1: Let’s travel back in time to the 1950s.  Imagine being in the middle of the hustle-and-bustle of the New York City wholesale shoe market.  A shoe representative has just shown off the company’s line to Nordstrom CEO Everett Nordstrom and a young Nordstrom buyer.  

The rep asks Everett for his reaction.  “Don’t talk to me,” says Everett, “Talk to my buyer.”

Yesterday, we looked at the Inverted Pyramid, the upside-down organizational … continue reading

“Our frontline people don’t work for us; we work for them. Our job is to support them in their job.” —James F. Nordstrom, former co-chairman of Nordstrom Inc.

1: “Dollar for dollar, Nordstrom is one of the great stories in U.S. business,” write Robert Spector and breAnne Reeves in The Nordstrom Way to Customer Experience Excellence: Creating a Values-Driven Service Culture.

This week we are exploring some of the … continue reading