Great Companies: Target

When times get tough, the authors write, the tough just get tougher. And if Bullseye, Target’s value-fetching bull terrier mascot, could talk, he’d explain how his master, CEO Gregg W. Steinhafel, and his staff quietly went to work in the midst of difficult economic times and did what Target’s leaders have always done best: They made good things happen.


If you’ve never heard of Steinhafel, you’re not alone. Target likes to keep a low profile, a reflection, perhaps, of the retailer’s culture of Midwestern reserve. The absence of any cult of personality around Target’s executives may be one of the nearly $70 billion company’s most potent weapons: It can rapidly pivot in whatever direction its leaders deem necessary to take on rivals or pick up market share.


Here, in this Quick Read, is Target’s story – with lessons for businesspeople everywhere.