Thoughts for Doubting Thomas

A couple of thoughts for the Doubting Thomas reading these posts: 

For the person thinking “What about dishonest customers, are you saying they are all honest?”

I’m glad you asked, during my 40 plus years in retail I can tell you tons of stories of me chasing shoplifters, tackling them in the parking lot, or for that matter about dealing with dishonest employees, but that is not the purpose of this blog.

Here are some essential ideas to always remember and a couple of questions...

• If you look for the best in every person you will almost always find it...

• If you look for the worst, how many times will you create your own problem?

• For the person thinking “That’s all well and good if you own the company but how in the world would you implement something like this when you are just a small fish in a very large pond and the big fish don’t seem at all interested in giving you the autonomy to change the world?”

That is an especially important and critical question that I have a few thoughts about:

• First:  You must believe in your own dream.  If you don’t then you will never win anyone over to your point of view.  Always remember that Supervisors, Managers and Owners want to win, they want their businesses to be successful so start small but show them through your impact that perhaps there is another way…show them, don’t tell them.

• Second:  Live your dream.  Every day with every customer or associate that you encounter make it your job to put a smile on their face.  

• Lastly:  Remember if you win them over to your way of thinking by being positive and showing how it can be done than it is in their own interest to think about changing.

• Remember the answer to this question:  How do you eat an elephant?  One bite at a time!