simplerich

I shop a lot at amazon.com and I rent movies through netflix.com. Those two sites know me. They know what I look at, what I buy, and what I watch. Subsequently, when I go back they’re able to suggest other things I may like as well.

Once upon a time our town had a comic book store and the people who worked their knew their comics. They knew them to the point they could, if I bought MongoDROID Issue 17 they could suggest that I might also like Mongopolypse Issues 12-16: The Chubby Rain* mini-series. This sort of product knowledge that they had was what kept me coming back to their store.

When I used to go to GameStop here in town the staff there was able to help me pick Nintendo DS games based on what I’d bought in the past and subsequently returned. They knew what I’d bought and kept and were able to suggest games that I might not otherwise have considered (anything with an animal in it I would never choose to buy on my own). Their expertise in their area was what kept me coming back as a customer. It wasn’t great prices or anything like that. I wanted to talk to someone about something that interested me and get feedback and suggestions. (the staff now isn’t as good as what they had before so I don’t shop there. I went in yesterday while waiting for a hair appointment and they ignored me while I looked at a game system, not a game, the system… that’s a big sale they didn’t even try for. It’s why they get no more of my gaming dollars.)

I don’t make any purchase over a hundred dollars without first finding out if there are amazon reviews on the product. Seriously. I use the wisdom of the masses to help me buy things. I was looking at car stereos today at a local car stereo shop and got some part numbers. I’ll look them up for reviews before I buy. Not because I don’t trust the guy. He was pretty helpful and the information he had on my old stereo matched up with mine. But we don’t have a relationship yet. I don’t know if he’s motivated by commission or trying to sell out old product or trying to help me, so I’ll consult Amazon.comand Crutchfield for information first. That relationship is something that is important to consumers. Hank Hill references it when he talks about “his car guy” in an episode where it turns out that through his masterful negotiation skills he’s paid “Sticker price” for years. That’s a case where the salesman was a jerk. I’m not talking about that. I’m talking about the establishing trust, having a specialized knowledge and expertise, and having a desire to help the customer get what they want.

When you’re in retail, and I am… if you’re a smaller specialty shop this is what your employees have to do. They have to know the product in the store. They have to engage the customer and find out what they’re looking for, what they’ve tried, what they liked and didn’t like about previous purchases, and try to figure out what is in stock at that moment that will help the customer right then. If it’s not something that’s in stock at the time the sales person needs to be VERY good to have the customer come back to them. If I tell the customer, “Oh, you mean the widgetmaster 2000? That’s EXACTLY what you’re describing and sadly, we’re out of stock but should have some by next Thursday for the low low price of something reasonable,” the customer is now armed and able to go to Internet.storefront.not.me.com and order it there… and I lose out. It’s not their fault. It’s my fault as a retailer for being out of stock.

This is a clarion call for all those boutique type stores out there, those one-shot type stores that do one thing… if you’re not going to do it well, you’re not going to do it long. That comic book store I was talking about? I thought they did things REALLY well. Knowledgeable staff, big selection, no competition within 100 miles to speak of, and plenty of local events to keep people coming in. They went out of business anyway. So, if you’re NOT doing it not just good, but really good, you’re not going to be doing it for long. Sometimes, even if you are doing it really well the ball bounces the wrong way and places go out of business. There’s no reason to be in retail if you don’t like retail. Honestly. There are so many other jobs out there, why do one you don’t like?

*Two points if you know the reference and give it in the comments.

PS: What’s the picture of the bowl of Trix have to do with anything? Nothing, but isn’t it bright and colorful?

I’m in retail. Not a big box type store, a specialty type store along the lines of a GameStop, Candle store, Cell phone store. People who come to my store are coming there for what I sell. People don’t just come into my stores to wander and kill time like at a Wal-Mart or Target.

Today I went looking for a blue tooth earpiece and I knew what I wanted. I’d done my research. I wanted a Plantronics Discovery 975 Bluetooth Headset now that link will take you to Amazon.com where I have free 2nd day delivery and a price that was lower than the store I found it in today. I’m a fan of shopping locally when I can and when they have what I want. There are times when I want something right away and if I do all my shopping online all the local stores will dry up. We can’t ignore our local stores for just the big box stores or the Internet options. This Christmas should have been a HUGE wake-up call to retailers. The Internet isn’t going away. At least half of all Christmas shopping this year was done online among my friends. That’s money leaving town and jobs following the money out of this town.

I went to two cell phone stores today and one was super busy and under-staffed so I couldn’t get help. They had the thing I wanted, but it was locked on a peg and I couldn’t get it off and there was nobody to ring it up for me if I could have. One employee. Yes. I’m sure that helps your labor stay down, but you lost a sale when you were too busy to take my money.

Three doors down at another local wireless store they had the item I wanted and two sales associates working, both sitting on stools talking to each other when I walked in. I shopped for a bit, looked at the phones, no new ones, and still loving my HTC DROID Eris Android Phone, then I wandered and looked at cases for the phone. Evidently the girl on the left was having an ugly breakup with her boyfriend… no, I’m not kidding. So, I stood in front of the accessories and waited, fiddling with them for a minute or so, listening to their story, and then I left. I waved at them as I left the store. They smiled back at me.

Retailers. Wake up. You aren’t necessary any more. I’m not kidding. Nobody NEEDS to shop with you now. EVERYBODY can get what they want from somewhere else. I don’t care how you think your nearest competition is a hundred miles away. You’re wrong. Your nearest competition is as far away as the public library or the nearest internet connection.

If you and your employees don’t want to be in retail keep doing what you’re doing and soon you won’t be in retail. The Internet isn’t going away. If you don’t want to go away you’d better step it up or I’ll wave good bye to you as I leave your store.

I was talking to a lady who had recently been hired by our company and setting up meeting time and training schedule when she said how excited she was. She said that “the most exciting time is between getting the job and starting it.” I laughed and said that wasn’t her most exciting time. The most exciting time would be the day after the training was done and she showed up for work that first day without having to listen to me doing any more training!

Training is something I really enjoy. I’m about to go train a new manager and area manager for a couple weeks and if they’re as excited about it as I am we should be in luck and the time will fly by. First thing I’m excited about? There’s a convenience store across the street from the store so I’ll never run out of coffee! You think I’m kidding don’t you? I’m totally not!

I’m also excited that the upper management in the company likes to use me as a trainer, even in areas that aren’t mine. I’m not sure if it’s because my managers are strong enough to do without me for two weeks or if it’s that they like the job I do? Do they like my enthusiasm? Do they like the culture I try and engender in my area? Do they like that I’m single with no kids so I can up and go if I have to without worrying about who will feed the birds or other pets? Do they like that I’ve always said “yes” to any travel opportunity they’ve offered me? I’ve trained in San Diego, New Orleans, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Memphis, Iowa, Wyoming, and North Dakota. I really like it.

So, I can’t talk more about it right now. The place it’s happening doesn’t really know it’s happening yet and they may or may not read this blog. I’m pretty excited about it though. Hopefully I’ll talk more about it once it happens. It’s cool though and I’m excited about it too.

I was reading "Say Alaka’i" over at the Honolulu Advertiser site today where Rosa Say ( author of my favorite management book, Managing with Aloha ) writes a weekly column.

The title of the article was "What If Your Business Got Sick?" and she told two mini stories within the article. The first, (brutally summarized, go read her article) was about her being challenged to think of her business as a person and not an inanimate thing. That mental switch being flipped changes the way we relate to our business. Now. I don’t own my own business, but I’ve worked for the same company (Can it be the same company if it’s changed names and owners several times and my position has changed many times? I think that’s akin to Theseus’ Paradox.)

If my job, my career of the past 15 years were a person what would our relationship be? What would the dynamic between me and my job be? Would it be an equitable one? In a healthy relationship both partners give and take and share with each other. When one person cares more in a relationship… when one person doesn’t treat the other with respect… those aren’t healthy relationships. They’re not lasting relationships.

The funny thing is we wouldn’t put up with it in a relationship with a person we call friend. We’d say they weren’t our friend if someone treated us badly, lied to us, disrespected us. We would say something. We wouldn’t just take it or just put up with it. We’d either address it and see if it’s going to change or we’d break it off. We’d break up. Why is it that with work the rules are different? Because they pay us? Because there’s pay involved? So. Just because there’s money involved doesn’t mean we should put up with a bad relationship with our jobs. Unless we’re masochists obviously.

I’m not a masochist.

My work has changed hands a lot, different owners, different CoO’s, different cultures. And in all that time it’s been fairly equitable. I’ve had great relationships with my bosses and subsequently with my job. It hasn’t all been sunshine and roses. Obviously. It’s been a fifteen year relationship and there are going to be rocky times. I’ve been very lucky when things got weird or tense or I felt like it wasn’t an equitable relationship I was able to bring it up. I was able to talk about it with my boss and addresses it.

Lately the job itself, the work culture has been a lot different. I’ve wanted to go back to the way things were… We’ve heard the saying that you can never go back… you can’t cross the same river twice. And I don’t know if I’d like it for real if I got to go back… but I’ve been able to talk about it with my boss and he understands it. He understands my differences with the job as it has become. The job has changed over time just like people do. Are we growing apart? Is there a divorce in the future?

It’s a fifteen year relationship. Just like a relationship requires work and patience and communication so does this relationship. Nobody throws away fifteen years worth of relationship over a month or two of tense times or bad times. But if there’s no communication and no real attempt to fix things, no real attempt to work things out, ON BOTH SIDES then the divorce will be inevitable. If I were to sit and brood about how I don’t like things now but don’t talk about it to someone who can actually do something about it then it’ll be my fault if things don’t work out and we break up. If I talk to people able to change things and they don’t change then I will have done what I could. If I expect that just because I tell them to change they must change then I’m being selfish too. It’s not all about me. It’s a relationship and the relationship should be about us. If it gets too one-sided then it would quit being satisfying and dynamic and meaningful. It would lose value. The value in the relationship is in the give and take. It’s in both parties in the relationship caring about the relationship and treating each other in a way that both of them believe is equitable.

Any conclusions from all this? Not as such. This is still new in my head. I only read her column today and it’s still new in my head but it’s still rolling around in there and it has really made a difference in how I’m thinking about things.

So, I’m an area manager with eleven stores that report to me. I’m responsible for 20% of the stores in the company I work for and how’d I get here? Really?

Well, I was a manager of a store, not a very big store really. The store was frequently in the bottom 3 of the company when I took over and it worked it’s way up to bottom 4. Yeah. I know… glorious. But in that time I increased sales by quite a bit in the store and decreased turn-over. I was a good manager. I know that. I didn’t steal. I didn’t screw up too terribly ever, and my employees didn’t hate me any more than any other manager’s employees hate them when scheduling overlaps a holiday and it’s unavoidable that someone has to work it.

Then, one day the person over me transferred away. They didn’t promote up, they transferred. Nobody else would say “yes.” So… I wound up promoted. You think I’m kidding, but I’m not. I was suddenly responsible for stores that did as much in a weekend as I had previously done in a week. I had managers working FOR me that had twice the experience I had and had turned down the job I’d accepted.

I’d like to imply that my bosses saw some secret spark in me that proved to them I’d be great for my job as an area manager but I sincerely believe what they saw was a good manager who would say “yes.” Well, they were right. I was a good store manager. I still think I’m a better store manager than I am an area manager and I want to go back to store manager so bad. I’ve asked for it a lot and been turned down for it.

I see it a lot in companies where we promote people away from where they were great to a place where they’re just good. Being good as a manager of a single location isn’t the same as being great as a manager of many locations at all.

When we area managers look around and wonder where the great store managers have gone we need only look around… we’ve promoted them out of where they were great to where they’re “good.” If we were to value store managers more we’d have an easier job of things as area managers. But we tend to not pay the store managers enough… and we act like store manager is a stepping stone to where the REAL money is… and it’s not the way things should be.

I would love to give a third of my pay to half my good managers because they work harder, longer, and do a better job of things than I do… they don’t need me and I’d be a fool to send them up to an area manager position because they’re so good where they are now… I wish store managers were valued more… not just because I want to be one again either. The part of my job I work hardest at now as an area manager isn’t the paperwork, checklists, or mechanics of the job it’s trying to make sure the managers under me have all the tools they need to more effectively do their job. I see my job now as more of a way to help the people under me be more effective than for me to top-down them into the ground like a hammer driving a nail.

To all you store managers out there reading this. You’re doing a great job! I hope your hard work is recognized by your boss. I’ve had your job and I loved it and miss it. If you do it and love it never leave it… promoting up for more money isn’t the right reason to promote up in my opinion. I did it and I’d trade with you in a minute. I miss the store manager job. I miss the customers. I miss the store.