The e-mail embargo, and a similar decision that no meetings should be held on Fridays, are just the sort of initiatives that are likely to make a difference - small, perhaps, but important.
How a head office functions, and how the people who work there see their roles, has a direct impact on the success of shops. It's easy for HQ staff to become distanced from the life at the coalface experienced by store managers, shelf-stackers and cashiers. And the distance becomes even greater when human interaction is eroded, or bureaucracy bolstered, at the centre.
Out of touch becomes out of reach as the very act of sending an e-mail or holding a meeting is regarded as a 'result', while the core business withers on the vine. There was far too much of that sort of thing under the disastrous leadership of King's predecessor, Sir Peter Davis.
No doubt tycoon Philip Green would approve of King's style. He welcomed the first intake of students to his fashion academy last week, and described his preferred method of communication in characteristic terms. 'I don't have time to read anything that is on more than two bits of paper,' he said. 'I don't do e-mail. I don't do text. I talk to people. I want to see people and look them in the eye and see if they're telling the truth.'
Justin King obviously thinks the same. Other retailers could learn a lesson here. Is your head office really supporting the shops, or are too many people looking busy in meeting rooms or banging off e-mails?
At a book industry function last week, the level of hostility among the literati to bookseller Waterstone's was breathtaking. The HMV-owned book chain is vilified by many in the trade as the Tesco of books - an 'insult', which many retailers would probably regard as approbation.
Earlier this week, on the day that Waterstone's disclosed a 6.4 per cent sales plunge, it emerged that The Publishers Association was lobbying for the Competition Commission to investigate HMV's planned acquisition of rival book retailer Ottakar's.
You have to ask what is behind the wider book trade's attitude to Waterstone's, other than literary snobbery towards a multiple retailer. Waterstone's has done as much as anyone to stimulate interest in books and reading.
Without Waterstone's 201 shops, sales books by members of The Publishers Association would doubtless be lower, andmany would never see the light of day on the shelves. There would be far less of the theatre provided by author signings and spectaculars such as the recent Harry Potter launch.
The relationship between retailers and suppliers is always spiky, but many in the books industry really don't know which side their bread is buttered if they regard Waterstone's as the enemy.
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