Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. is the largest retailer in the world, and it was founded in 1962 by Sam Walton. It is expanding further throughout the world to penetrate the global market. Wal- Mart operates retail stores in the United State in three different segments: discount stores, supercenters and neighborhood markets. Today, Wal-Mart has 3807 units in the US and 4557 units internationally. The net sales for the year 2011 increased by 3.4 percent to $419 billion and the earning per share increased by 12 percent to $4.18 per share. They returned $19.2 billion to the shareholders through dividends and share repurchases (Wal-Mart 2011 annual report). Walton had established the company with a vision to be the "worldwide leader in retail" and to accomplish the vision, Walton came up with the general mission and company mission, "We save people's money so they can live better" and "If we work together, we'll lower the cost of living for everyone. We'll give the world an opportunity to see what it's like to save and have a better life". However, the whole vision and mission of the company grew from one simple objective and wealth maximization, which means maximizing the net wealth of the company's shareholders. In finance, there are three key decisions, investment decision, financing decision and dividend decision. The management of the company needs to look into these to make sure the company is meeting its main objective. Being number one in the US does not mean the company has satisfied the stakeholders by meeting the company's objective. In this highly competitive world, Wal-Mart is facing many conflicts to compete and satisfy its stakeholders. Stakeholders are those people who are interested in the company, they can be related to it personally or even not.
[...] already started its online store however; it was not according to the needs of the customers nowadays and for the future of the business. To being able to keep up with the e-commerce market the board purchased Kosmix for $300 million for a social media startup. The acquisition made due to increasing level of users of social commerce. In addition to it, the board has decided to purchase the Tweet Beat platform and Right Health site that is under Kosmix as well. [...]
[...] During the recruitment and promoting the staffs, the board should comply with the labor law of the country. They are many capable and knowledgeable women out there, they should be given chance to be one of the management team. Conclusion In conclusion, Wal-Mart is growing rapidly in the international market and US market, as the market is growing, the conflicts are also growing together with it. The conflicts that incurs in Wal-Mart are crucial. If they fail to plan the solutions now, they might end up in a worst situation where the share price will drop and they will fail to meet their main objective, maximizing shareholders wealth. [...]
[...] Benefit for the employees to buy company stock at a discounted price but most of the workers cannot afford to buy it. The only solution for this problem would be review back the wage payment to employees and share the wealth they are getting, to make to encourage the employee work more efficiently. They should also study and improve the work life of employees and try to improve on it. Moreover, they can even opt to outsource their employees, so that the management can focus more on their globalizing business. [...]
[...] They should be taking in the custom and norms of the specific area they are investing in. The international market is too wide they could not control all the market for one place, decentralization is the best thing to do for better performance. As the company should do more franchising and joint ventures so that they will have two different mind set and also local people to think in the way to bring up the business. Shareholder and Operational Manager Can Wal-Mart keep up with their slogan "Low prices. [...]
[...] Wal-Mart faced difficulties in German market, after five years of disappointing results. Wal-Mart's failure was due to the ignorance of the key principles of internationalization strategies and intercultural management. They also neglected and overlooked at the competitors in Germany. Wal-Mart at that point of time was not decentralizing the management team; it was another barrier for the company to move forward. The product they were selling at Wal-Mart in Germany was more US based products. The labels in the products are all written down in English not German language. [...]
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