00:00.00
retailjosh
Welcome to today's episode of retail initiative I am stoked honestly, it's a weird thing to be stoked about because I want I want to talk about the recession I think if you've been living under a rock Maybe you haven't heard about it. But for everyone else, it's kind of everywhere right now and so as a retailer. What does it look like to really not even just survive but actually let this be a season of growth and so that's what I want to dive into if you're listening I'm going to dive into the theme if you're watching on Youtube then we will get straight into the episode.
01:54.88
retailjosh
So I'm sure you've heard on the news. There's quite a bit of talk quite a bit of a talk about this idea of a recession that our economy isn't growing and ah you know whether it be gas prices or whatever. Um, and. I don't I don't think that's sincerely wrong I I think if you look at all the writings on the wall. That's where we're headed. Um, but here's the other part of this honestly like I'm not that scared I was at a conference ah last week I'm terrible with time I have ever since covered started. Ah, with the wiz beng group and Bob nagin he was quoting the founders of Amway saying like yes I heard about your recession I just chose not to participate or I choose not to participate. Ah, and I think that's a cool thing that we get the opportunity opportunity to do. But I know that it's like okay well it's your surroundings you can't just not participate that's like saying I choose not to participate. in a hurricane coming like okay well good you choose not to participate it's going to hit your house I live in Houston and so hurricanes are still a sensitive subject as you might guess although I was blessed to be. Totally fine. There. That's a side note anyway, what does that mean if we say ok but I choose not to participate does that mean that we ignore the recession and just act like nothing's going on and do business as usual, kind of but I would say that would be generally speaking. That's a mistake. So. What do we do? well. I think a lot of it comes down to this idea. Um I first heard this from one of my mentors Taylor Welch he said that the things you blame are the things that you give control if you're a notetaker and you're at a place where you can't take notes I would write that down the things you blame are the things you give control if you were in a marriage. And you blame your spouse for the problems in your marriage your marriage can't get better until they do if you blame covered for your business problems then your business can't get better until covid goes away. You see how that it gives total control to that. But instead if we can say hey the. There is this massive actual issue with covid but regardless like it's my responsibility to have been reaching my customers and through multiple channels that was my responsibility and I live up to it but guess what I now have something I can do about it so you you can't what we don't want to do is give control. Of our lives of our business to an outside economic circumstance. We don't want to give control of our business or our life to an outside economic circumstance. We can't control the things around us we can't control our circumstances. Jim Roone would say that we can't control.
07:43.72
retailjosh
The air that hits our sails but we can control the set of the sail the angle of the sail can dictate how fast you go. We all have the same wind. But what we have control over is the set of the sail. So what would setting a sail that is. Going to allow us to grow over these next few years. What would that look like well I think it's going to be a few things so number None you want to control your inputs you want to control the things that you let impact your mind. Um, it's funny I don't know if you ever heard about this idea. Called the law of mirrors the law of mirrors says that like those things that you think um, you kind of project onto other people and they will do the same thing. An example is that this was I remember when I was going through sales training. Um I used to always think like oh you really shouldn't make big decisions in None phone call. And then I was surprised when people weren't deciding to move forward with me in None phone call. Well I was projecting that view onto people that otherwise might have decided to make a big and a big impact in their own business I was projecting something onto other people and it was really impacting their. Attitude and so if you're saying hey gas prices are really high and people just aren't buying clothes. Well guess what people around you are not going to buy clothes because you were kind of we kind of project that onto them and and you could say that you're impacting their behavior or you can say that. Ah, you are going to start changing your own behavior and that will change theirs I don't really know? Um, but what I do know um, is that the way that we think if we are scared other people are going to be scared and that one of the easiest ways to kind of get out of that funk is to control the things that you let impact your mind. So this could be friendships if you have friends that are constantly pushing you towards fear. Maybe that means you need to control your time with them. Maybe that means you need to mustang like end the friendship or cut these people from your life. But I am saying that you want to limit the ability that you let them speak into their life. Um, your news cycles find news that yes you want to know what's going on in the world but do we need to know about every possible reason why we have to be scared every time gas prices increase like look these things are going to be there. But if we just keep it in the front of our mind. It's going to be really difficult to control our mindset and I think. Our mindset is going to be the most important thing over the next few years so number None control your inputs number None invest in yourself. One of the first things that people tend to do when things get hard is we pull back on our investments and that's understandable. Yeah, we don't want to be wasting a bunch of money.
13:26.34
retailjosh
On things during a time and we don't know is that money going to come back. But I think that the money that you spend on yourself is one of the most important investments that you can make and so there are two ways that you can do this? Um, the first is get a library card and I'm not kidding here. I'm not. Um, making that to be a bad option. Get a library card and read and there are 2 types of things that I would be reading right now I would be reading a some sort of biography or story around people that have done well in previous recessions. Want to learn like okay there were other times the economy was really bad but people still grew people still thrived. What was it? What was it about them and then I would identify some like tactical problem that you are facing right now and learn and read about that whether it be through podcasts or books or whatever. But you can get this stuff for free. This isn't courses or any of that I'm talking free things so when I say invest sometimes that's financially and sometimes that's in time um but don't pull back on doing that because I think that's going to be a huge mistake. Ah, the interesting thing is like the people that invest in themselves in the middle winter when spring comes what happens real growth happens and then in summer you have this huge harvest but the people that don't invest in themselves through the winter. Spring comes and we wonder why all these things didn't grow so consider that invest in yourself through your through free things like a library card and those kind of resources and second I do think that one of the fastest ways that you can do it is through things like courses from things people from people who have. Been where they are sorry people that are further along than you that can look back into hey look out for this watch out for this kind of like airplanes. Do right? Um, and so those None things you can look for free at the library where you can go a little bit faster and do things like courses and then none continue to invest in growth. A lot of times we don't have expense problems. We have revenue problems again. We don't have expense problems. We have revenue problems. We need to make sure that we are not just asking the question where can I cut expenses but we also need to ask the question. Where can we find rooms for room for growth and we want to ah like I get cutting expenses. You want to trim fat wherever needed. Don't spend in a stupid way going into a recession but we can say okay where can we cut but where can we make room for growth and continue to invest in activity.
18:49.42
retailjosh
Whether it be in your time but really your money into things that grow don't pull back on your advertising. You can say what advertising is most effective and how can we double down there but don't pull back on those things so you want to again, control your input though your mindset and all of this area. And this whole next few years is going to be beyond important invest in yourself through a library card and through things like courses and the way you educate. Ah how you do what you do? It's so important and then none invest in growth don't just cut. But you also want to make sure that we are doing a things that are going to be needed for us to grow. This one is a little bit of a brainy one I hope that it was encouraging for you because to be honest, I'm hopeful I'm hopeful about where we're headed I think that those of us that stay committed to the process that. Um, don't shrink back in fear but really continue to dive into serving our customer serving our people I think that the market's going to reward us because there are people that need you. It's not just your family It's not just your your team. The world needs what you're bringing and. I hope that this show can be an encouragement for you to show up again and again and again figure out what's working stop. What's not and continue serving your people. Well so thanks for listening and I will see you next time.
