Czaro Strategic Communications

In my prior post, I described my recent grocery shopping experience. Workers were helpful and I found what I wanted. I left off with an assistant manager helping me. After we talked he walked to the end of the aisle where there were two other members of management. As a team they stocked two endcaps in less than five minutes.

I finished the rest of my shopping and headed for the checkout, when an announcement came over the intercom asking for additional cashiers and package help to handle the increased customer flow. In less than a minute, five or six lanes opened. One of the managers was helping shoppers find the shortest line and even loading groceries on the belt.

When it was my turn, I took my reusable canvas bags to the end of the counter and started loading them with scanned groceries because they were still short on baggers. The cashier seemed concerned and she was looking around while I sacked groceries. She found what (in this case who) she was looking for because she strongly suggested in a whisper, “Please don’t do that. We’ll take care of it.”

I followed her line of sight and saw the reason for her concern. The head manager was a couple of aisles over, pushing a cleanup cart with a mop and bucket. He used an anti-bacterial wipe on his hands and headed straight for my lane. He sacked my groceries with lightning speed.

I understood why the cashier was concerned. She wasn’t doing anything wrong – she realized that the store’s customer service was coming up short and she didn’t want the manager to be disappointed.

Do you think the other store associates notice if the management team loads groceries on the conveyer belt and stocks endcaps? What about if the head manager mops up spills and sacks groceries? You betcha.

An underrated leadership quality is not being above doing anyone else’s job. Every associate in my grocery store learns that important leadership lesson every day. Whether the associates make a career out of working at the store or move on to other positions with other companies, these workers will have learned why it’s important for the boss to walk in the shoes of the front-line employees.

Do you have any shopping success stories to share? What about nightmares?