Which relatively easy-to-acquire skills are useful in business?

HarvestTheFields said:

Learning another language? Learning some type of coding? Writing skills?

I guess I'm just looking to get ahead a bit more. It's competitive these days.

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Canada is fortunate in having the speakers of so many languages resident; and so there are often courses at community colleges, etc. for learning many languages.

I work in a large privately-owned country store. Here are my ideas.

How to arm the DiBoco sprinkler/smoke detection system without 1: giving the whole place a bath and 2: triggering the alarm at the police department.

Leverage. If I can pick up a 300 - pound violent customer and throw him out the door, so can you.

Electronics 101: If I have to drive 30 miles down goat trails, mudslides, and rabbit roadblocks to plug in that printer again, we're going to have a little chat.

Cell phones: If you have to ask, the answer is NO.

Customer service: We don't mind dealing with returns, but when the tag on the item clearly says "Walmart," it's best to re-think that one.

All good things
Emmy

HarvestTheFields said:

Learning another language? Learning some type of coding? Writing skills?

I guess I'm just looking to get ahead a bit more. It's competitive these days.

Click to expand...

What is your current field?
If you deal with customers who may speak another language, then learning one MAY be useful.
If you work with computers then learning a new popular computer language may be smart.

It does seem rather unappealing out there. If I were to become unemployed in the future it will be hard to get a new job. The young'ns are all ahead of me these days (I work with computers). I began selling online about 14 years ago and I suppose I would put all my time into that for my work if I had to. I would have to stop donating most of my profits and use it to live on.

HarvestTheFields said:

Learning another language? Learning some type of coding? Writing skills?

I guess I'm just looking to get ahead a bit more. It's competitive these days.

Click to expand...

Product knowledge, and drop dead customer service.
You can have a satisfied customer who will make a purchase at another store.
But the loyal customer will always come back to you even if your a little higher on price.
In today's marketplace it is ridiculous the lack of service and knowlage the average salesperson exhibits.
Invest in quality people who are mature,there is nothing worse to go ask the 19 year old sales person a question ,and have them give you the deer in the headlights look.
Advertising is expensive, with going out of your way to accommodate a customer they will spread the word.
Your cost of good service is a fraction of what advertising cost,and the rate of return is much higher.

Product knowledge and customer service will set you apart from the competition, it will make you the authority in your market.
A simple marketing plan that keeps your name in the minds of your customers can be very effective.

New computer programs will always cost you money,their price and the learning curve will disrupt your sales.
New employees during training will do the same thing.

I advise employing some older more experienced people in general,even if they don't know your product they catch on fast.
Older people are better athan building relationships than kids and often do not need overtime.

I don't know the age of your customers, but even if the average was 21 a 30 year old could build that critical bridge between a sale today and a future sale.

First best business skill I know of: Creativity.

Your business, to make what Peter Drucker calls 'real profits', as opposed to what he calls 'the 10% margin fee for competence', needs to be based on a seriously good, new idea. Encouragingly, for those of us without $oodles to spend on developing new products, that innovation can also be in sales channel, manufacturing method, service delivery, customer relations, indeed, in any important aspect of business.

How do you get creativity? Knowing your industry backwards and forwards, seeing it's potential, and why it fails to reach it. Whatever you do, don't fall for 'creativity workshops', which are just expensive jaunts for overpaid, self-indulgent executives. If you read at all, though, a few inexpensive paperbacks on lateral thinking wouldn't go amiss. Otherwise, just have a wide intellectual 'bandwidth' (specialisation is darwinian death, ask any dinosaur, if you can find one) and a genuine interest in the way others earn their living; the cross-fertilisation of ideas will happen, then, naturally and automatically.

Only then, once you have your idea, your first world-enhancing innovation, should you concentrate those vital resources of your time and money on it, and once that is running smoothly, it's onwards to look for the next.

Cheers, Strivax

With emphasis on "easy-to-acquire", I'd say, reading, writing, learning Excel and Word.

Second best business skill I know of: Salesmanship.

It should be obvious, that no business exists without sales, but in these days of complacently ignorant, extravagantly salaried, life inexperienced MBA's hogging management roles it tends to be forgotten. Without sales, whatever business you're in, you're heading for bankruptcy. You can get the basics from books, from in-house training, from external courses, from life-lessons, from wheresoever you can. Then, you need real life, customer facing practice.

But, at the end of the day and whatever your job title, if you can sell, you are a business. If you can't, and don't know the standard moves, you're lost in a sea of sharks...

Best wishes, Strivax.

Third best business skill I know of: Motivation (of self and others)

Well, I'll just mention this, as the last in my list, before I start charging management consultancy fees

It helps to feel you are contributing, as you work, not only to your own well-being, but also to the common good.

If your job means more to you than just buying enough junk food to eat as you watch junk TV; if you would do it anyway, voluntarily, without pay, because that is your expression of your very being; if your work actually contributes to a better world, and you can communicate that benefit to everyone around you; then you have discovered not only a vital business leadership trait, but simultaneously an important and privileged secret that has significant purchase on your lifelong happiness prospects.

Best wishes, Strivax.