Company Blog

Motivating the Motivator

by Adam Zack — October 27, 2021

The only one who can motivate you is you.

It’s hard to be a leader. I have a list right in front of me that I look at most days with 10 reasons why it’s hard to be a leader. (If anyone wants to see it, just shoot me an email azack@dwgreen.com). As a leader, we are constantly working to inspire, teach and motivate our team. It’s a never-ending job that has got increasingly more difficult, challenging and stressful over the past couple of years. Good leaders do it naturally, and the feeling of pride and accomplishment as you observe your team members thriving is the reward. But as the chief motivator, what happens when you let stress and frustration into your picture? How do you motivate yourself? I think it’s incredibly difficult once you’ve lost your motivation to get it back. I think that sometimes it’s cyclical, and the pressure is short lived, soon replaced by that great feeling you get when your team spiritually lifts you up by actually practicing the motivational techniques you’ve shown them over the years. The only one who can motivate you is you, and maybe sometimes we are a bit ha...

by Adam Zack — October 20, 2021

Unexpected, deserved and sincere.

You know how good it makes you feel when unexpectedly and without prompting, someone you care about and respect hits you with some words of praise or appreciation? Something other than “You’re doing a great job.” or “Thanks for taking care of business.” Or “Thank you for cooking dinner.” Something that is both personal and insightful. It can be a compliment, observation or comment on an insight that is truly personal. It catches people off guard, lets them know you care and literally makes their day. And it doesn’t have to be work related. It can be something toward your spouse, your mom, your sister or one of your kids. It happened to me recently and I decided I needed to do it more, and regularly. First, I thought I’d set myself a goal of 15 times per week. Then I set 10. Now I have revised it again to just 7. That’s one time per day. Or it could be 3 times one day, and 4 the rest of the week. The key is that it has to be meaningful to others. Unexpected, deserved and sincere. It can be a gesture, a phone call, a written note, an email or a text. The goal is to stagger them with kindness and insight that only someone who is truly observant and can know and say. ...

by Adam Zack — October 13, 2021

We often see excellent retailers developing incredible marketing materials and then nailing their execution.

When I was 17 my best friend Bob and I heard a lot about this new movie that had come out called Chariots of Fire. It was supposedly action packed, fast paced, critically acclaimed and a great sports story. All things that were right in our wheelhouse. We went on a Friday to the theater at the mall to see it, our expectations very high. Also, at 17 we thought we knew a lot, but like pretty much all 17 year olds, we didn’t know squat. So we get to the theater, popcorn and Cokes in hand, and the movie starts. First, it is very British. And in our limited world exposure, that meant boring. Second, track and field is boring, especially to 17 year olds. And third, it was long and slooowwwwwww. We left thinking it was the worst film we had ever seen and how our high expectations had not been even close to being fulfilled. We generate high expectations for our customers when we plan exciting and interesting promotions and ramp up to them with spot on marketing, word of mouth and thorou...

by Adam Zack — October 6, 2021

You have the choice every day regarding the attitude you will embrace for that day.

It’s a beautiful day, don’t let it get away – U2I never really thought that a good day, or a bad day, had more to do with my attitude going into the day than with what my interactions with the day’s people and challenges brought. I was always the constant in the equation, and the actions of the people and situations I dealt with largely determined whether I’d have a great day or crappy day, right? I didn’t put enough stock in my attitude going into the day. I didn’t fully realize that if my day started with optimism, appreciation and energy that the rest of the day was likely to follow. Even more impactful was that as a leader the people around me were keyed to my attitude and followed suit. This was all brought into focus with an article on attitude shared with me recently. Thanks Linda for seeing how this could help me, and in turn help others.ATTITUDEAttitude is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failur...

by Adam Zack — September 29, 2021

Enthusiasm for life is essential for mental and physical health.

When I was in my early 20’s my good friend Karen and I would go out late at night and play the Purse Game. You know, where you tie a piece of fishing line to an old purse and throw it out into the road and wait for someone to drive by, see it and stop. Just before they got out of the car to look for it we’d yank the line and pull it to where we were hiding by the side of the road. We just thought it was the funniest thing ever to see these people get out of their car and look for this purse that they swear they’d seen. One night, in fact the last night we ever played it, we hauled the bag in and waited. This man has a flashlight and comes over to where we are hiding, shines his light on us and says something like “Aren’t you a little old to be playing the Purse Game?” We were totally embarrassed and thought, “You know, maybe he’s right.”

Everywhere we go around San Diego, California it seems we are surrounded by youth. Millennial families with little kids that scream with delight every time their feet touch a wave. Gen-X kids on skateboards in the parking lots while they smoke cigarettes. High schoo...

by Adam Zack — September 22, 2021

Could you do this job or task if your life depended on it?

I have been having weekly leadership meetings with a Leadership Coach to be a better team leader – (No, you’re never too old to learn). The Coach is a customer and has worked with one of the finest grocery organizations in the country in terms of team culture. Yesterday, the subject of training came up and I realized that the grocery industry, with some exceptions of course, is notoriously horrible at a thorough training program. Especially in today’s market where finding employees is very challenging, the old way of just throwing them in the job and letting them figure it out has become more commonplace. It’s kind of the “any warm body is better than nobody” approach. So when John, the coach, posed the question of asking employees “Could you do this job or task if your life depended on it?” It made me realize that many, if not most, new grocery employees (say in their first 6 months of employment) would probably say no. I mean, those are pretty high stakes – your life or knowing produce codes. Death or knowing how to properly slice prosciutto. The electric chair or telling a customer the proper way to broil salmon. Of course it’s never going to c...

by Adam Zack — September 15, 2021

Keep your target in mind as you craft your message.

It’s been five years since I wrote this blog, but it still makes me laugh. And more than ever, we are all looking for something to make us laugh. And farts have always been and will always be funny.This may or may not be a true story. And it may or may not have happened last Sunday. And I may or may not get killed by my wife for writing it.There’s this couple that have been together for many, many years. Over the years the man has got more comfortable with bodily functions around the woman. Plus, as he gets older he has a little less control. So, on a semi-regular basis nature does its internal combustion work and sounds (and sometimes smells) are emitted. He is frequently reminded that they don’t smell like bon bons and roses or root beer. And most of the time they just occur. And we have no dog to blame it on. Whoops! She has been known to say “I can’t believe you just did that!” and “That sounded like it hurt!” or the standby “You better check your shorts.” The guy usually thinks they are kind of funny. No, really funny. After all, what guy doesn’t think the ...

by Adam Zack — September 8, 2021

Why, then, did you want to tell me this?

Guest Vacation BlogAdam’s on vacation this week, so his life-long friend Scott offered up a guest blog.Hello from Adam’s friend Scott, guest blog filler-inner.I was thinking the other day about how different life is today compared to, say, 30 years ago (yes, I just dated myself and Adam, apparently). Times were different, music was amazing, culture and technology made a sharp turn for the better in many ways and we as a society kept moving forward. Looking at today, I see many opinions, diversified schools of thought and division. We as a group should step back and look at our collective selves and give grace where grace is due (not saying that we were any more giving 30 years ago, this could be said for any generation) but seeking to be a more discerning person I was reminded of a parable I once heard. Unsure of who penned it as I’ve heard it was Socrates, Plato or even a children’s story. Not sure that the author matters but it gives me something to ponder, so here goes.One day, someon...

by Adam Zack — September 1, 2021

That fatigue you’re feeling as leaders needs to be kept to yourself…

Every single grocery store that I know is looking for employees. In the past, most were always hiring for some positions and always accepting applications, but it’s never been quite like it is today when everyone is hiring for every department in almost every store. I attribute it to Covid Fatigue. We pulled together at the start. We endured uncertainty and took action to avoid being exposed. We provided appreciation (or hazard) pay and bonuses. We got creative to keep our shelves stocked. Management and ownership did their best to absorb the stress and keep the troops motivated and energized. Tears were shed, ulcers induced, and many liters of booze consumed. The unemployed received extra stimulus pay and fell into a new way of life, not needing to work like before, which leads us to where we are today. In an industry that cannot operate on automation, people are the most precious and fought over resource. Fatigued management is desperately searching for ways to continue to keep morale high, prevent turnover and also recruit new employees. But how? That’s the million-dollar question. I don’t have the whole answer, but I can tell you that it...

by Adam Zack — August 25, 2021

“Celebrate bad things that happen to you.”

When I was about 11 I got in a motorbike crash. It was summer in Palm Desert, where my brother Mike and I would have to go and spend a month with our dad, who was divorced from our mom. We’d try and think of things to do in the 100+ degree heat while Dad was at work and his wife sat in the house smoking Salem cigarettes, drinking Pepsi and watching her soap operas. My dad had this little Suzuki mini bike motorcycle and we’d go ride it around. No helmets, no padded clothing. Probably just wore flip flops for shoes, too. Our stoner neighbor Jimmy Bender had been doing wheelies on the bike and flipped it over backwards, breaking off the tail light and leaving only twisted metal for a rear fender. So Mike and I are out behind my dad’s house in the big dirt lot and set up a ramp to jump the motorcycle. Sounded like a good idea at the time. On my first jump I went very far and came down hard, holding the handle bars (where the brakes were) as the rest of my body slid off toward the back of the bike. The rear tire took a patch of skin off my right thigh (hair still scarcely grows there, probably a good thing since I have so much hair everywhere else except my head and ankles)...