E-Myth Client of the Month June 2009

The H1N1 outbreak itself didn’t really cause problems for us; it was more like the cherry on top of it all. On top of an already shaky economy, it hit everyone pretty hard. The whole country (except for supermarkets) was closed for three days in May — days that Mexicans typically travel and party. We have locations in the three malls that people visit when they come to Merida (while locals run for the beach) and Kukis has become a "must visit" if you are in town. That weekend we lost tens of thousands of much needed pesos!

Here is the thing: at the end of the day, the H1N1 outbreak actually helped me and my business! How? It gave me a unique opportunity to gather everyone on my staff for three full days. That turned out to be fantastic! You can not always choose the circumstances, but you do have the freedom to choose your attitude and how you react to those circumstances.

Since January, we’ve held bimonthly meetings with our staff. We’d just started developing systems after a wonderful "Key Frustration Process" meeting, but we couldn't go as fast as we wanted through the process! This three-day “break” gave us time to revise, talk and ask the important questions. We did things like practice the "perfect ribbon-making technique" and we left with a wonderful, positive feeling from everyone. I’ve challenged them to help KuKi’s become the oasis of optimism and good cheer that is so needed these days!

My E-Myth coach has always urged me to get everyone involved, but I would never have closed my stores in order to have a three-day seminar! Thanks to this situation, I got the unique opportunity to communicate with my staff as a group to talk about why and how things were changing to the E-Myth way. It was so good, that we had the best Mother’s Day sale in four years! Everyone was in tune, trained, informed and self assured. And here’s the best part: I wasn’t even there! I was in Vancouver!