February FAQ – New Store, New Opportunity
One Friday, each month, I dedicate the post to looking at some questions I have heard recently from developing leaders. Sharing those questions and my thoughts about them is a way for me to spread the information to as many leaders and future leaders as possible. If you have a question about leadership, or just a situation you would like some additional insight on, please email me at Effective Retail Leader. Let’s take a look at this week’s question.
I just got to a new store as a Store Manager, and it is a mess. How do I make an impact on standards?
First, congratulations are for your new assignment. Unfortunately, many managers find themselves being promoted and moved to stores that are troubled and require immediate attention to bring the store up to standards. I found myself in that situation more than once in my career. This can be a fun experience, but it requires a plan, patience, and most importantly, persistence. Few locations get to where they are considered ‘broken’ without deep-rooted people and process issues.
If you are just arriving at a new store that has troubles to overcome, the first step is to assess the overall situation and begin to determine what is at the core of the issue. Is it staffing, is it the quality of the people, or is it a training gap where you have good people that do not understand the role or expectations of them? Clarifying your expectations is the most important step after the assessment is complete. You need to let the team know what you are looking for and that your role will be to support them in achieving those standards.
You must begin to immediately model the behaviors you expect. Those could be related to how service is delivered to customers, the efficiency in which you work, and the quality of what you complete. Related to that is ensuring that you hold everyone to the new standard. If something comes up short, call it out and discuss. This does not have to be a negative situation. Early on, these should be coaching sessions. It will give you the opportunity to remind the team of the expectations, show them what ‘good’ looks like, and then help them achieve that for the next time. Making changes to standards and expectations always takes patience and practice. For most, these will be new levels of output that they are unfamiliar with. You can help them see the benefits of working in a new way.
One of my favorite things to do, especially in stores with areas that are merchandised, but could be any area of your location, is to work on resetting it exactly to the new standards you are working towards. Let’s assume it is a new planogram you are setting for your store. Get it exactly right – everything in its place, overstock is neatly managed, every sign produced and placed exactly the way it should be. Once you have that complete, show the entire team in a big celebration (make this appropriate to your situation, and it doesn’t have to be elaborate). Use this as a ‘re-grand opening’ of that area. Walk everyone through the attention paid to details and relate them to the standards you have set. This paints a very clear picture for everyone what you are looking for. Suddenly, they have an example of what great really looks like.
There is never one way or one thing that helps to change a poor-performing store into a high-performing one. Still, it starts with having a plan, getting the right people in place, ensuring they understand the expectations, and then coaching, practicing, and following up consistently to build a new set of habits and routines for everyone. This can be an exciting journey, especially when you look back three, six, nine months later to see the sweeping changes you were able to make. Good luck!
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