
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, December 29, 1993                   TAG: 9312290051
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: A-7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: MIAMI                                LENGTH: Medium

WAL-MART: HAPPY FAMILY OR SUPER CHEAPSKATE?

More than a year after Hurricane Andrew, laborers waited by U.S. 1 south of the city. "Need work. Blow horn," their signs said. But Jason Sarwar never was out of work, despite the storm's havoc.

Within hours of the hurricane, he and co-workers took brooms and flashlights and started cleaning up. Paychecks continued. His company donated candles, food, clothes for his 5-year-old daughter - and cash and time off to repair his shattered home.

"Whatever I needed, I got it. Wal-Mart was very good to me," said Sarwar, a department manager at the discounter's store in the hard-hit Kendall section.

When the hurricane struck in August 1992, Wal-Mart mobilized staffers from its Arkansas headquarters and other stores to assist in Miami. Fellow workers around the country raised money.

"We had people from everywhere helping out," said Mae Mougeotte, who works in housewares. "I'd do the same thing for them that they did for me. We're one big family."

The Miami workers echoed phrases that Wal-Mart executives long have made a mantra of the corporate culture of the nation's largest retail chain. Ordinary people doing extraordinary things: That's how Wal-Mart likes to describe its 470,000-member work force, known as "associates."

Many workers say they agree with Wal-Mart's inclusion in the book, "The 100 Best Companies to Work for in America." Authors Robert Levering and Milton Moskowitz call the companies "magnets for people looking for meaningful work. They are models for companies trying to get it right."

There are some serious doubters, however, in the smiling Wal-Mart ranks, people who say the $55 billion (sales for year ended Jan. 31, 1993) company should do more for its work force, that it has grown too big with more than 1,900 stores, that management's ears are closed to anything but cheerleading.

"The whole idea of everybody being happy and being `associates' - that's just not true," said Dale Stiles, a retired phone company executive who took a job as a $4.25 an hour Wal-Mart sporting goods worker two years ago. He quit in May.

"Family" or not, ordinary Wal-Mart people have done some extraordinary things.

"It's something to look forward to, something for college for the kids," Anita Watkins of Rogers, Ark., said of the $200,000 she has built up in profit sharing. At 35, she has worked for Wal-Mart for 18 years. To her, profit sharing is just one more proof that Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton's drum beat about team spirit was more than sloganeering.

Sometimes, management's hearing is very clear. Four hundred suggestions from the rank and file to streamline operations were quickly implemented, the company says, saving $38 million in a single year.

Wal-Mart offers financial incentives for such initiative, and for innovations that reduce theft and improve safety.

Some think the dedicated associates should be rewarded more. "It's kind of a Golden Rule-type thing," said Stiles.

"I consider them supercheap. . . . A friend of mine got a raise - she'd been at the company for five years - got a raise to $5 an hour. Then I think about that $28 billion," he said, referring to an estimate of the Walton family's wealth.

While many hourly employees have only a high school diploma, Stiles has degrees in engineering and business. While many are working in the best job they've ever known, Stiles had been a manager at South Central Bell for 25 years.

"I was a great admirer of the Sam Walton story," he said.

Last year, Stiles wrote a lengthy article for the alternative Arkansas Times newspaper laying out what he felt Wal-Mart was doing right - he noted charitable efforts, calling the company and workers "good community citizens" - but also a no-holds-barred critique of the treatment of workers. He complained about pay, scheduling, even the "early Salvation Army decor" in the employee lounge.

Wal-Mart, in an accompanying rebuttal, defended its pay scale as better than that of some competitors, noted its health benefits and profit-sharing plan, and urged him to use the open-door policy to discuss his thoughts with management.

After the article, some co-workers criticized Stiles. Far more, he said, quietly told him, "Good for you."

by CNB