Wal-Mart: Until its founder Sam Walton died, the retailer was pretty much an America-only phenomenon

BACK OF THE BOOK

Think of Wal-Mart and the name that pops up in your head is that of its legendary founder Sam Walton. But was Walton-or Mr Sam, as he was popularly called-really the retailing genius he's made out to be? Don't expect Slater, a former Time reporter who's also written books on Jack Welch of GE, and John Chambers of Cisco, to answer that question with a yes or no. And that's not just because he seems beholden to a usually tight-lipped Wal-Mart for talking to him. The problem is altogether different: Without Mr Sam, there would have been no Wal-Mart, but without his A-team-including, among others, David Glass, Don Soderquist, and Lee Scott-there would have been no $244.5 billion retailing colossus.

When Walton died in April of 1992, Wal-Mart was already big-it had some $43 billion in annual sales. But there was nothing to betray that it would grow its revenues six times in just the next 10 years, and become the world's largest corporation. Far from it, Wal-Mart's critics were busy writing it off, now that the charismatic Mr Sam was dead.

The Wal-Mart Decade By Robert Slater Portfolio Price: Rs 818 PP: 241

However, the new team, first led by Glass for 12 years and then by Scott starting 2000, proved the critics terribly wrong. Although Slater doesn't say so, looking at Wal-Mart's performance since 1992, one could even argue that Walton was not so much Wal-Mart's growth driver as its speed guard. But that's who he was at heart: a small-town merchandiser who liked more to spend time on the shop floor talking to employees and customers than strategising in the boardroom. He hated it whenever any of his senior managers spent money on technology or invested in anything that did not directly impact the customer. For example, beefing up the human resource department. That's a new perspective Slater, who otherwise mostly writes like a faithful reporter, brings to Wal-Mart's popular story.

So what did Glass & Co. do that helped Wal-Mart turbocharge its growth and at the same time keep Mr Sam's legacy and his "every day low prices" magic alive? According to Slater, whose narrative gets a bit repetitive at places, they picked the best of both the worlds: Walton's and their own. Glass, whom Walton picked over his eldest son Rob as the CEO (as Chairman, Rob became the family's voice on the board), had a keen interest in food retail; Walton believed in merchandise. The founder was wary of debt, but Glass had no problems borrowing. Also, Glass took Wal-Mart global; until Walton died, the chain had focussed only within the US.

But making Wal-Mart the biggest retailer ever may have been easier than making it the most admired corporation (notwithstanding Fortune). Wal-Mart had started making enemies even when Walton was alive, but their numbers ballooned as the retailer became more and more powerful. Today, Wal-Mart is a target of some of its own employees who crib about its poor wages and allege gender and racial discrimination; of suppliers, who can scarcely breath in its vice-like grip; local communities, whose lives forever change once a Wal-Mart enters; and more recently of the government for indirectly employing illegal immigrants. In the years to come, as Wal-Mart gets bigger still, it will have a tough time convincing Americans that what's good for Wal-Mart is good for America.

I Don't Know How She Does It By Allison Pearson Wiley Price: Rs 225 PP: 256

Why must four-year-olds come down with the flu just the day you have a crucial client meeting, which is just the day your maid bunks and the in-laws go out of town? If you're a working mom whose life consists of a series of Kodak moments such as these, you'll completely identify with the manic world of Kate Reddy-investment banker and mother of two. This is Bridget Jones, but with brains and real life concerns.

With warmth and wit, Allison Pearson has captured the many subtle dilemmas working moms go through in a corporate world designed for the alpha-male manager. From the different standards in the workplace (the need for ''a Man's Excuse'' when one's late-something that does not have to do with sick children or an absent nanny, preferably something involving car repairs or traffic) to a hilarious take on the ''Muffia''-the mafia of full-time moms whose existence fills Kate with full-time guilt over neglecting her kids (''Phones may have become cordless," she sighs, ''but mothers never will.'').

The book is peppered with insights into the working mother's mind that are both poignant and hilarious at the same time. One of my favourites: ''When I was younger, I wanted to go to bed with other people,'' Kate confides, ''now that I have two children, my fiercest desire is to go to bed with myself for a whole 12 hours.''

Kate can juggle nine different currencies in five different time zones and get herself and two children washed and dressed and out of the house in half-an-hour (though occasionally with banana oatmeal smeared on her Armani suit), but is it worth the price?

Women will love this book-although I Don't Know How They're Going to Do It (find the time for non-work related reading, I mean). Now if only it could be made compulsory reading-for their Men and hr managers.

-Rashmi Bansal

From Followers To Leaders
By Naushad Forbes & David Wield
Routledge
Price: Rs 1,177
PP: 214
Followers need not remain followers, say the authors, they can metamorphose into leaders once they get innovative. A book sensitive to companies that aren't quite rocking.

You Can Sell It!
By Paul Hanna
Penguin
Price: Rs 295
PP: 239
An Australian motivational speaker on how to wow others with ideas-the key to successful sales. Not so obvious lessons on obviously desirable skills.