We have twelve airplanes—only one of them a jet, I’m proud to say—in our hangars out at the Rogers, Arkansas, airport, and that’s why they’re there. We stay in the air to keep our ear to the ground. Our whole travel system is really an outgrowth of the way I

Spend time in the branches

we have eighteen regional managers, all of them based here in Bentonville. Every Monday morning, they pile into those airplanes and head across the country to the stores in their regions. It’s a condition of their employment. They stay out three to four days, usually coming back in on Thursday. We’ve drummed into their heads the belief that they should come back with at least one idea that will pay for the trip. Then they gather with the senior

Rls 4 days in branches

When that meeting is over, every one of those regionals should be on the phone to the district managers, who should be passing the word along to the store managers, who’ll get the department managers

Information flows wekly updates

Once a quarter, every buyer has to go out to a different store and act as manager for a couple of days in the department he or she buys merchandise for. I guarantee you that after they’ve eaten what they cooked enough times, these buyers don’t load

Put yourself in shoes of others

Push Responsibility—and Authority—Down

Empower Others

Force Ideas to Bubble Up

Ideas up

Stay Lean, Fight Bureaucracy

Stay small

Some folks in the retail business have asked me where I came up with the 2 percent formula, and the truth is I just pulled it out of the air. In the early days, most companies charged 5 percent of their sales to run their offices. But we have always operated lean. We have operated with fewer people. We have had our people do more than in other companies. I think we came to work earlier and stayed later. It has been our heritage

2 percent rule

you don’t zero in on your bureaucracy every so often, you will naturally build in layers. You never set out to add bureaucracy. You just get it. Period. Without even knowing it. So you always have to be looking to eliminate it. You know when

Remove buaceacy

You don’t have to have a small ego to work here, but you’d better know how to make it look small, or you might wind up in trouble.

Smal ego

RULE 1: COMMIT to your business. Believe in it more than anybody else. I think I overcame every single one of my personal shortcomings by the sheer passion I brought to my work. I don’t

rule 1

RULE 2: SHARE your profits with all your associates, and treat them as partners. In turn, they will treat you as a partner, and together you will all perform beyond your wildest expectations.

Share profits with staff

RULE 3: MOTIVATE your partners. Money and ownership alone aren’t enough. Constantly, day by day, think of new and more interesting ways to motivate and challenge your partners. Set high goals, encourage competition, and then keep score.

Ruke 3 motivate staff

RULE 4: COMMUNICATE everything you possibly can to your partners. The more they know, the more they’ll understand. The more they understand, the more they’ll care. Once they care, there’s no stopping them. If you don’t trust your associates to

Rule 4 comunicate and also share information

RULE 5: APPRECIATE everything your associates do for the business. A paycheck and a stock option will buy one kind of loyalty.

Appreciate staff

RULE 6: CELEBRATE your successes. Find some humor in your failures. Don’t take yourself so seriously. Loosen up, and everybody around you will loosen up. Have fun. Show enthusiasm—always. When all else fails, put

Rule 6 celebrate sucess and hVe fun

RULE 7: LISTEN to everyone in your company. And figure out ways to get them talking. The folks on the front lines—the ones who actually talk to the customer—are the only ones who really know what’s going on

Listen to staff and get them talking

RULE 8: EXCEED your customers’ expectations. If you do, they’ll come back over and over. Give them what they want—and

Rule 8 exced customer expectatkons

RULE 9: CONTROL your expenses better than your competition. This is where you can always find the competitive advantage. For twenty-five years running—long before Wal-Mart

rule 9 control yuour expenses

RULE 10: SWIM upstream. Go the other way. Ignore the conventional wisdom. If everybody else is doing it one way, there’s a good chance you can find your niche by going in exactly the opposite direction. But

Rule 10 swim upsream