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Success from Scratch |
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Motivation StrategyEnduring MotivationUnmotivated Employees
Motivating Yourself
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Success |
Success From Scratch
Lessons For Success
Success Secrets
Successful Life Choices
10 Keys to Success
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Management |
Building A Better Boss
Skills of an Effective Manager
Fortune Cookie Management
Managing Fairness
Management & Training
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Leadership |
Unifying Leadership
4 Lessons for Leaders
Take Action
Leadership Behind the Walls
Leadership Pitfalls
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Goal Setting |
Commit To A Goal
Work Smart
Choosing a Profession
A Determined Will
Be A Goal Getter....
One Race at a Time
The creation of The
Home Depot began with two words in the spring of 1978: "You're fired!"
Twenty years ago, we were two out-of-work executives.
Our situation was not a lot different than millions of others who were
shown the door. We had little in the way of capital and faced some
daunting personal and legal challenges as we tried to get our careers back
on track.
In our early years, we lived on the edge, with no balance
sheet and a lack of financing. It took great romancing to establish
the vendor base necessary to open and maintain the broad product selection
for which we quickly became known. We were always pushing boundaries
beyond where our industry's conventional wisdom suggested we could
go.
And it paid off. In just twenty years, our company, The Home
Depot, has multiplied exponentially from four stores in Atlanta to 775
stores, 160,000 associates, and $30 billion sales. Almost all of our
growth has come from internal expansion and very little through
acquisition. How did we and our associates do it?
Building The Home Depot was a tough, uphill battle fr
om
the day we started in a Los Angeles coffee shop shortly after we were
fired. No one believed we could do it, and very few people trusted
our judgment Or they trusted our judgment, but just didn't think the
whole concept of a home improvement warehouse with the lowest prices, best
selection, and the best service was going to work. They certainly
didn't realize that what we were planning would turn out to be a
revolution in the retail business.
We really are just two regular guys from similar modest personal
back-grounds strong drives to succeed by our respective parents. The
values that form the core the The Home Depot's business philosophy were
critical to our success. They developed from our families as well as
from key business experiences in the early days of our careers. A set of
eight values has been our bedrock for the past twenty years. Although they
were not put in writing until 1995, these values enabled us to explode
across the North American landscape and will be the vehicle for reaching
our ambitious goals in the marketplace.
But we're not a company that's just about numbers.
We've attained them because of a culture that is agile and flexible enough
to change direction as quickly as events demand it. When something
isn't working in our stores, we don't keep doing it the wrong way simply
because the rules say to do it that way. Instead, we do it the right way
and change the rules. This type of thinking and flexibility is
important for anyone who wants to succeed in business.
We know that we are only as good as our people - especially
the men and women working in our stores everyday. If the front line
isn't absolutely committed to the cause, we can't win.
That's why we believe a sure way of growing this company is to clearly state our values and instill them in our associates
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Values and beliefs
that do not change over time; they guide our decisions and actions.
They are the principles, beliefs, and standards of our company.
Our values are not platitudes that are dead on arrival
on a lobby wall plaque, but are the spine that shapes the way we do
business. The Home Depot's core values, although they are so
universal that they should apply to every company.
1.
Excellent customer service.
Doing whatever it takes to build
strong customer loyalty.
2.
Taking
care of our people. The most important reason for
The Home Depot's success.
3.
Developing entrepreneurial spirit. We think of our
organizational structure as an inverted pyramid: Stores and customers are
at the top and senior management is on the bottom.
4. Respect for all people.
Talent and good people are everywhere, and we can't afford to overlook any
source of good people.
5.
Building strong relationships with associates,
customers, vendors, and communities.
6.
Giving back to our communities an an integral
part of doing business.
7.
Doing the right thing, and not just
doing things right.
8.
Shareholder return.
Investors in The Home Depot will benefit from the money they've given us
to grow our business.
Our values empower people to be their best. That will
allow them to do all the right things without us having to constantly tell
them.
Nobody loves a company. A company is just a sign.
Nobody loves brick and mortar. These values are our company.
They are our belief system, and we believe in them as much today as we did
when the first Home Depot stores opened in June 1979. Without them,
we're no different then our competition. Our competitors could copy
them just as they've copied our stores, products, and merchandising ideas.
But they would have to believe in the ideas underlying these values to
make them effective, and that's a tough step to take.
There is a concept in Judaism called "tzedaka",
which means "to give back." It is considered a good deed to give to
somebody who doesn't have, and we believe strongly in giving back to the
community.
You want a formula for success? Take two Jews who
have just been fired, add an Irishman who just walked away from bankruptcy
and an Italian running a no-name investment banking firm. Add--then
subtract--Ross Perot. Lease space from a shrinking discount chain, fill a
space the size of a football field full of hardware (and a few hundred
empty boxes), and you've got a company. At least that's the way we
did it. v
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