If there was a competition for most complex HR operation, Walmart certainly has a shot at taking the prize. The supermarket giant operates across 28 countries, running 11,500 stores staffed by 2.3 million associates – the organisation’s name for its employees. Of these, 1.5 million are in the US working across 6,000 stores, while Walmart also owns UK supermarket chain Asda.
The upside of this hefty organisation is $482 billion per annum in sales, helped by the 260 million transactions it carries out every week. But the firm is also faced with a brand that garners negative connotations, not ideal when you’re looking to recruit the best talent out there, times a couple of million. According to a 2015 Consumer Insights report, Walmart was the most well-known brand but also one of the most disliked brands.
Ray Malouf, recruitment marketing director at the firm, was at Dreamforce last week outlining the challenges Walmart faces, and how the retailer is aiming to overcome them through a smarter use of technology. He said:
I wish I managed the employment brand for Apple, for Starbucks. People naturally gravitate to those brands because of the product that they offer. People love the iPad, they love the MacBook and people love Starbucks coffee. Sometimes at Walmart they associate the employment brand with the consumer brand and sometimes that experience doesn’t live up to our expectations.
Walmart is a very well-known brand, but unfortunately it’s not the most loved brand so as an employer we have to raise that as we’re still trying to attract really good talent. In Silicon Valley where our e-commerce office is located, right across the street is YouTube. So when we talk about competing for talent and being a talent magnet, I promise you I know how difficult it is. I certainly understand what it means to differentiate ourselves.
The core of Walmart’s business, as set out by its founder 50 years ago, is to help people save money so they can live better. However, the firm is aware that it cannot carry on operating in the same model since its launch five decades ago, and is aware of the need to evolve to stay relevant and be around for another 50-plus years.
The retailer has pinpointed technology as the means to achieve this evolution. It has recently launched Tech Better, a site designed to build the brand through detailing the work it is doing in the technology space.
Over the past five years, Walmart has also made 15 tech acquisitions, and has just made what Malouf thinks will be its most significant yet. Jet.com is an e-commerce discounting service that lets shoppers save money by buying multiple items - the more they buy, their purchases are bundled together and the cost goes down. Walmart splashed out $3 billion on the deal in August, and will be looking for Jet to help grow its e-commerce sales from the current $13.7 billion, not even three percent of overall revenues. Malouf said:
That’s a huge double-down big bet for our organisation and it should be a pretty strong signal that we mean business in the e-commerce space. Our CEO said we’re poised to be number two in the e-commerce space, and I don’t like being second in anything. So absolutely we are going after Amazon and they have been winning but our acquisition of Jet will help that.
Walmart is also taking a more innovative approach when it comes to staff recruitment and retention. Part of this is a $2.7 billion investment in training, education and higher wages programme for associates, coupled with a mapping out of the associate journey to identify the pain points, starting from the application process and making sure new staff know where to go on their first day. Malouf explained:
We’re focused now on the notion of associate experience, how do we treat them like they’re our best customers. It’s our frontline associates that make or break our business. If you take care of your people, they’re going to take care of your customers and everyone wins.
We’re also thinking specifically about millennials. One in three US workers are millennials, defined by technology, digital natives. I can’t say they were born with an iPhone in their hand, maybe that’s Gen Z – my kids were – but they expect an omni-channel experience.
Salesforce partnering
To this end, Walmart has partnered with Salesforce to develop technology systems aimed at solving the problem of ‘why can’t work work more like my life’. Malouf said:
Ten years ago, 15 years ago you went to work and you probably felt like you were moving forward and having a more digital experience than you would have had in your personal life. Today unfortunately for a lot of companies - because of red tape, bureaucracy and legacy systems - you go to work and it’s like going into a time warp and you went back 10 years.
I want people when they come to Walmart to have a connected experience, to feel like it’s digital. We think about becoming a talent magnet. If we do those things well we’re going to be more competitive and attract the talent that we’re really after.
Malouf has spent a lot of time considering the potential for bringing innovation to HR, coming to the conclusion that more of the consumer experience needs to be introduced into staff management. Hence when Walmart began working with Salesforce to help improve recruitment processes, it cited the Domino pizza tracker app and Uber model for inspiration:
We were thinking about how do you give that to a candidate. They apply for a job and can get an update on where they are in the process. Uber can show where you are in the journey; we’re thinking about those great consumer experiences and bringing them into HR.
The result of this will see Walmart launching a new careers website in February, which Malouf said is “absolutely consumer grade”. Walmartcareers.com is built on HTML5, supports rich media, and is designed to be user-friendly, intuitive and personalised. Malouf said it will improve the entire process for job candidates:
If you come back as a returned user, you get an interactive dashboard to show where you are in the process. You can see your application has been submitted and if you’re now at the stage for a phone interview or on-site meeting. You can add in your skills and interests, tied into work LinkedIn has done with their APIs. It will also serve up related opportunities, and show them the team they’d be working with, and the location.
It’s a big bet and a big solution to solve that early pain point. Candidates are no longer going to feel like they’re in a dark hole on the application process.
Walmart has also been working with Salesforce to create the InternOne App, which was developed and created in less than two months. The idea was to offer a way for the hundreds of interns the firm hires every year to stay connected to their fellow interns, and keep them engaged. Clayton Clay, manager at Walmart Global Talent Management, said:
Leveraging Salesforce1 and Chatter, we created custom gamification. Interns are very competitive, as they should be, all fighting for jobs, and these challenges rolled right into their competitive nature. They’re going to do this and get a reward for it, it might be to introduce CEO Doug McMillon at a Saturday morning meeting we do, to have coffee with our CFO, there are rewards tied to these.
The app features treasure hunts, maps of the local area highlighting places to go and see, videos and the challenges, and lets interns stay in touch. The 400 interns ended up creating different small communities for specific groups, from a Chatter group for people staying at the same hotel so they could share Ubers or bike together, to a paintball tournament Chatter channel.
However, Malouf conceded that not everything about the app went right first time round. He said:
If I went back six months, I would have thought more about how do we really want the intern app to be used, what are the expectations and make that really clear. Interns want to be seen as being really professional but we’re asking them to be social on this app, and their managers are on the app.
They’re trying to secure their first professional job out of college. They wanted us to set the expectation on how much we wanted them to engage, and also we needed to think about whether their managers should even be involved, or it’s just a community for the interns. Now we’re building version two for next summer and these are all things we’re considering.
During Dreamforce, Clayton also took the opportunity to make the final touches on Walmart’s next HR technology project, the Feedback App. This is due to launch in about two weeks with a small group. He said:
We wanted to create for our associates meaningful feedback in a digital way. We’re tying competencies into this piece, and we’re also going to be adding in transparent goals so you can see what you need to do to progress and help the company achieve its targets.
We’re piloting an older version in our Sam’s Club [wholesale organisation], and it’s creating more conversations outside of the app. We’re trying to drive peer to peer engagement with mentors, with managers. It’s about getting our associates engaged in each other’s progress.
Walmart has taken steps to ensure that any feedback exchanged stays private between the two people involved, as the firm does not want comments to start appearing on Facebook or LinkedIn, and the information is not used as part of the candidate’s evaluation. The firm is also looking to provide training to employees on how to properly give feedback. Clayton explained:
We want to help associates understand what is good meaningful feedback as opposed to just ‘you rocked it today’ and kudos kudos kudos.
