Award-winning Publix managers reveal leadership secrets

Running a Publix, or even overseeing a dozen Publix locations, is more than apples and oranges. The people side, with listening skills at the front of the line, requires a lot of attention, too.

By Mark Gordon
| 5:00 a.m. March 15, 2023
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Julian Agollari has been with Publix since 2004.

Leadership

Julian Agollari’s American Dream, when he moved from Albania to the States with his wife and their baby daughter some 25 years ago, started on the floor. Not just at work, but in the family’s Southwest Florida apartment. “We slept on the floor for six months,” Agollari says. “We did that until we could afford a mattress.”

Agollari is now a district manager for Publix, overseeing a dozen stores for the $54.5 billion Lakeland grocery giant in and around Naples. It’s at least the third management post he’s held in nearly 20 years at the company; he started in the customer service department in 2004.

Yet Agollari’s humble start sleeping on the floor, when it comes to leading people — especially with empathy — is never far from his mind, he says. “When I’m managing people I try to think about that experience.”