Model the Success of Others

Sam Walton was a master of this. He started from a single store in Bentonville, Arkansas and went up against big, well-funded retailers like Sears.

But Sam didn’t invent anything He copied. He took the best practices from wherever he found them and implemented them. They say good artists copy, but great artists steal.

Sam was constantly experimenting. He often took competitor’s strategies and modified them; making them even better. He went all over the world looking to find good ideas he could turn into a competitive advantage.

He was constantly learning, testing, and adapting. His obsession with keeping abreast of best practices once landed him in jail. On a trip to Brazil the police locked him up. They’d responded to a call about an “old man” crawling around on the floors of a retail store with a tape measure.

According to Walton’s book, “Made in America” Walmart was built almost entirely off of other retailer’s good ideas. Sam writes, “Most everything I’ve done I’ve copied from someone else.”

Sam Walton isn’t the only one who sees value in modeling the success of others. Charlie Munger famously said, “I believe in the discipline of mastering the best that other people have ever figured out. I don’t believe in just sitting down and trying to dream it all up yourself. Nobody’s that smart.”

Current Walmart CEO Doug McMillon once told PBS’ Charlie Rose, “…going all the way back to Sam Walton, we had a part of our DNA that was interested in learning from others; copying good ideas. Don’t be so proud that you can’t implement a good idea.”