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Walmart Corporation

Adali Cantu

Department of Org. Leadership, South Texas College

ORGL -4341- KV2: Management Theory I CBE

Mr. Joe Cruz

April 21st, 2022

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Walmart Corporation

Many organizations have failed or nearly bankrupted themselves, however Walmart

continues to stay as the world's biggest retailer and has been a key part in the realm of retail for

quite a long time. This company was founded by Sam Walton, it all began in 1950 when

businessperson Sam Walton bought a store from Luther E. Harrison in Bentonville, Arkansas,

and opened Walton's 5 & 10 and in 1962 with a single store in Rogers, Arkansas. Expanding

outside Arkansas by 1968 and throughout the rest of the Southern United states by the 1980’s

operating a store in every state of the United States, plus its first stores in Canada by 1995.The

company introduced its warehouse club chain Sam’s Club in 1983 and its first supercenter in

1988. By the second decade of the 21st century, the chain had grown to over 11,000 stores in 27

countries (Walmart Corporate).

Sam Walton was a man with vision leadership, and our business is a result of that. Since

the first Walmart opened in 1962 in Rogers, Arkansas, we have been dedicated to making a

difference in the lives of our customers. Today we are helping communities save money and live

better all over the world (Walmart Corporate). The culture within the Walmart organization

revolves around a centralized structure, where the decision-making authority is concentrated at

the higher levels of hierarchy (Principles of Management, n.d.). At Walmart, it is expected to

practice servant leadership, the guidelines of business which consist of Sam’s Rules, the mission

which is to save people money so they can live better and customer satisfaction, to make the

customer your number one priority. Walmart is successful today due to their laser focus and

obsession with its true purpose, to save people money with everyday low prices, the company

continues to innovate and strive to exceed its customers' expectations.

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Everything the company does revolves around the customer’s perspective. At Walmart,

Customer service is a key component of their business, “There is only one boss. The customer.

And he can fire anybody in the company from the chairperson on down, simply by spending his

money somewhere else” ( Sam Walton). Customers want quality merchandise, low prices,

friendly service, convenient hours, and a great shopping experience. This is the secret of success

in retail. If you take care of your customers, they will keep coming back over and over. “Sam

Walton understood better than anyone else that no business can exist without customers “(Sam

Walton & John Huey, 2003). While keeping the customer at the focal point of the organization's

mission, their main goal is to "Save them money, so, they can live better whenever and anyplace

and their vision with eCommerce is to make consistently easy for busy families through

convenience.

For an organization to find success, it needs to keep on developing, recognize the

purpose, adjust to change, and embrace better approaches for customer shopping to enjoy a

competitive advantage. Moreover, by seeking innovation - driven opportunities by shifts in

demands; Walmart has had the option to keep on finding true success. The company has had the

ability to select the right leader through changing times, their effectiveness of their leaders and

how they bring success to an opportunity using the Planning, Organizing, Leading and

Controlling (P-O-L-C) functions and often find themselves faced with the need to manage

organizational change effectively (Principles in Management, n.d.). Walmart has been known for

being able to transform through changing times and to be successful with the implementation of

its tactical, operational plans.

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The organization has zeroed in on gradual advancement on how it operates with

innovation in their distribution centers tailored to web orders and redesigning it website, while

keeping costs low and focusing on the growth culture that Sam Walton imagined by zeroing in

on its customers and their needs. Although, the company has invested in innovation to drive

productivity and efficiency and by upskilling its employees with technology to gain a presence

within a rapidly growing eCommerce. This has not been enough to overtake Amazon which

captures 49% of the U.S. ecommerce market just yet and is one of Walmart's top competitors in

the eCommerce business (Matthew Bloomberg, 2018). Some questions remain unanswered, why

are customers choosing to shop on the Amazon vs. Walmart platform? What can be done

differently to improve customer experience? What makes Amazon so successful?

In addition, to the current opportunity at hand, the Covid-19 pandemic occurred,

interrupting, and impacting all businesses in the industry, negatively creating staff and supply

shortages for brick-and-mortar businesses. The effort to slow down the spread of the virus

through lockdown and social distancing, forcefully powered organization digitalization and the

trip to web-based business set off significant changes in customer shopping behaviors. Those

businesses that had an existing presence online could be at an advantage than those that were

not. With more customers shopping online, this led to a huge demand for online services from

brands and retailers and a fantastic opportunity for Walmart to gain momentum with its business

strategy.

Walmart’s foundation set on its core values of being guided by goods, service their

customers, respect for the individual, strive for excellence, act with integrity has led them to the

right path toward a destination those within the company can believe in (Walmart Corporate).

Walmart’s leaders are constantly focusing on their competitors, not focusing on what they are
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doing wrong but what they are doing right and how they as a company can do it better. Its

competitiveness drives the company towards finding new ways of working and the ability to

gauge what they know, willingness to discover new ways and what needs to be learned to reach

their goals has been their way of survival within the industry. The learning style of Gauge -

Discover- Reflect consist of three components Gauge- take stock of what you know and

capabilities about a topic; Discover- learn enough about a topic so that you can set specific

development goals in which you can apply and practice, and later gauge again your progress

towards your set goals; Reflect – step back and look at the ways you have achieve your goals,

take the opportunity to set new goals and journal the experience and though process (Principles

of Management, n.d.).

If they take what it already been proven within their culture, which is observing their

competitors on how well they are preforming along with their trends, gathering data, and

focusing on the customer and the way they shop, the company can utilize this information to get

ahead within their eCommerce business and reach their goal to be the top retailer in the

eCommerce world. The goal would be to gain momentum, build strategies regarding ecommerce,

provide solutions to the opportunities they are currently facing, investing in programs or

organizational changes to existing strategies that will enhance the productivity of people within

the organization. Finally, gauge progress based on data, discover, and reflect and gauge again to

set new goals to reach success.

The action plan is an important part of the organization to identify the expected goal the

organization wants to achieve to be effective. This step can help them achieve short term or long-

term goals. The goal would be to partner with the leaders within the organization such as the

Ecommerce, Global sourcing, Supply chain, Merchandising, and Marketing officers to work
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together and share knowledge by providing an in-depth insight on current ecommerce

performance and data to make informed business decisions.

The Ecommerce officer can provide knowledge on categories shopped most to include

categories the competitor is gaining on, online customer traffic (from cart to purchase), identify

how the company can engage customers, provide more product offers that meet their needs and

entice purchases. Global and Supply officers would oversee procuring products and brands that

customers are looking for at a lower cost with company suppliers or partnering with third-party

sellers as an alternative within any of the categories identified. Marketing officer will be tasked

to identify why the company online customer count is decreasing rather than increasing and find

a way to stay connected with the online shoppers, through personalized messages based on

experiences with their past transactions and highlighting the connection to the Walmart brand

and therefore increasing brand loyalty. Upon gathering and reviewing the information provided,

leadership can determine the changes necessary and what the implication might be based on the

decisions taken and the managing of the implementation to include updates to the controlling

systems and processes to that affect the tasks assigned to the employees and any

company performance assessments to measure progress (Principles in Management, n.d.).

Customers are shopping online more than ever, buying online, pick up in store or

curbside pickup are some examples of the new norm because of the pandemic and how retailers

had to rethink how to do business. Although the supply chain was also interrupted by the

pandemic and on its slow path to recovery. By implementing this action plan now and utilizing

the learning style of gauge-discover- reflect to apply what has been learned, gauge progress and

reflect can position the organization on the right path to achieve organizational goals.
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The company’s strategic plan is to focus on business growth in Ecommerce and maintain

customer loyalty that will certainly place the organization at a competitive advantage and

demonstrate potential growth by 2024 as demonstrated below.

Figure 1:

With the information shared with the need for an organizational change in strategy and action

plan provided, the graph below demonstrates with properly implemented plans can result to

potential eCommerce growth by 2024.

Figure 2:

Business growth will lead to customer loyalty and the proper implementation of the tactical and

operational plans. The pie chart demonstrates the increase in eCommerce customer loyalty to

the brand on its projected path towards full dominance by 2024.

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The increased use of cell phones has added to the development in online business with

the accommodation of buying and selling online more adaptable and latently. Ecommerce has

become the mainstream in people's lives and with considerable benefit. Every retailer has the

desire to rule the ecommerce world and redefine the retail industry.

Walmart has over 5,000 physical stores and most customers live within a 10-mile radius,

that places them at an advantage with fulfillment, exceeding the customers expectation while

focusing on the customer needs and providing a convenience that online based stores cannot.

Walmart can certainly be one the path to become an eCommerce giant if it uses its physical

stores for decentralized inventory in Walmart US, Walmart International and Sam clubs to be

their secret success to their eCommerce growth.

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References

Introduction to Principles of Management. (n.d.). In Principles of Management. Retrieved from

https://courses.lumenlearning.com/principles management/chapter/1-introduction to
Principles of Management/

Matthew Boyle Bloomberg. (2018, August 11). Walmart has built an alliance of tech firms to
battle Amazon. Toronto Star (Canada).

Organizational Change. (n.d.). In Principles of Management. Retrieved from

https://courses.lumenlearning.com/principlesmanagement/chapter/7-4-organizational-
change/

Planning, Organizing, Leading, and Controlling. (n.d.). In Principles of Management.

Retrieved from https://courses.lumenlearning.com/principlesmanagement/chapter/1-4-
planning-organizing-leading-and-controlling/

Walmart Corporate. Our Story. https://corporate.walmart.com

Walton, Sam & Huey, John. 1992. Made in America, My Story. New York, New York.
Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc.