Walmart shareholders week – my reflection on being exposed to Sam Walton's ‘10 rules’ for business
Having been given the privilege to represent Massmart at - and participate in this year’s Walmart 2019 associates and shareholders week has without a doubt been one of my career highlights.
I won’t be able to effectively summarise my experience and learnings from the week spent in Fayetteville (Bentonville and Rogers also), North West Arkansas. As I had only had a glimpse into what can only be described as an extraordinary business, built on great values and carried by many talented and passionate associates. I came across for the first time, what is known as ‘Sam Walton’s 10 rules (for building a successful business)’. (https://corporate.walmart.com/our-story/history/10-rules-for-building-a-business)
The rules are summed up by the words: Commit; Share; Motivate; Communicate; Appreciate; Celebrate; Listen; Exceed; Control and Swim upstream. These words actually summarised well my own experience at conference. I would like to share some of my learnings from conference by attributing a particular learning or experience to a few of the ’10 rules’.
- Commit to your business – if you ever get to meet Mr. Isaac Mluma from GAME Potchefstroom in South Africa, I hope you will be as impressed as I was by his appreciation and awareness of the customer when in store.
A moment that captured this man’s character was when an elderly customer approached him during one of our associate store visits asking if he would be willing to teach her to play the traditional drum he was carrying as a team cheerleader. With a smile he said sure and soon they were drumming together!
Isaac’s actions showed how committed he was to his business even though it was not his own store or country. Isaac we as Massmart are fortunate to have you!
- Exceed your customers’ expectations – dressed in our brightly coloured conference shirts meant we weren’t hard to spot during store visits. But after I inquired with Teresa (an associate with 20 years of service in Walmart) about a specific t-shirt and being told they had no stock, I honestly didn’t expect much even though she asked for my contact information which I duly provided before leaving the store. I was definitely not expecting to hear back from Teresa. But when Teresa contacted me and told me she managed to get my shirt by working with her suppliers in sourcing it from another store, by doing this she pretty much blew my expectation as a customer out of the water! Teresa, from Walmart Super-center #359, you are a rock star!
- Swim upstream – whilst at conference and during multiple store visits and conversations with individuals throughout Walmart and Walmart international it became very clear that what we doing in South Africa through our Supplier Development programme to indeed be bold and unmatched. This is due to how our department executives have gone about their engagement with external and internal stakeholders and the programmes funding model they have chosen to follow for our existing small and emerging suppliers. We may at times go about our investments in non-commercial ways but we always seek to do so for the purpose of ensuring commercially sensible and sustainable results for the supplier as well as our business.
Having had the chance to visit and engage fellow associates from other markets around the world indeed helped me return to my current role as project manager with great enthusiasm; a resolve to continuing learning and aim of achieving excellence in my role within the company. Try and take some time in reading and pondering the original ’10 rules’, I don’t think you will be wasting your time. In closing I want to thank both Massmart for giving me the opportunity to attend and Walmart for being incredible hosts throughout the week.