The last 7 months have proven one thing. We are more than what we do.
Our very means of expression and provision has been stripped from us and we are now left to pick up the pieces and try to reassemble everything from processes, menus, staff, schedules, and every other component that collectively creates the whole of our coffee shops.
In recent interviews related to COVID I heard a lot about this being an opportunity for owners to do soul searching and that with the intent of fortifying the values that drive us and inspire all the work it takes to create a great coffee retail experience. It is the classic question coined by Author and Speaker Simon Sinek, What is our “Why” ?
For so many of us the why seemed pretty straight forward when we first started. In fact we might have just assumed that we had one because of the excitement of beginning the journey and seeing it grow. Thing is though, as things grow, what was enough to keep them at the start, needs to change or be expanded to sustain it. In other words, our “Why” needs to grow with the business and we even need to be open to it changing a bit as the business shows us the realities that we could only speculate about before the shop was open.
Armed with the benefit of experience and history, we own it to ourselves to reexamine our motivations and values. We owe it also to our customers and all the people who have a stake in the success of our shop helping stabilize a shaky supply chain. When we are clear on the deep er values and motivations then we are clear about our goals and our ability to be resilient, innovative, and collaborative in service to those goals. When we are just plugging along and have nothing driving us from within, the drudgery becomes overwhelming and, like a can that is easily crushed when empty, we succumb to the external weight for lack of fullness and resilience from within.
My encouragement to you toady is also a reminder to myself. Take time to refine, scale, and adjust your “why”. Search your soul and be open to what you discover and to what you want from your business as well as the needs of the community that has grown around it. For a lot of people this will be a time of tectonic shifts in their business model, for others they will need to adjust some small things that end up making a big difference down the road.
In either case, we must use this time as an opportunity to build and fortify our foundations and create a habit of tending to them into the future.
-Chris
If you want the truly level-up your batch brew then you absolutely need to check out the Ground Control Cyclops Brewer ! Please visit our friends over at: www.vogacoffee.com for more information
You can contact me at : Chris@keystotheshop.com
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