18-19_GF.qxp_Grid 05/10/2022 11:53 Page 2
OVER THE
COUNTER
BY DAVID ROBERTSON OF JP POZZI, ELGIN AND BUCKIE.
The 3 Rs... Below: The 3Rs were the focus of education, but will they need to be for the children of tomorrow?
Despite a more rounded approach to education today, many of the old school campaigners have championed a return to the basics of the 3Rs claiming this would prepare pupils for the real world. In my opinion the huge failing is that we don’t teach youngsters the true basics of how to study and learn. We expect them to know how to do these things, where in reality they may be foreign concepts to them and their families. We need to give them the mechanics so that they know how to learn a language or research history. Otherwise, it is not learning, it is remembering. We have to encourage self-exploration and the ability to make mistakes and of course take great strides forward. Running a business, be it as a retailer, greeting card publisher or anything else for that matter, is again something that no lesson or book can teach you. A business is not a hobby in my opinion, it is something that, while fun, must be taken seriously. The basics of setting up your store, finding stock, marketing, customer interaction are perhaps the first steps, but there are so many other aspects that those are perhaps the easy bits. You can learn, read and study business, but until you are actually doing 18
PROGRESSIVE GREETINGS WORLDWIDE
Some 27 years ago, when my job as a teacher was to stand in front of a class of 30 pupils, their parents’ priority was how their child was performing in the 3Rs Reading, ‘Riting and ‘Rithmetic. This was then followed closely by the next question, which revolved around their little cherub behaving themselves. The 3Rs, as they were called then, were a simple way of saying to concentrate on the basics. All these years later education has undoubtably changed and schooling is as much about mental and physical health as it is about the core education, but what about the learnings in the business climate today?
it, none of it really matters. Every day you will be faced with challenges in dealing with people and events that never happen in the order of the text book. There is not a curriculum that can teach you how to do this, every day is a test and simply to ‘pass’ is an achievement, never mind being able to excel. Very few of us will be ‘straight A’ students. With this being the case I want to introduce you all to my 3Rs. Or at least the 3Rs that have been at the forefront of my mind in these last few weeks. These are the traits and mindset I think you need to allow you to success and move forward…
Relentlessness The pace of what we do and the nature of running a retail or publisher operation is at this time pretty much all encompassing. The definition is ‘unceasingly intense’ which probably also describes the way we are feeling. We all have a tendency to keep going against all the challenges, because quite simply if you are the person that the buck stops with, you have no choice.
Left: David’s own ‘succession’… Hudson Robertson. Bottom: Some Pozzi-tive news as David Robertson was recently awarded the Scottish Local Retailer’s Newstrader of The Year Award for his JP Pozzi newsagents business.
Since the early beginnings of 2020 all businesses have faced significant challenges. Covid-19 of course, spiralling inflation, rising interest rates, lack of staff, supply challenges, increased expectations of the public, another recession and of course the energy crisis. Yet we are expected to cope with all of the aforementioned, taking it all in our stride and finding a way through and still make some money. I know many people in our sector alone are understandably tired. They have fought and fought, yet things still remain very difficult. In many ways it feels like we are fighting to keep our heads above water. This leads onto my second R…
Resilience If the pace is relentless, then the ability to recover quickly from each of the challenges and each of the knocks is without doubt crucial. So much emphasis is put on the idea that we should be able to cope with stress and challenges, but you have to be mentally, emotionally and physically in the right place for this to happen.