Lack of Ownership and Initiative

I have recently been conducting several training programs for store managers. A common theme that I like driving home is the point of ownership. This is a favorite topic of mine since chain stores constantly talk about this, but on a day to day basis, do absolutely nothing at all to ensure that the store staff have ownership.

A case to the point is my experience recently at two stores while doing Diwali shopping.

First is a chain of discount/ value apparel stores. The store was over merchandised with hardly any circulation space. The staff had left cardboard boxes of stock all over the store, including the stairs and one of the two elevators was blocked with these boxes. Bright spot lights with crowds and inadequate air conditioning was a sure fire-recipe for people to faint. Long lines outside the trial room led to shoppers using the wash room as a trial room and there was a line outside that too!!!

To cut a long story short, we were waiting to get billed and leave. The customer ahead of me was caught up in some complex promotion involving discount vouchers and all that. (That’s a different topic about why people have such complicated promotions).

Anyways, here I was standing in the line and sweating. Sweating - because the store had these nice bright spotlights as mentioned before and the air conditioning near the entrance where the cash tills were located was not working. When my turn for billing came, I asked the person who appeared to be in in-charge (who turned out to be the store manager) why something cannot be done to make this experience better. He was lost!

I suggested that he should get a fan at least near the cash till and he gave a half hearted reply. I can bet that if I went there after a few days later, there would be no fan and no change.

Because, the store manager and staff have no ownership! The guys at the head office grill them about sales and reports. But not about ownership! Sad. But true.

Compare this to a store down the road. A stand alone apparel store. The customer crowd was pretty much the same but one did not feel suffocated as the air conditioning worked, there were no boxes of stock lying around waiting to trip someone, staff were helpful, etc.

When I was billing, which was pretty fast given the crowd, my family members were not crowding around me increasing the tensions. They were enthralled by a magic show. Yes, a magic show being conducted near the billing counter.

I don’t know if this is a result of the owners having read my book, “The Indian reTALES” but I was thrilled that someone was directly implementing what I have written about billing and how to handle the same. It was great to experience ownership of the store where customers felt good after having made the purchases instead of feeling like prisoners who have escaped the Tihar Jail.

So, to my moot point - will the lack of ownership of store managers of chain stores be the death knell?

I think so. Wake up guys and change the way Indian Corporate Retail works.

Empower the store staff and make them own the customer experience.