When Thomas Bata died aged 93 in 2008, he had not only rebuilt the shoemaking business that his father started in 1894 in what was then the Austro-Hungarian empire. He had also turned it into the world’s leading footwear retailer and manufacturer, with 30,000-plus employees at production facilities in more than 30 countries. It is not only what he did, however, but how he did it that should inspire any manager.
To begin with, Tom decided to “go global” when the world seemed bent on going the opposite way. He moved to Canada to establish a Bata presence after the Nazis invaded Czechoslovakia in 1939. From Canada, he witnessed the 1945 nationalisation and confiscation of the headquarters of the business his family had already built into an international powerhouse. Unable to return to a country now under the influence of Stalin’s Soviet Union, Tom rebuilt the business from a new base in a town near Toronto that still bears his name.
Under his leadership, the company continued the tradition started by his father of expanding into markets around the globe: Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and Africa. Tom went to corners of the world where no one else wanted to go, sometimes against great odds, and often in less-than-favourable circumstances. But he went there first, stuck it out for the long haul, and built a powerful brand that has galvanised loyalty among generations of customers and employees. It is estimated that his company sold more than 20bn pairs of shoes over the course of his lifetime.