Face Blindness, Retail Blindness

"Retail Blindness" Can Come From Some Very Intelligent People

The innocence of losing money in business is a difficult subject to cover.  Even though it is an easy subject to identify, it is almost impossible to describe.  Almost nobody goes into private business and tries to intentionally lose working it.  Unfortunately, a lot of business owners lose money all the time.  Failed businesses are easy to identify.  They change their names, they change their ownership, they close their doors, they vacate their locations, they quit doing what they were once doing and they cease operations.  Most of the time the business models who fail in business are easy to identify.  Furthermore, most of those who fail in business do it rather innocently.  They do not wake up one morning and get after the losing game with all of their might and efforts.  They fail in business doing it so innocently.  It is much like having face blindness.  Those who fail in business usually cannot see how they fail in business.  They are blind to the methods they use to make it happen so wrong.  They have "retail blindness."

Face blindness, as shown on CBS networks 60-Minutes recently, is a unique concept.  Although we know how it operates and what it does, we do not know exactly why.  That same description can be added to "retail blindness."  We can see where it happens but we cannot describe in detail why.  What makes this process more difficult to describe, is that many business models can operate forever even though they lose money each year.  A lot of the business models who lose money do it quietly.  They lose just enough money each year to remain open for a very long time.  They learn the art of rolling debt.  Heck, millions of people do that kind of living at home with their personal debts.  Millions of people always spend more than they make.  Millions upon millions of people borrow to survive year after year.  That is how the credit card industry grew so large.  This kind of debt rolling process is exactly how business models lose money so innocently, so quietly unnoticed.  They learn the art of rolling debt.  The United States Government does exactly that without batting an eye.  It is not even innocent in their case...it is intentional.  A business can operate forever in debt.  Most do.

I told a story one time about how I used to go to a friends office nearly every morning and spend a little time talking about business and life.  He was a CPA who did not do my private or business accounting.  We were just two business friends who talked a few times each week about business stuff.  We would share a hot cup of coffee once in awhile and chew the fat about business life.  He was the guy that one day I asked the serious question about how many business owners truly win at the business game.  He was the one that I pointed to all of his color-tabbed, client file folders in the main office of his business.  One day I pointed to all of those hundreds of client files and asked him two serious questions.  First, how many of those clients in all of those files are 'debt free?'  When he answered, "none of them."  I asked the second question..."Then where the heck are the debt free ones going for business advice?"  It was a good thing we were close friends.

Seeing business owners lose in their business life is easy to see.  A lot of business models in the world lose money.  They do it innocently.  They do not intend to lose money year after year.  They lose money because they have "retail blindness".  They lose money consistently because they do not see how not to lose money consistently.  Once more, they have "retail blindness".  They do not have the ability to recognize what takes them down.

Let's start with some serious but pointed questions.

• 1.) Who's your boss?
• 2.) Who's your supervisor?
• 3.) Who's your customer?

How do you view these three relationships?

Furthermore:

• 1.) How do you produce your income check?
• 2.) Who signs your payroll check before they hand it to you?
• 3.) Is the answer to these last two questions the same answer?    If not, why not?

How do you view the answers to these last three questions?

Business leaders....this is exactly the kind of seriousness that matters to your trek for success in your business model.  Be what it may, your success comes directly related to how these questions are answered.  No holds barred.  Your business success comes from knowing the right answers to these few questions above.  Your "retail blindness" begins with not addressing these questions properly.

I can become 'wicked-off' at how cutting these statements are, but I cannot avoid the truth they carry.  Only those with "retail blindness" will jump over these truths and move on to fail some more.  That, my friends, is the truth.  My accountant friend did not kick me out of his office that morning.  Instead, we decided to engage in some serious discussions about winning and losing in business.  It began a new chapter of thinking in both of our business careers.  He and I eventually arrived near the heart of these questions.  We all have a boss, somewhere.  That boss is not us.  The sooner we respect our boss the sooner we improve our performance.  Our level of "retail blindness" will quietly go away when our boss shows up to apply the right kind of pressure to our views of action.  Until then, "retail blindness" will dominate the way.  And it does it so quietly, so innocently.

The day we recognize this business truth is the day we begin to remove the negative effects of our "retail blindness".  This fact is true even if we own the business model.  I like to always be aware of the fact that someone ponies up their wallet to make my business model happen well.  I like to always make sure I know and remember who ponies up the money that I am blessed to move around.  The people that pony up the money are the true owners I need to respect.  Not every business owner or business leader does an exact job of remembering this fact very well.  Business leaders often forget who the real boss truly is.  They forget this fact in such an innocent way.

The business leaders who slip into this lapse of memory are often the same ones who innocently lose at the business game.  Forgetting where the money comes from is exactly how we grow to lose.  It is the beginning step to "retail blindness."  How does my money get generated?  Who ponies up the cash to create the flow?  "Retail blindness" begins right here.

Groups Can Collectively Produce "Retail Blindness."

The innocence of losing money in business is a difficult subject to cover.  However, even though we see business owners lose money consistently in their business life is an easy thing to see, a lot of business models in the world still lose money, consistently.  To make matters worse, they do this trick innocently.  They do not intend to lose money year after year, but they do.  They lose money because they have "retail blindness".  They lose money consistently because they do not see how "not" to lose money consistently.  They do not have the ability to recognize what takes them down.  They are blind to the wrong things they do.

I have watched many growing business models work to get bigger and end up losing more money than they did when they were smaller.  How does this silly stuff happen?  Very innocently, that's how.

No business tries to grow up and lose more.  However, many do exactly that.  When business owners develop their working patterns, much of the duties they perform have not been efficiently and effectively developed yet.  Business leaders first learn how to grow a business, even the leaders who have been at it a long time, then they get the idea that they need to become larger to win more often.  They do not have the proper skill sets in place and the proper working patterns developed to grow their business model correctly.  Even so, they begin their trek to build it larger.  Most believe they will learn the right kind of stuff along the way.  That is how innocently they perform.  They tend to use their business model as an experiment room.  They mix their own ingredients together, tug and pull when the pressure arrives, adjust where they think they need to adjust and live with whatever comes their way.  Most business leaders operate their business life exactly this way.  They do not see how much "retail blindness" they have acquired.  Off they go, out into the wild blue yonder.

I have watched some CEO's of some large companies perform this kind of silly stuff and produce some losing ways on a consistent basis.  What's more, it is more common than anyone would admit.  These same CEO's do not truly believe they are the reason for the failed patterns their business model endures, but they are.  They have "retail blindness."  They continue to do the wrong kinds of things and truly do not have the ability to see how wrong those things are.  They miss it.  What's worse, they do not have the ability to know they miss it.  That is exactly why losing is done so innocently.  The losers do not know they are losing.  They do not know why they are losing.  They have developed some very intelligent descriptions as to why they cannot produce better result.  As a result of this intelligent approach for the missed diagnosis, they inject new ways of explainable logic that continues to go wrong.   They have "retail blindness."  The only business leaders who understand this truth are the ones who do not have "retail blindness."  They are the ones who see this effect clearly.  Everyone else goes right along with the intelligent thoughts and applied solutions.  We can all justify good thinking, even when we are blind to the ways it will not work.    

When I bake a simple cake I cannot rely on trial and error in my decision making ways to determine how much of each ingredient I will need to mix together to produce a great cake.  Just because I know what ingredients are needed for making a cake does not mean I will bake a good one.  Most business leaders operate exactly this way.  They believe they truly know what they need to do to add the things they know they need.  Off they go, to build their cake.  Off they go, to build their business model larger.  Wow, we all do this stupid stuff.  I have worn this same effect in my business career, much of the time with terrible results.

Our first cake produced under these rules of operations will not win any county fair awards.  Neither will our second cake, neither the third one nor even any of them.  We will just learn how to make an average quality cake, much like every other leader learns to produce on their own, using this method of leadership development.  Most of us cake builders, under these methods of operations, will continue to manage our efforts to success by losing more money than we preferred or expected.  Our "retail blindness" continues to make its way.  We need help.  That is the bottom line.  We need help.

When a business leader who has a string of losing ways littered all about their trail of work finally comes to a crossroad that defines who they are, that is when that leader gets motivated to accept how they got there.  "Retail blindness" is not a bad thing to have.  Most business leaders have it.  It is just not a good thing to deny we have it.  "Retail blindness" is a common thing to possess.  It delivers consistently bad results.  Unfortunately, those leaders who have this affliction are usually the ones who do not see they have it.  To discover the level of "retail blindness" a business leader protects is a difficult thing to perform.  The very first thing to review when approaching this discovery is to check out the performance record of the models they lead.  This is exactly where the best indications remain.

Good luck working with someone who has "retail blindness."  They truly do not know they have the affliction.  That is why it is called, blindness.

Until next time...