Cup of Coffee : "We Were Pioneers, in Dealing With a High Velocity of Change"

June 2009 By Audrey Gray

multipage

I started out not really imagining a business career or individual success myself and then I had this wonderful experience. I got so much more out of the career than I could ever have imagined. It is connected to the milestones, but it’s also connected to individual dreams. That gave us a reason to exist and a competitive edge.

PB: Can you tell us a bit about the enormous decision to transition Best Buy from a product distribution company to more of a service company?
Anderson: I didn’t think we’d have a future if we couldn’t do that. We had to change. I don’t think our leaders could have transformed our company without that kind of risk. Because our industry is so challenging, we had to figure out how to do that.  But we had the great fortune in our past of having to fundamentally change more than once. And we’re still in the process; honestly, we still have the design instincts of a product company. It’s still not a natural fit for us.

PB: What’s got you the most excited now in terms of emerging services?
Anderson: One of the good things about the turbulent economic climate we’re in is that we’ll all either have to change our standard of living or find out how to do things more efficiently. We have lots of options in our industry to offer to help with that. Look, if we hadn’t had to change, we wouldn’t have. The opportunity for our industry in the next few years is to help people do a lot more for less.

PB: Best Buy Mobile famously offered U.S. customers a more streamlined cellphone sign-up experience. What do you think the company will offer its new European customers in coming years?Anderson: Europe is a completely fresh slate for us. We’re building new Web sites and store configurations. We’re hoping to use everything we’ve learned to present to our European customer a compelling choice: a lifestyle-oriented integrated set of solutions.

We’ll look at a customer as trying to solve a problem. They’ll still be able to go into a store and just buy a TV, but if they have a band and want to record music or if they want to work from home, the way we are building services will make it much easier for them to do those things. We’ll be able to solve particular challenges using technology.

PB: You’re credited with welcoming an interactive corporate culture where your employees participate in a private online social network [Blue Shirt Nation], a company-wide wiki, and even in sales projection games. What did you learn from those employees, many of whom are under the age of 25?
Anderson: It feels like a million years ago since I was that young! But what I had 30 years ago, in spite of being young, was that I was closer to the customer’s experience than the people who were running the company. I think that’s why I got a chance to lead in the first place. Part of what we’re trying to do at Best Buy is to leverage that [proximity of staff to customers]. Their insight is likely to be better than anything that I can provide, but I can use the things I’ve learned to add to the insights of the folks in the stores.

Back when I was in the store, if I felt nobody was listening to me, the level of service I provided to customers reflected that. But if I was doing something I believed in, the level of service was much better. So we’re creating more engaged employees. That wouldn’t be possible without the very tool sets that we sell.

PB: The retail conditions of the last six months couldn’t have been more challenging. Is Brian Dunn giving you a hard time about turning over the reigns to him this particular year?
Anderson: We just shot a cover photograph for an internal magazine and it was a picture of me handing a remote control to Brian, it’s meant as sort of a symbol...In one of the shots, I’ve got a huge smile on my face and Brian looks a little alarmed. (laughing) I think that’s a pretty good representation.

PB: Do you feel some relief?
Anderson: Yes! (laughs) The company is so much bigger than we ever dreamed it’d get to be...It’s a consumptive enterprise to manage and I am looking forward to feeling less guilt.

PB: We know you are big reader. Do you have a stack of books already waiting for you this summer?
Anderson: They’re piled up next to my refrigerator. I think the stack of books is about five feet high.  

PB: Would you consider a Kindle?
Anderson: Yes, actually! I haven’t bought one yet, but I definitely would consider it. I seem to still have this affection for big, clunky books that weigh down your luggage.