Practicing Humility In Small Business

We have all worked for bosses whom we wish we had never met. They are haughty individuals who seek to glorify themselves at the expense of all others. In small business, however, this does not work. We must humble ourselves before our customers and our staff to grow our small businesses.

The humble small business owner will lead by doing. The story is told of Sam Walton in the early days of his dime store of a customer coming into the store to buy two paint buckets. The customer had driven an hour to get the buckets over dirt roads in bad weather conditions in the backwoods of Arkansas. Sam did not have the paint buckets that the customer sought. That night they arrived on the freight truck. Now, Sam could have forgotten about the customer wanting them, or he could have called the customer and told him that the paint buckets were in, but instead he drove to the customer's house in his old red pickup to deliver the paint buckets. It was this humility that allowed Mr. Walton to build Wal-mart to the business we know today.

We can learn some more lessons from the life of Sam Walton. Early on Sam heard that one of his stores was having trouble with their freight deliveries. Determined to get to the bottom of the problem, Sam arranged for the truck driver to pick him up on his next delivery a few miles from the store. He arrived at the store in the back of the truck and when the unloaders unlocked the truck, he soon found out that the problem existed because the unloaders were messing around and not getting the work done. Appearing from his hiding spot between pallets on the truck, he proceeded to fire all the unloaders and the store management. He then unloaded the truck himself and took the pallets to the sales floor. It was a hot, dirty job, especially with the high humidity of Arkansas in the summer time, but Sam knew that his customers needed the freight on that truck.

Most of the time when Sam Walton arrived at a store, he did so in his old red pickup accompanied by his dog, Ol' Roy. He usually dressed as an associate and entering any of his stores, he immediately started greeting customers and associates by name. He understood that the most important person in his store was the customer, followed by the sales associates who waited on them. While Sam could have eaten anywhere that he wanted, his favorite place to eat when he visited a store was at a company picnic. Each associate would make a dish and bring it, while Sam would hire a local restaurant to furnish the meat. At these picnics, he would love to play horseshoes and visit with the associates. He knew one thing would come from these picnics. As the associates visited, the best ideas would develop, ideas that he used to build his business into the empire it is today.

We all need to carry the humility practiced by Sam Walton into our small businesses today. It will still have the same effect today that it had in Sam Walton's time. Sam Walton built an empire on humility by employing three basic beliefs. The first of those beliefs is respect for the individual. The second is serving our customers. The third is striving for excellence. When we employ those beliefs in our own businesses they, we will see the benefits.