What Grocery Baggers Can Teach Us About Business

What Grocery Baggers Can Teach Us About BusinessIf you want to learn how to improve outcomes in your company, ask employees, “What would you do if you were CEO for a day?” Their responses will likely be surprisingly helpful!

During an intermission between and semi-final and final round of the 2014 Washington State Bagging Competition, Meaghan Black, the event emcee, asked that very question to each of the twelve finalists who competed as champion of their respective grocery store chain.

One contestant humorously answered, “To bring in a bigger sofa for the employee break room.” Not to be outdone, another contestant said, “Bringing in any size sofa into the break room would make me a hero at work.”

On a more serious note, each of the top three finishers in the photo above all answered pretty much the same, responding by saying…. “I would create an environment where all employees who worked at the store were really happy to be there and didn’t have a bad attitude.” Now that is pure brilliance on so many levels… My takeaway is that highly motivated and top performing employees want their co-workers to be engaged in the workplace. I imagine this maxim applies at your company too!

By the way, my son Carl is in the photo above and placed 3rd in the state competition. He works 30 hours per week at QFC while attending Bellevue College as a high school senior in the Running Start program. It was a ton of fun to watch Carl compete last month and it brings me a ton of pride knowing how his dogged determination, sense of responsibility and unbelievably driven work ethic is going to help him make a graceful transition into adulthood.

This week, why don’t you ask 5 employees what they would as, “CEO for a day” and discover what’s on their mind. Go deeper in questioning if an employee rises to the occasion and offers valuable insight. Challenge yourself to take all good ideas and work towards making them reality. Identify potential leaders and mentor them while providing opportunities to grow and flourish. There is no downside risk to implementing positive change and there lies a huge opportunity to increase employee engagement and improve profitability at the same time.

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