At a lot of jobs, including those I've held in the past, if you're just not dialed in, you can dog it for a shift and maybe have nothing happen, or you can get into a heap of trouble with the boss if he or she is observant and sees that you aren't participating.
It's a little different now. My boss(1) is the ownership group, and my boss(2) is the consumer public. So basically I answer to nobody, but I also answer to everybody, which means there's really nowhere to hide.
Moreover, the consequences could be immediate or could occur on a delayed blast, and it might not be obvious to me which has occurred. If I slip up and upset a customer and they put an item down and leave without buying it, well, that's pretty obvious cause and effect. It is rare for the consequences to be on such evident display, however. More often when I've run low-octane, what I've done is slowed down the process of advancing infrastructure projects that multiply revenue, and therefore I have slowed the process of the compounding revenue from those vectors. The process of getting all of a store's singles listed on TCGPlayer, for example, provides an almost logarithmic ROI. Any time I slow down the process of fueling that engine, I lose both speed and acceleration. An hour spent out-of-sorts on Wednesday the 11th might end up making a $50 revenue shortfall on Friday the 27th, or it might make a $500 revenue shortfall. Both are within normal parameters. For one hour of me being off-task. It's the kind of thing that haunts you at night. Fear is a motivator.
The good news when you run your own business is this: It works both ways. Going the extra yard and working it harder and cleaner can erase a multitude of sins and make up lost ground.
There are more days when I am running sharp than running dull, so in the aggregate I offset to the positive, I am fairly certain. The ongoing challenge is digging out of a sub-par session.
One very simple answer is to work more. It's not a universal sovereign but it works more often than it doesn't. Within the limits of avoiding physical burnout, pulling an evening shift or going in earlier in a morning can provide an opportunity to focus well in the quiet of the hour. I am rarely upset to have "gone in for a little longer" on any given day... it's true that I gave up a chance to log an hour or two in the catharsis of Ori, but I always end up creating value within the business and that makes me happier.
When I'm having focus issues due to digestive or blood sugar or protein problems, an unfortunate reality for post-bariatrics like me, I like to revert to tasks I know will generate income, but are solved processes, no judgment required. Lately this has been parsing through the loose video games and creating proxy cases for them so they can be shopped more effectively. Sometimes it's as simple as sorting cards. That task is the great equalizer and nobody in the organization should consider it beneath them to do it.
What not to do when trying to banish the drag-a-lags is buying. Buying is where my money is made or lost, and the judgment in setting pre-orders and other procurement is so absolutely vital to the health of the enterprise that I dare not engage in it when I am not cold and crisp. Secondarily, any other judgment-heavy activity such as personnel reviews or tax planning is right out.
The stakes are high, and I'm manipulating live wires, which means I can make high-voltage moves, but also get shocked hard. Would I trade this for a nice secure desk where I no longer controlled my own destiny? Well, it would have to be a hell of a paycheck. So until we're speaking in those kind of figures, I'm going to stick with the capitalism plan.
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