SUMMARY: Walmart plans to hire more than four million new associates across the globe in the coming years, and needs to assimilate them in a way that improves performance and maintains the company’s core values.  To address this need, we helped the company redefine its culture and connect it to performance, align management around that definition, and operationalize it globally.

HIGHLIGHTS:  We employed an inclusive, research-based, “pilot tested” process to define Walmart’s optimal culture in universal, measurable terms that overcame some long-held beliefs and opinions based on anecdote.  The process identified a set of specific, behaviors that top performers employed to drive sales and profit.  Essentially, these were behavioral best practices that created a culture at its best, and that could be replicated and measured throughout the entire organization – at every level, every operation, in every country.  The power of culture was recognized by Executive management, as the newly articulated culture became one of four core, global strategies.  Moreover, the behavioral approach drove changes in many human resource systems (recruiting, training, leadership development, performance management and others).  It’s still a work in progress, but culture always is -- especially when it involves one of the world’s largest organizations.