A day hasn’t gone by without someone talking to me about tariffs.
My industry is panicking. My friends are anxious. Every meeting I
attend, every conversation I have, includes this nasty little
six-letter word that I’m only ever half-sure I’m spelling right.
As a business owner, I don’t have the luxury of ignoring it or
waiting to see how it all shakes out. I have to act proactively to
protect our store, protect our livelihood, and try my damndest to
predict the future. Our prosperity depends on it.
It’s an impossible feat, but I’m trying nonetheless.
So, let’s talk about uncertainty in business and how we can best
navigate the times when the future is opaque and information is
lacking.
Make Good (and Careful) Decisions
Yes, this is a boring section name. Yes, this is really what it
comes down to in the end.
The tricky thing about making good decisions is that, normally,
you want a good foundation of information to inform your choice.
The more the better. In a world where everything is predictable and
all quantities are revealed, you can make the best decisions because
you have access to, in theory,
all of the known information.
This slowly unravels the less context and data you have.
In the case of tariffs, we don’t know how long they’re going to last.
We don’t know which countries will continue to suffer them, and
which will impose retaliatory ones on us. We don’t know the
long-term implications of this economic shakeup, and who’s going
to survive them.
Again, we don’t even know if companies will actually go out of
business because we don’t know how long this will last.
What we do know is the current numbers, what the president has said,
and how the rest of the world is reacting for now.
As I’m writing this, China has tariffs of 145%. It might be
different by the time you’re reading this. Last week there were
high tariffs on everyone, now they’re mostly down to 10%. Last week,
smart phones were exempted. This week, there’s talk of them being
affected again.
In a landscape like that, the future is in constant flux.
So, what do we do, then? Well, we do our best. We make decisions
based on the information we do have: internal performance data and
trends, industry reactions, the stock market, local and
international news.
When the external world is experiencing upheaval, all we can rely
upon is what we’ve built and surrounded ourselves with.
For the store, this means a couple of things:
Stocking up on products at the current cost so we have plenty to
sell for the next 2-4 months, especially if they’re made in China.
Meeting with everyone on the team to explain our strategy moving
forward, arming everyone with as much knowledge as possible.
Speaking with distributors, publishers, and anywhere else we
source goods to understand what they anticipate happening and the
preparations they’re making.
Canceling or delaying plans that involve increased cost
(new software tools, rewards programs, and most non-essential
spending).
I want to make one exception very clear about the above list,
however: we are not cutting staff, wages, hours, or outreach efforts
within our community. In fact, we just announced a new discount
teachers can use to bring games into their classrooms and
after-school clubs.
This is an important factor:
be careful making changes that lead to semi-permanent or worse outcomes.
If I fire an employee, I’m not getting them back. If I cut wages,
I risk losing people I value tremendously. If I stop supporting
the businesses, schools, and people around us, I’m souring
relationships right as we need each other the most.
It’s important to anticipate consequences, not just gains, when
making decisions. Especially when you’re flying blind and you don’t
know how long you’ll have to fly in circles while you wait for the
tower to give you the clear to land.
Be a Leader and Lead Well
In times of uncertainty, your leadership skills are at their most
important. Anyone can be a good leader when times are easy, money is
plentiful, and everything is soaring. It’s much more difficult to be
a good leader through difficult times.
The people working for and with you aren’t dumb. They know some of
what’s going on, and they may even be well-informed. Hell, they may
know the current situation better than you, and that's a good thing.
Treat them like the intelligent people they are. Arm them with as
much information as you can so they understand the situation.
Hiding information only makes people scared and erratic. Don’t
starve your team right as they need your support.
It’s uncomfortable, but it’s downright essential.
We’re hosting our first-ever mandatory all-hands meeting
so we can walk the team through our plans for the
remainder of the year and how we plan to react depending on what
happens.
Most importantly, though, we’re going to open the floor up to our
employees to ask questions. Any questions. They don’t even have to
be about the store. Instead, we want to act as a stabilizing force
to the people around us who dedicate themselves to the hard work
we depend on to keep the store growing.
Uncertainty is Exhausting
I’m already tired, and we're only getting started. How about you?
Let’s talk (briefly) about mental health before I let you go,
because everything is harder in times of uncertainty. Everything.
Take care of yourself. Get good sleep, and look after your body.
See friends. Talk with peers and professionals you respect. Go out
in public and spend time around people. Take a nap. Whatever it
is you use to decompress and relax, put it to work.
If you burn out, it all comes crashing down. Taking care of yourself
is so, so important. If you get fatigued, you’re going to become more
emotional and more reactionary. It’ll take a toll on your decision
making, and may feed into a vicious cycle.
So, don’t do that. Be kind to yourself, give yourself grace, and
acknowledge that there is no such thing as a perfect decision
right now. Some of us will make money, some of us will lose money.
Some of us may even close, though I hope with all my heart
it doesn’t come to that.