National Clothesline

Members of our RPI group know that we quite often focus on attitude as a vital component to the overall performance of your staff.

Whether it is a presser, counter worker, driver, manager or sales person, the overall attitude can be infectious or contagious, not only to your staff, but to your customers as well. Sometime the overall attitude of the company starts with the owner as well.

This leads me to the title of my article: “What is your blood type?”

I know that there are several actual types of blood for the human body, but since the success of the company is driven by the heart and soul of the owner, along with their staff, we will look at three specific categories and see where you fall as an owner or as an employee.

The first one is simply “O.” Someone with an O blood type is just a steady Eddie and reacts with an “Oh” whenever a situation occurs or when there comes a time to adjust your systems.

“O’s” do not have vision or creativity and quite often develop a sense of complacency which in turn deflects growth. In our industry, times have changed and many “O’s” are still doing what they did five to 20 years ago.

If your employee has this blood type, they do not like change or direction. They also do not truly care about the overall movement of the company. Quite often they will not react to issues and simply don’t care.

If you are an owner of the company and you are an “O,” you probably are accepting the decline in sales as the standard while your competition is developing more and more routes around you. It may be time for you to get out of your comfort zone or kick someone off the sofa.

The second blood type is “A Negative.” These are the worst to work with as a consultant. Quite often they react with disagreement toward direction or change. They also have the tendency to infect everyone else around them.

We all have bad days, but “A Negative” looks for them or even will create a bad day or situation. They dwell on the bad moments and deny any good news that comes before them. This blood type must be hit head on in order to stop the bleeding.

A perfect example is our media. They cannot wait to report the next bad thing and stay with it day after day.

An owner with this blood type usually has a lot of employee turnover which leads to customer turnover. They are never satisfied with results. Employees who are “A Negative” will provide excuses, not results. Either way, this is a blood type that usually needs a major transfusion in order to right the ship.

My favorite is “B Positive.” These are the individuals who strive for success and maximize the positives while minimizing the negatives. In sales, this is so critical on all fronts.

Our industry is up and down enough, but adding the extra aspect of sales and marketing makes it ever more critical to keep your blood pressure down and your encouragement up. A “B Positive” owner usually achieves the most success with the support of their entire crew.

One careful note about a “B Positive” is that they do tend to avoid meeting negative or difficult situations head on, but, regardless of the outcome, they still come through awaiting the next challenge. They overcome objections and obstacles, all the while finding a ray of sunshine in their job.

What I am asking is for you and your staff to take a look at your own attitude and how it affects the heartbeat of your business. Sometimes it has nothing to do with the tools given to us or our basic personality, but how we react and respond to the workplace around us.

The bottom line is that it will affect the customer as well. I learned through Sandler Sales Training that your performance is a combination of Behavior, Attitude & Technique.

If you are a driver, manager, owner, sales or counter person, take a simple look at how your performance can be enhanced by adjusting your attitude.

So, B POSITIVE and look at what is working and what is not.