By Jackson Beach
Have you ever been to a retail store and seen all the salespeople working? If so, have you ever questioned their satisfaction at their job? Moreso, how do they feel they are contributing to the company’s success?
Very recently, I have started working at Home Depot and on Friday, I learned about the values that make it very different from retail stores such as Lowe’s. First of all, it provides opportunities for developmentally disabled people through its Ken’s Krew program. Ken Krew was named in honor of Ken Langone, the namesake for NYU Langone Hospital who was struggling to find opportunities for his neurodivergent son. Thus, Ken’s Krew employs vocational trainers to help with joining an inclusive work environment.
In addition, Langone also helped finance the founders of Home Depot, Arthur Blank and Bernie Marcus, who became philanthropists in themselves and helped revolutionize retail via warehouses. Blank owns three Atlanta sports teams (Atlanta is where Home Depot is headquartered), most notably the Atlanta Falcons; although Marcus passed away in November 2024, he was also heavily involved in philanthropy, especially The Marcus Foundation, which has funded clinical research to cure childhood brain tumors and advocating for war veterans with severe brain injuries; in addition Marcus also founded The Marcus Institute for developmentally challenged children. Thus, I feel that a good retail store to work at is one that is founded by people who have everyone’s, no matter differences in skin color, ability, or age, among other credos, best interests at heart.
Although I did a job test in July 2024 and an introduction to the store manager last month, I learned about Home Depot’s values that have made it successful. First was the “Value Wheel”. This consists of eight tenets that the company feels are integral to being ethically and spiritually successful towards everyone involved in said success:
- Taking Care of Our People (Encouraging risk taking, leading and developing people)
- Respect For All People (No discrimination or harassment)
- Doing The Right Thing (Good judgment in decision making and responsibility)
- Building Strong Relationships (Building trust and integrity by listening to needs of customers, vendors, and “associates” (employees))
- Giving Back (Contributing to community and society in an impactful way)
- Excellent Customer Service (Helping customers understand what products to buy for their needs)
- Creating Shareholder Value (Helping those who provide capital through strategic advancement)
- Entrepreneurial Spirit (Encouraging associates to use innovation to help foster the business’s success towards its customers)
In addition, Home Depot also lives by the standard of an inverted pyramid: Put customers and associates first, and the rest will take care of itself. That means the customers’ and employees’ needs come first and management is there to support them. Looking back, I realized that many of 2023’s nationwide and global strikes, especially for auto workers, TV/film writers, and actors, worked the same way, with disenfranchised and pandemic-impacted workers trying to flip the hierarchy of CEOs over labor and encouraging them to become better people in the digital and technological age by using their immense wealth to improve their well-being and careers. As a person, I do not mind corporations and their wealth, but when it boils down to materialism and a “means to an end” mindset of not caring about the financial and spiritual well-being of people responsible for their success, then something is wrong with those companies of which management chooses the path of corruption, greed and disrespect.
A remarkable example of Home Depot giving back and taking care of its people is The Homer Fund. This fund allows the company to provide financial assistance to its employees impacted by hardships such as death of a loved one, natural disasters, injury, etc. One example I heard about was someone’s spouse had died in a car accident and they paid for their funeral. That is something I would not see another company such as Target, Home Goods, or Trader Joe’s doing. This goes to show that Home Depot lives by its own version of success: one that involves regularly encouraging its labor as well as its customers and goes out of its way to support for them in the hardest of times.
I feel I picked a good place to work at in Home Depot. Although I have been a customer there for years, I am amazed by how it has adopted a philanthropical business model that I believe should be the standard for business everywhere in all industries. This is because it strictly promises all of its values, especially non-discrimination through the Ken’s Krew program. Also, I have been able to build connections to the resurgent labor movement of the last few years. Home Depot is a very special place to work at because it has values and belief systems that practically no one else believes in.
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