Angela Ahrendts, head of Apple's retail division, recently spoke during an interview with Fast Company about her time at Apple and what the first two years have meant for her leads as head of the store division Apple and head of distribution.
As most of you already know, Ahrendts was previously CEO of the high-end fashion brand, Burberry, from which she has managed to extract the essence and all the experience to apply certain subtle changes and others not so much, within the stores of Manzana. These changes include, for example, the treatment of employees, where she herself affirms that her strategy is Treat them the same as you would an executive.
Ahrendts noted that during his first six months at Apple, he had to travel to 40 different markets and spend time with the top sales managers in each of them. He described that Apple Stores as retail stores, are "Uniting the employed staff and getting them to collaborate with each other."
Perhaps the most remarkable thing about what he stated was that Apple in 2015 had the highest retention rate in terms of store employees that it has ever had, that is, stood at 81 percent. To argue this, Ahrendts explained that she does not see store employees simply as lower category employees, but sees them as executives who are "interacting with customers with products that Jony and his design team have taken years to create. », So it makes clear the importance of transmitting the correct impression of the product to the customer or user, hence its importance in the chain.
The executive explained that everyone who works at Apple is there to "change people's lives." It's more than just productsIn addition and thanks to Tim Cook's strategy, we get involved in social problems and we try to leave the world better than we found it:
A month before I started working, I told my husband something that I hadn't realized before: “Now I know why this is one of the most successful companies in the world: It's because of his strong culture and principles such as pride, protection and values'. The company was built on a foundation to change people's lives. That service mindset, that drive to change things, is a core value at this company. Tim Cook tells us that it is also our responsibility to leave it better than we found it. So here you have two incredible pillars and a culture built around that. The same happens in the retail division and in the Cupertino offices.