Transforming a legacy brand via the power of purpose

Wesley Hitt

Tony Rogers, Chief Marketing Officer of Walmart U.S., spent the first five years of his career as a corporate accountant, following in his father’s footsteps. He realized while auditing his corporate clients that the employees who seemed to be having the most fun were the marketers. The more he talked to them, the more interested in marketing he became. He started to consider advice his father had given him years before: “Figure out what it is that you'd like to do and then figure out how to get paid to do it.”

So that’s what Tony did. He went back to business school to “rebrand” himself as a marketer and has spent the last twelve years at retail giant Walmart. He now oversees marketing for U.S. operations, including 5,000 retail locations and 2.3 million employees.

Tony recently shared with me on CMO Moves that his career at Walmart truly kicked off ten years ago when he was asked to lead a company-wide rebranding project. A daunting task when you “imagine a brand like Walmart with thousands of stores around the country and you want to change their logo, a logo that's literally attached to the building of 4,000 stores.”

But Tony knew that if he was going to take on the challenge, he wasn’t going to stop with just changing the logo. He was going to need to re-evaluate the DNA, the purpose, and the mission of this sixty year old legacy brand. He thought back to the advice of his mentor, Roy Spence, purpose evangelical and founder of GSD&M and The Purpose Institute, that “people who are bought into a mission at a deep emotional level in their soul, will deliver on a different level than people who are just mercenaries.”

The inspiration for the brand’s new purpose ultimately came from the founder himself. "We found an amazing video tape of our founder, Sam Walton, receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President George H.W. Bush. In his speech he said: ‘If we work together… we'll give the world an opportunity to see what it's like to save and to have a better life.’ And boy, when we found that tape, we found those words, we realized that our work was done. We didn't need a bunch of MBA’s to come in here and figure out the purpose [of this company]. It had already been articulated by Sam Walton. And that message really is something that we've spent the last decade trying to insert every place we can in this company.”

Tony believes that he wouldn’t have been ready to take on such a huge marketing challenge if he hadn’t first mastered the functional elements of the job. He credits his early days spent as an accountant as the first chapter in his marketing education. “The years that I spent in accounting and finance really created a solid analytical foundation for me. You know, a lot of marketers lack that. And I think that the marketers I enjoy working with the most are people that kind of have a balance of the right brain and the left brain.”

Four years ago, Tony and his family moved to China where he took over as CMO of the Chinese market, an experience he credits for helping to develop his EQ as a marketer. “If you're working in a large company, try to go to a smaller part of your company, whether it's a different division or a different country. You get a chance to be on a smaller leadership team and you find yourself involved in a lot of things that have nothing to do with marketing . . . I think that set me up well to come back here and take over [as CMO of Walmart US].”

Tony says he would have stayed in China if he hadn’t gotten a call from his other mentor, Steven Quinn, with news that he was retiring as CMO of Walmart US and a request that Tony consider taking over the role - a huge challenge that Tony felt he was ready for. “Walmart is such a huge place. If Walmart were a country, its sales would rank it 28th in the world in GDP. And everything we do here is so big. You can’t survive here unless you learn how to lead others and lead cross-functionally. I feel like the time that I’ve spent here has really been a lesson in leadership.”

That ability to work across the organization with different teams to lead change is what Tony believes is the second requirement of any successful CMO. The third has been the most challenging - and fun- for Tony to master. “If you've nailed the fundamental marketing skills and figured out that you've got to be a cross-functional leader and not just a marketer . . . Then for me, the third thing that's really been the biggest learning curve for me - and maybe the most enjoyable — is to really become a true advocate for the customer inside my company. I find myself now doing that more than anything else that I do.”

He goes on to describe the challenges he faces as the customer advocate within Walmart. “It's a grueling thing because you're always on. You have to be engaged in every discussion, every conversation, because everything has something to do with the customer. But if you'll start and go about the course of your day looking at every single thing through that [customer-centric] lens, it's amazing how many different things you can impact, and course-correct, and bring new ideas and new thinking to.”

Throughout his career, Tony has valued his relationships with team members above all. “I find the relationships to be the most interesting part of life, of work… So I surround myself with people who I trust, who I like, who I enjoy spending 70 hours a week with, and who are really, really good at what they do. And boy, it’s hard to find all of those [elements] in the same person, but when you do, you've got to place a bet there and build a situation where they never want to leave . . . When I look back, [those relationships] will be the thing that I treasure the most from my career. Way more than any ad campaign that we've worked on.”

He doesn’t stop with building deep relationships with his team members. He believes that part of being a successful cross-functional leader means putting in the hours getting to know your interdepartmental peers as well. “The challenge I think, is to try and develop that level of trust and those kinds of relationships cross-functionally in your company and with your boss. And that part takes a little bit more work, but I find that I am by far the most productive when I'm surrounded by a team where those relationship needs are being met.”

Ultimately, Tony does this job because he genuinely likes marketing. “I really just love and cherish the process of making advertising. Of finding an insight, turning that into a strategy, briefing really smart and talented creatives, and then evaluating the work that they bring back… until you get to this place where you’re bringing the original thought to life. That blend of art and science, that's why I changed from being an accounting guy to getting into marketing and I just absolutely love that.”

from Salon https://ift.tt/2J3EzNQ