To operate a company of the size of Sears Holdings or Wal-Mart or Target or Home Depot or Lowe's, you need a combination of skills, and each of those skills needs to be sufficiently strong.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I was very clear why we put these companies together and what our goals were. It was really to allow both Sears and Kmart to compete in what I thought was going to be a more challenging but evolving industry.
Look, you need technical skills to run a company.
Building a company isn't that different from climbing a big mountain. You need people helping you traverse treacherous paths and to lift you up when you fall.
You can't compete with Walmart. But you can have smaller businesses that are successful.
The key to competing and surviving against Wal-Mart is to focus your business into a niche or pocket where you can leverage your strengths in the local marketplace.
Wal-Mart hires average people but squeezes above average performance and results out of them.
You'll have to hire people to expand your business. But it's a good discipline to really question if you need each and every hire.
Jobs are created by businesses, especially small and mid-sized businesses.
Successful companies hire people.
Someone asked me about what's it like managing 2.2 million associates, and I said, 'When they're Wal-Mart associates, it's not all that hard because of the quality and the depth of our talent.' I'm really proud of the fact that 70% of the managers in the U.S. started as hourly associates with our company.
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