But man oh man, in the past few months I've been acknowledged for my abilities so many times over it's dizzying. In August we had our regional meeting and I was given 3 awards! Three, baby! One was from the COO for being number one in the company during a bean promotion. Another was a Team Hero award that my own district team gave me. They voted me as the team hero for the year and I got a little tiger paw award because as a district we "believe in holding back tigers not pushing elephants." And then I was given an award by regional manager for a core value. Our company has 4 core values and each year our regional manager gives an award for each value to a manager that exemplified that value. And mine was for Commitment to Unique Personality. No surprise there!
And then I find out that I get to travel to one of our coffee farms in January. And that coffee farm is in Coast Rica!! I was number one in the entire company for a bean promotion in the month of June and because of that was put in a nomination pool to go to the coffee farm where that bean comes from and I won!! The company sends 2 groups of 6 of company members that have excelled at something in their job. AND I GET TO GO! Before the bean promotion started my boss said that if our district was number one in the company, he would nominate the number one store manager to go to La Minita, Costa Rica. I wanted that trip and I held the number one spot for nearly the whole promo. I dropped to number 3 for a few days and then took it back and never let it go. And now I get to to go to our coffee farm, pick the coffee off the mountainside myself, meet the farmers, it's going to be life changing.
AND THEN.... about 3 days before I find out about the trip, my boss approached me with taking over one of the top 10 busiest stores in the company. It's a drive-through location and a million dollar a year store and I was nervous about the change. But to say no to the opportunity that he was willing to give me was just dumb. The door had been opened and I would have shot myself in the foot if I had said no. So I had made my decision on my drive home, I'll take the job. And 5 days before our biggest promotion of the year, I took on a beast of a store. And I have survived 3 weeks so far. No one has quit, and the store hasn't burned down. I do have my work cut out for me. I'm noticing the deeper I get into this store, the more work it is going to be. But, when I take a step back and look at my successes and the awards I was given, I know I can do this. I have a reputation to protect and I don't fail.
I was in the midst of writing this about a month ago and got side-tracked and didn't finish it until now. I'm 3 weeks and 2 days into my new store and am at the overwhelmed part. I have 5.5 days to meet my company goal, because you know my district strives to be the best and we all agreed to meeting goal on 10/21, even though the promotion goes until 10/31. I broke down at a meeting today, sometimes it's all too much. 95 pounds in 6 days. REALLY? And today when I voiced my concern, the tears welled up because my peer team and my boss are so supportive. I have 3 people coming to my store to help sell and I have refocused my energy into my top sellers and the ones who care. I'm reamping myself. I made a paper chain to cut off each link every time we sell a pound, I'm trying to create energy within my team to sell sell sell. It's big and scary and completely possible.
I have a quote at the end of my auto-signature on my work email "What you get be achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals." -Henry David Thoreau
And I believe that is true.
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