Appendix 3 (life script): Sam Walton’s Birth Order and his Leadership Character
David M. Boje
New Mexico State University
September 4, 2005; Revised Aug 11, 2007
Sam Walton was born Mar 29 1918 in Kingfisher, OK, and died Apr 5 1992. He is first born, and was born on a small family.
Both of Sam’s parents (Thomas Gibson & Nancy Lee Walton) shaped Sam’s leaderly character. Sam and his parents lived on a farm until 1923, until Sam’s dad decided to go work with his brother again, as a Farm Loan Appraiser (repossessing farms during the Great Depression).
Sam is the first born of two children. James Lawrence (“Bud”) Walton, the younger brother was born in 1921; Bud died March 21, 1995. When Sam was 5 and Bud 2, the family moved to Springfield Missouri.
“Bud had a very different personality” than Sam (Ortega, 2000: 27); “the brothers had been close as children, and Sam Walton had long tried to steer Bud’s progress.” Bud was “bright and capable…. He wasn’t as outgoing as Sam; but at the same time he adopted a far more carefree attitude…. He didn’t seem driven to achieve the way his older brother did. Where Sam was abstemious, never smoking and rarely drinking, Bud thoroughly enjoyed both vices” (Ortega, 2000: 27-28).
Birth order theory suggests that life plots (scripts) of first born children differ from those of second, or third, or last born. Sam Walton’s talent for leading is a direct result of his childhood experiences (Boje, 2005, Chapter 3).
Sam’s mother pushed Sam to be a winner, to excel in every activity. While attending 8th grade in Shelbina, Sam became the youngest Eagle Scout in the state's history. Sam’s Mother (Helen) started a dairy cow business during the Great Depression. Sam like his younger brother Bud, had numerous chores: milked the family cow, bottled the surplus and drove it to customers. Afterwards, they would deliver newspapers on a paper route.
Sam’s leadership career exhibits the predicted characteristics for first born: strong achievement orientation, takes responsibility, highly dependability, authoritarianism, dominant, conservative, shrewdness,high dependency, need for affection and praise, but also insecurity, sensitiveness, jealousy, spoiled, and stinginess (traits from Forum on Birth Order).[i] In addition, Sam’s autobiography attests that his “Mother and Dad were two of the most quarrelsome people who ever lived together … They were always at odds, and they really only stayed together because of Bud and me… As the oldest child, I felt like I took a lot of the brunt of this comestic discord… I’m not sure exactly how this affected my personality – unless it was partly a motivation to stay so busy all the time…” (cited in Ortega, 2000: 20). Indeed Sam became a workaholic.
Sam played basketball, was quarterback for Columbia, Missouri’s Hickman High School; they won state championship in 1935; he graduated from high school and was voted the "Most Versatile Boy" in his class.
Sam strived to become President of the Student Body his senior year at University of Missouri; Sam majored in economics and was an ROTC officer. He was rush captain for his fraternity, Beta Theta Pi. Upon graduating, Jun 3 1940, Sam was voted "Permanent President" of the class. In his autobiography (Walton, 1992: 14-15) tells about his Rush Captain days and his campus leadership:
I bought a real old Ford, and I traveled the whole state that summer, interviewing potential Beta candidates…
I learned early on that one of the secrets to campus leadership was the simplest thing of all: speak to people coming down the sidewalk beroe they speak to you.
Hired by JC Penney at $75 a month, but turned down offer from Sears; started in Des Moines Iowa 3 days after graduation from college; Worked at JC Penney till WWII. Bud followed Dam in becoming a Penney’s trainee (Ortega, 2000: 28). Sam and then Bud resigned from their positions at Penney’s in 1942 in anticipation of being inducted into the military. Bud became a Navy lieutenant, leader of a torpedo bomber squadron and was in the attack on Okinawa.
1945 After Army, his father-in-law with a loan of $20,000, plus $5,000 he had saved from his time in the Army, Walton purchased a store in Newport, Arkansas (franchise of the Butler Brothers chain). Sam sold the store and made a profit over $50,000.00. Bud became Sam’s assistant manager (cleaned the ice cream machine, did window displays with his brother), then Bud moved on in 1948 to manage his own Ben Franklin franchise in Versailles Missouri (Ortega, 2000: 28).
In 1962 (see time line below), the brothers began opening up Wal-Mart stores. In 1971 Bud, Sam and a few other executives created a real estate and construction division to keep up with the new Wal-Mart stores; there were 18 stores by then and a plan to add 14 more (Ortega, 2000: 73); Bud was put in charge of the new division.
The point is that Sam took the lead role, and Bud was left to take a follower role; keep in mind both brothers founded the chain, and Bud had lesser executive roles his entire life.
It was therefore natural that when Sam Walton died Apr 5 1992, that at the annual shareholder’s meeting, CEO David Glass would call upon “Bud” Walton (Sam’s younger brother) to address the crowd of 15,000. But Bud, like Sam believed in listening to the employees (both had listed their home numbers for associates to call). The workers were update that the new CEO had been cutting their hours, turning full timers into part timers to save more money. So at this 1992 meeting, Bud took the podium:
“On the stage in front of more than 14,000 shareholders, a loose, relaxed Bud Walton joked and laughed and waved at people … [at] Wal-Mart’s 1993 annual meeting.
He’d been designated as the company’s substitute for his late brother Sam for the event…. Behind him, David Glass, Don Soderquist, and all the Wal-Mart directors took their seats as the carefully choreographed show got underway. But then Bud Walton unexpectedly veered from the [scripted] agenda to say he wanted to talk about something he hadn’t mentioned to the board…
“I probably shouldn’t even bring this up,” he said. But sales at stores open more than a year had stagnated in recent months, he noted, so Wal-Mart was cutting payroll, cutting back on people’s hours to cut expenses.
“I think that’s wrong,” he said, to shouts of approval from the several thousand employees in the arena. “I know we got to cut expenses, but we can find another way,” he said, to another ovation…. “It’s difficult for people to manage on paychecks for only 30 or 2 hours,” he said to the directors, before turning back to the crowd. “I’m sticking my neck out for you. They didn’t have any idea I was going to bring this up…. I want you to go back and tell your people I’m behind them 100 percent. “This is a company problem and I don’t think we’ve faced it,” he said.
“I’d suggest the executives should take a pay cut,” Walton added loudly, to a thunderous cheer from the crowd, as the directors and executives sat stone-faced behind him” (Ortega, 2000: 346-7).
You can guess the reaction of Glass and the other executives; not one executive or director mentioned Bud’s remarks; at the next meeting in 1994, Bud was not invited to speak. Instead the upper echelon Wal-Mart executives concocted a plan to create a more virtual Sam Walton, what I will call the simulated ‘ghost of Mr. Sam” (see section following time line).
Sam Walton Time Line
1951 (Aug 1) Opened “Walton's 5 & 10" in Bentonville, Arkansas (Walton, 1992: viii).
1954 he opened a store with his brother (Bud) in Ruskin Heights, a suburb near Kansas City in a shopping center. This store was quite profitable, too.
1962 - The first true Wal-Mart opened July 2 1962 in Rogers, Arkansas; Sam Walton (was 44), with his brother Bud Walton, founded Wal-Mart, the chain of discount variety stores. By 1962 Sam and his brother Bud owned 16 variety stores in Arkansas, Missouri, and Kansas.
1970- Wal-Mart flourished and went public
1988- Sam Walton stepped aside as chief executive of the company, but remained active in its management. Sam Walton was twice as rich as Bill Gates.
2005- The Walton family held 5 spots in the top 10 richest people in the United States until 2005.Sam set up the inheritance in stock ownership; Sam and wife Helen got 20%, each of the four children received 20% of family stock. Eldest S. Robson “Rob” Walton succeeded his father as the Chairman of the Board of Wal-Mart John T. Walton was a director until his death in a 2005 plane crash. Youngest son, Jim Walton, manages the financial end of family business; Youngest of the four, Alice Walton, raises horses.
As of 2005 The company employs 1.6 million associates worldwide through more than 3,600 facilities in the United States and more than 1,570 units in Mexico, Puerto Rico, Canada, Argentina, Brazil, China, Korea, Germany and the United Kingdom. More than 138 million customers per week visit Wal-Mart stores worldwide (Wal-Mart facts web site).
Sam Walton is a charismatic leader. He developed home-spun, style of storytelling and engaged in a good deal of theatrics to hone the Wal-Mart corporate culture.
The Wal-Mart Cheer source
Before telling you about the ‘ghost of Mr. Sam’ I want to explain a bit about how Sam infused the Wal-Mart culture with his energy and charisma; then you can see that when the charismatic leader dies, then the company has to routinize that charisma (Weber, 1947).
Sam inspired by workers he saw in a tennis ball factory in Korea; he introduced the famous "Wal-Mart Cheer" to employees, whom the company refers to as "associates."
Sam Walton, the late CEO of Wal-Mart would ask his employees to raise their hands and say: “Remember that at Wal-Mart, a promise we make is a promise we keep. Now repeat after me. I solemnly promise and declare that, from this day on, every time a customer comes within ten feet of me, I will smile, look him in the eye, and greet him. So help me, Sam!” The bottom line is that the only oracle we should listen to is the client! (Birth Order Book, P. 17).[ii]
To start with, we all have an inner theater. This inner theater is made up of motivational need systems that contribute to the development of a set of traits. Referring to traits, we also need to take into consideration temperament, which is visible in children from an early age. Birth order is another factor of importance. This inner theater is enacted in the form of competences…(Birth Order Book, p. 6).
Sam Walton implemented, as well, an outer theatre, his “Cheers for Wal-Mart”; this means that any Wal-Mart that is open 24 hours will do cheers, at each shift change; that’s three times a day, 365 days a year.
Upon arriving at a store he’d often pull the associates together in the front of the store and talk with them about the company. Before he would leave he’d always lead a Wal-Mart cheer” (Bergdahl, 2004: 71).
Sam taught other Wal-Mart executives to “often use theatrical methods to illustrate a point” (Bergdahl, 2003: 69). There is another side to Wal-Mart, a way in which leader storytelling and theatrics are used in a more predatory way.
With their showman gone, the successors to Sam Walton tried to carry on the show.
The Ghost of Sam Walton
For the past few years, CEO David Glass and Vice Chairperson Don Soderquist use the “spirit of Sam Walton” to motivate workers: “Often they invoke the spirit of Sam, telling workers that he’s looking down on them from heaven” (Ortega, 2000: xxiv). And “so revered is his memory that a decade after his death company leaders refer to him as ‘Mr. Sam’” (Bergdahl, 2004: 3); “As you read about the company on its web sites you’d almost think Sam is still alive and providing personal direction!” (Bergdahl, 2004: 79).
Bergdahl (2005: 79) argues that posthumously Sam is an icon like Colonel Sanders of Kentucky Fried Chicken. Actually, the Colonel is more of a second-order simulacrum; the Colonel became a cartoon caricature of his leaderly self (Boje & Rhodes, 2005a, b). Sam Walton, on the other hand, is a very different kind of virtual leader; posthumously the senior executives of Wal-Mart have erected Sam as a “specter,” virtually the ghost of Wal-Mart.
Actually, I think creating the Mr. Sam ghost, theatrically, started soon after his death. For example, at the Annual Shareholder’s meeting, an elaborate theatric was organized in which the ghost of Mr. Sam would address the crowd of 15,000.
There was the usual company cheers, flag-waving and songs. Much of the meeting was a memorial for Sam Walton, who’d died two months earlier. It began with a video tribute to him on three huge screens; at another point, a Wal-Mart employee even pretended to talk with Walton in heaven, declaring Mr. Sam wanted everybody to sign “God Bless America.” They did (Ortega, 2000: 240).
“Mr. Sam” as he is referred to, is a specter of charisma and ongoing transformational leadership at Wal-Mart. Sam was charismatic in his storytelling style and his theatrical delivery
Executive Don Soderquist at the Wal-Mart 1997 annual shareholder’s meeting told the crowd of 17,000, he believed “Sam is looking down here, and he’s very proud” (Ortega, 2000: 369).
Wal-Mart in the 2004 and 2005 annual reports includes declarations by current CEO Lee Scott that the executives will engage in “aggressive storytelling” practices. One way to leverage the virtual leader story assets of the deceased Sam Walton through a storytelling campaign on the Wal-Mart web sites and annual reports for investors, employees (called associates), and consumers (called guests).
One of the ways the ghost of Wal-Mart is theatrically enacted is to prevent unions. "We’re not antiunion," said Wal-Mart spokeswoman Cynthia Illick; "We just don’t believe that unions have a place in our business" (IBEW, 2003).[iii] Sam Walton, until his death in 1992, stressed a “union-free” Wal-Mart.
In sum, Sam is the eldest son of Thomas and Nancy Lee Walton, and he has all the qualities attributed to first born children in a small family; plus this was a Great Depression family, who stressed frugality. The second born, Bud Walton, became a conscience for Mr. Sam. After Sam’s death, the ghost of Mr. Sam Wilton is resurrected theatrically by contemporary executives in the storytelling and the graphics of Wal-Mart’s web sites, annual reports, and in the day-to-day posthumous celebration of Mr. Sam. A specter weaves its way into the story-fiber of the Wal-Mart culture.
The question is, what kind of specter is the Mr. Sam ghost? In Dante’s Inferno, the “hungry ghosts are the reincarnations of people who are constantly ravenous, but can never be satisfied. They despoil and devour everything around them” (Ortega, 2000: 377). Perhaps Sam is not the ghost from heaven that the Wal-Mart executives stage him to be.
I don’t presume to know where Sam Walton wound up after he passed on. But I can’t help but think, at times, that his hungry ghost is still with us in the form of Wal-Mart itself (Ortega, 2000: 377).
In short, Sam Walton’s charismatic storytelling and theatrics created a company culture that mirrored his own personality: workaholic, need to achieve, and to win at all costs; in short, a predatory business culture. That brings us to the dark side of Wal-Mart crafted by the eldest son, then perpetuated by the ghost of Mr. Sam.
The Dark Side of First Born Leader of Wal-Mart
By all accounts Sam Walton was a master storyteller and some who made his point theatrically. The photo above is Sam Walton in 1986 making a case in Little Rock, Ark., that buying American products could be the answer to the country's trade deficit Source
Sam Walton is alleged by critics to have carried his “will to power” and “to win” to excess. For example, in the “Buy American” campaign, it was revealed that 83% or more of Wal-Mart products are sourced out of the USA (Ortega, 2000: xii).
Sam was the consummate workaholic, who even on his death bed, was writing furiously in his notebook on how to improve Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart’s executives often put in 70 to 80 hour weeks, in the tradition of their deceased leader. Behind the Mr. Sam the “friendly ghost” façade of the grandfatherly founder, the contemporary executives perpetuate a form of predatory capitalism, a hypercapitalism that depends upon sweatshops and cutthroat competitive strategies. Behind the friendly ghost, is another specter, one more like the “hungry ghosts” in Dante’s Inferno. With the death of the founder, the successor executives seem to have narrowed the ethical horizon of Wal-Mart even further.