Chris Grouchy:

Hey, everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Legends of Retail podcast, brought to you by Convictional. We talk to leaders in retail and eCommerce so you can learn from them about retail strategy, leadership, and team management and hopefully take their insights back to your company. I'm your host, Chris Grouchy, co-founder and president of Convictional.

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Convictional is the supplier-enablement platform that helps retailers onboard dropship vendors in minutes so they can curate their product assortments faster. In this episode, I spoke to a B2B commerce and distribution icon who has championed Convictional since our early days. With leadership stints at brands like Ingram Micro, Staples, and HD Supply, he is someone who has had a front-row seat, the evolution of B2B and retail. I'm pleased to be speaking with Munawar Quraishi, general manager at HD Supply Canada. Munawar brings his deep leadership experience to this conversation.

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We talk about the art of giving feedback, the difference between being smart versus being intelligent, and how that can impact your relationships with your teams, and why executive coaching matters. We also chat about HD Supply's acquisition by the Home Depot in 2020 and how that's going. We also talk about HD Supply's digital transformation and how he thinks about virtual inventory, and the benefit it brings to retailers and distributors alike.

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I learned a ton from this conversation, and I think you will too. Here's my conversation with my friend Munawar, general manager at HD Supply Canada. Munawar, thank you for taking the time to join us today.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Hey, thank you for allowing me the opportunity to be on your podcast.

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Chris Grouchy:

Awesome. Well, we've had many conversations over the years, and we've always talked about retail, eCommerce, B2B distribution, and we'll get to those topics. But we were just talking before we started hitting record about the importance of morning routines for you.

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And so maybe if you could just walk the audience through your typical morning routine and what that looks like for you. I think it's pretty inspiring for the average person.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Well, thanks. Well, it's interesting. It has changed a little bit over the last 18, 19 months, where you kind of get a little relaxed with the morning routine. But I would say I got a bit of a wake-up call. And what I mean by that is, I'm like, "Hey, I'm falling off. What's going on? No judgment. I got to get back to it." But really, the core of my morning routine after you get past all that morning stuff, brush your teeth, all that fun stuff, I spend about 10 minutes meditating. That's the first thing I do.

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And then I get into a morning stretch for a guy who's getting close to 50 and sitting down all day, especially now, 18 months we're at home, if anyone else is like me, you're spending from basically eight in the morning to sometime after six, seven o'clock at night at your desk and forget to get up, and you just concentrate on getting things done. So now I really put a big emphasis on getting a strong stretch in. So I spent about 15 minutes in the morning doing that.

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And then, in addition to that, I'll start to go from there, and I'll put a workout routine in about two or three days a week to make sure, got to keep the body strong, not only in the mind but the body's got to stay strong. And then to get the mind strong, I do some sort of reading or I listen to a podcast. Depending on the day, depending on the mood, my energy level, I'll spend doing one of those two things. And then I have to have my bulletproof coffee. Yes, I love it.

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I love to have butter in my coffee. It gets me the good boost of energy. One coffee a day, but it gets my morning started the right way, and then after that, I have to be a dad and get my kid going for school and get them ready and all that kind of stuff. He's 13, but it is another opportunity for me to spend some time with him before he starts his day and to bond and whatnot. And then I get into it at work and get my day going.

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Chris Grouchy:

So I mean, it sounds like you've lived an entire day before you get your kids ready for school. And what time are you waking up in the morning?

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Munawar Quraishi:

These days, I'm waking up at six because I don't have an hour drive into work. So I took that time before when we were going into the office, I was waking up at five because you got to get up earlier to get that hour drive in. So now it's six.

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So I like to think I get to sleep in, but I'll tell you this. I don't sleep in on the weekends. I'm usually up around six, and sometimes I sleep until about 6:30, but six o'clock is the time now.

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Chris Grouchy:

That is the key for, I think, maintaining a consistent level of awakeness and alertness throughout the week is waking up at the same time on the weekends and not letting yourself get sleepy and hits snooze a bunch of times. Very key. In one of our previous conversations, you brought up the importance of breathing. And not just meditation but the Wim Hof Method.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah.

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Chris Grouchy:

Could you maybe define what that looks like and how you've applied it in the past?

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah. So I actually was doing the Wim Hof Method for probably four or five months, easy, like solid in it. I do it every now and then when I find my stress levels are getting up. In the middle of the day, I'll go and lie down, and he has a guided methodology to what he's doing.

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But essentially it really... I would say, from my perspective, it's just another form of meditation where you do some really good deep breathing, getting kind of that diaphragm-based breathing, going kind of up and down, up and down, up and down for probably a couple of minutes.

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And then you get into holding your breath. So you push all that air out of your breath out, and then you hold your breath, and basically, it's pretty amazing. The highest I ever got up to was two and a half minutes of holding my breath, which is pretty good.

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Chris Grouchy:

Wow.

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Munawar Quraishi:

But it's interesting what happens once your mind starts to think and get into the challenges of, "Oh, am I holding my breath? What's going to happen? Am I going to die?" You start to go through all that stuff, but once you learn that you can calm that down, that mind down, your heart rate starts to slow down, and you can actually hold your breath. But it's really a matter from my perspective of putting my body into that stress, bringing it out of stress.

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And so, really, it's teaching myself to be able to learn to get in and out of that stress level. And so I've combined that Wim Hof Method of breathing with it. Taking a... My morning routine actually does have a cold shower routine into it. So usually, I will do cold... end my shower with 30 to 45 minutes of being in as cold as my shower will get, which is some mornings, especially in the winter, it gets pretty cold.

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But yeah, so those are the two components, and I really enjoy that methodology, especially if I'm having a rough day, where my stress levels are high, it actually brings my ability to calm it all back down.

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Chris Grouchy:

It is amazing when you start taking cold showers consistently along with deep breathing just how much better you feel after doing the combination of those two exercises and the amount of mental clarity that one can develop in creating a morning routine that encompasses those things.

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I think it's hard for people who are new to maybe the Wim Hof Method or even just taking just cold exposure in general how one could stand in a freezing cold shower for north of 10 minutes. But once you start to do it, I find it actually kind of becomes a little addicting, just have to get over that initial jolt. And then it's something you actually look forward to. Has that been your experience as well?

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah, it absolutely has. It's actually funny because Wim Hof talks about it. He actually talks about the cold exposure. You take that deep breath, and it's actually you're teaching your body to relearn how to do deep breath. Because if you think about yourself, if anyone who's listening at this moment, I would say just take a moment and be present and see how you're breathing in this moment.

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Most of us are breathing very shallow, and that includes me. I have to take that moment back. And that's why the meditation, the Wim Hof Method, the cold exposure really helps to go and gets you into that deep breathing. And I think it's really important to be able to calm our nervous system down when we want to. Because, truly, when we can control what our brain does and how our body's affected by it, we have better outcomes every day.

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Chris Grouchy:

I think that's incredibly important and well said. Where did the desire to motivate yourself come from? Are there any life experiences or themes throughout your life that you can point to and say, "This is where I turned the page and started focusing on the habits, the routines, and the inner voice that's playing inside my head?"

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah. Yeah, there definitely is. I've always thought of myself as high-energy, motivated type person. But like most people, I think that despite myself, I've been successful. I haven't really... I know what I've wanted, but I didn't really have a methodology. I didn't to have a good morning routine. And a few years ago, I had an opportunity. A friend of mine said, "Hey, do you want to go to a wealth expo?" And I didn't know, at the time, it was a real estate wealth expo.

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And this is like 2017, 2016 around there, and I really had no desire to go. But I went, and the whole day, I was thinking, "How am I going to get out of this thing?" And Tony Robbins was the keynote speaker, and he was going to be there for three hours at the end of the day, and I'm like, "Three hours." This is like, "We're getting to the end of the day. It's almost six. I'm going to be here till nine. I've been here since... I think we got there at seven in the morning." And so I was just like, "Ugh, this is going to be too much."

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And at that time, I wasn't a big fan because growing up, Tony Robbins was a guy who was on doing infomercials, and I'm like, "Infomercial guy, whatever." But I'll tell you, I don't know at what moment, but it was pretty close to the beginning. He said something that I had heard so many times in my life.

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And he said basically, "The only person in your life that you can change is yourself." And that to me... He talks about this all the time is, "In a moment, just take something in a moment that can change your life. You take a direct action." And at that point, it was a direct action for me of I've been trying to fix everybody else in my life, and the only constant person in my life is me, right.

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And so, that moment, I basically went from trying to look at everybody else and how to fix them to starting to fix myself. Now that wasn't an overnight journey. It is not easy when you kind of have as a coach, you think, "Okay, my job is to save people, save your complex. I got to fix problems. That's what people look to me to do."

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And so I had to move away, and it's taken me the last four or five years to really transition from someone who was really, "Hey, move aside. Let me do it for you. That's how you do it." To being more curious and asking people questions and learning. And really, being a coach is really not... It really is important to remember we're not players anymore. We're coaches. We're here to help people identify opportunities. And so, in that moment, it really did change the course of my life.

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I saw that, hey, things were starting to happen for me. There was lessons. All of this stuff were big lessons for me. It allowed me to reflect on those lessons. Think about relationships I've had in the past and how I could improve those relationships and start to really focus on making those relationships that much more meaningful.

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So from my perspective, really I can see how I interact with the people that I get to coach every day and how much I love actually coaching. It really drove me to being a better coach. And that's essentially when I think about my vision. My purpose in life is really to be a coach and to help other leaders really eliminate their limiting beliefs and get things going from that perspective.

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"My purpose in life is really to be a coach and to help other leaders really eliminate their limiting beliefs and get things going from that perspective."

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Chris Grouchy:

What's inspiring is that you don't self-identify. Your top level objective as a leader, as a manager, if you will, is not to drive profits for the organization that you represent. It's, "How can I enable more leaders regardless of the context." So I find that very inspiring personally.

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And regardless of what folks think about Tony Robbins, I mean, he has an unmatched ability to snap people out of that hypnosis of the wandering through life and use neurolinguistic programming techniques to help people kind of see the chess board of life more clearly and the actions that they can take.

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So I mean, I think it's very much worth people taking a look at if they're just embarking on this journey or if they feel like they're stuck in a rut. Let's talk a little bit about coaching and mentorship because this is something that you're passionate about. One thing that you mentioned that was particularly interesting is that questions can guide the participant or the recipient of coaching.

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And so I want to talk about more tactics, but before getting to that, what are some key questions that you use in coaching people on your team to help them reach their objectives? Are there any kind of templated questions that come to mind?

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Munawar Quraishi:

I don't know that there's any templated questions, Chris, but I would tell you that I try to stay away from words why. I think when someone says, "Why did you do that?" Or, "Why did you use that approach?" People start to get a little defensive from that word. And so I try to avoid putting people in the defensive position. I really go in looking to understand the approach, comment, or compliment on, "Hey, I like the way your thought process went," because I think you got to establish trust.

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And I think, over time, as you establish more trust, when you ask why people give you the benefit of the doubt. But I think it's still important to really get an understanding of what they were trying to do, what their approach was, and asked them the question. In fact, I had this conversation yesterday with my son. He got a little defensive with me because he had assignment and it wasn't done.

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But he got an extension because he chose one book and another book, and he's like, "You're making me feel anxious." I said, "Okay." I said, "I'm not trying to make you feel anxious." But I said, "If we can walk away from this going, 'Hey, what could we have done differently,' then next time you can improve it."

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So you chose a book that was too long to read that you wouldn't get through in the book assignment, right? He said, "Yeah." I said, "So now we know. We can choose a book for these assignments that's going to give you a challenge." And so once I came from a different perspective, he was able to take that anxiety down and have a conversation with me. And so this is an ongoing process.

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Sometimes you get... It's easy to get people into defensive mode because they're coming from their own story. But when you identify, "Hey, they're coming at you," I think the opportunity is to really, how do you take that situation from high intensity down to a place where we can have a normal conversation and then help to get them back on track?

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And really, my intention wasn't to coach him. My intention was to... initially was, "I'm just trying to understand what happened and why your teacher gave you the extension," and dialogue with him. So I think really, like I said, I like to avoid the why's and start to understand and take the approach that I'm here to learn so that I can be better.

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It's kind of like you think about that mastermind concept. Two minds make three minds, right. So if we can riff and learn and brainstorm, boom, right away, we're already doing something better than we were yesterday.

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Chris Grouchy:

In replaying the conversation that you had with your son, one thing that he said is he labeled his emotions, right. He labeled his feelings.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Mm-hmm.

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Chris Grouchy:

And anxiety is a feeling. Most people, when they start labeling their feelings, they actually label thoughts, right.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yep.

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Chris Grouchy:

And it's very important that when people are feeling defensive, they actually label that initially to themselves and then to the other. And then it's important for the person who's hearing that to deescalate by acknowledging and-

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Munawar Quraishi:

Right.

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Chris Grouchy:

... using mirroring their words back at them. That is a simple tactic I've learned that has made a big difference in being able to have hard conversations, be it critical feedback or what have you. What are some other hard problems that you face when coaching and mentoring people on your team?

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah, so it's good... great question. From my perspective, some of the other challenges that I face, one, I have to remember that I'm not the player. I'm the coach. So I got to take that step back. I kind of said that earlier is that it's so easy to go back in, and I was a volleyball player. I'll use the volleyball analogy to go in and start setting or passing or hitting the ball for the people that are doing it to say, "Hey, this is how you do it."

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But there's also an intimidation factor that, "Hey, look. Maybe I am working at a high level already." And they're coming in, they're like, "He expects me to be just as good as him." The reality is we got to let people fail. And I think I was listening to an audible book by Bruce Lee's daughter called Be Water, My Friend, and she said her father, Bruce Lee, said that he would actually get an idea, go at it, fail, and then stop doing it and then get the next idea and get the next idea.

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And he became so good at executing on ideas. He knew when ideas weren't good ideas and when ideas were good ideas. And so we get caught up, I think, in business that we're just trying to get people to execute and do it right the first time. But the reality is, if you think about any of the most successful people in the world, they've probably failed more times than they have succeeded. And it's because they've learned to stop doing those failures fast and succeeding.

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So I think getting people to or reminding people that, "Hey, we have to get you to just go and execute. I get you got a story. I get you of a belief system about yourself." But I think when we start to move people towards just trying to move towards execution, there's growth in that, right. And everybody's at a different level.

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And I think it's an important piece to remember is... to remind people is, "It's okay. The first time you learned to walk, you fell a lot, and your parents didn't give up on you in that moment and go, 'Okay, he or she's not a walker, right. They're going to be a crawler for the rest of their life.'" They actually said, "Hey, good job, good job." Right. So same concept, and I think we have to be reminded of that people are... it's okay for them to fail.

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The idea is if they're going through a process and you're brainstorming. Again, I'll go back to this whole mastermind concept. Because really, when you're coaching, it's a mastermind. It's two people getting together. And the reality is, if I'm the coach and you're the player, I am learning just as much about whatever we're working on as you are.

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And if I take that approach, then it allows you to have the ability to open up and go, "Yeah, hey, we're both in this together. They're not judging me." And we're trying to take that judgment away, right.

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Chris Grouchy:

I want to dive into that because I think for being the coach, it's expected that you will coach or provide critical feedback. And so long as you have methods and a shared understanding of how we can combat defensiveness and focus on execution, we will be good, right. The relationship will sustain itself.

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How do you get coaching from the players, right? So when you as a leader want to get better and improve, are there norms or tactics that you use to flip the script and get critical feedback from the people that you're coaching?

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah. I think what's really important to say is my team knows I want them to be direct, honest, and not be afraid to tell me. I always say this to people. I say, "I may not like what you have to say, but I can do an act on what you say, and I'll get over not liking it." I'll put my ego aside, and I'll put on my big boy pants type of thing, and I'll run with it because it's an opportunity for me to learn and get better.

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Now, I'll tell you, if you asked me, that a year ago, I wasn't as good as I am today. I mean, four or five years ago, I was horrible at it, but I wasn't as good a year ago, and I'm now getting better and better and better, and I just keep being more and more open. And so I think it's really important to just understand that when you open up that door, it allows people to see you from that perspective, and they're going to want to open up more. And then you're going to get and accomplished more and more things.

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Chris Grouchy:

That makes a lot of sense. Yeah. Normalizing vulnerability.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah.

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Chris Grouchy:

There is a coach that I had who shared with me a tactic for getting critical feedback from people who you manage, and there's that power distance there, so you want to eliminate that. But people, because of that power distance, they feel fear.

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And so, one way to help them come to terms with that and communicate the real feedback is to ask them, "Think of the feedback that you want to give me, but you're afraid to because you think it'll hurt my feelings. Just think about that. Pause and reflect on it. Say the feedback in your head that's going to hurt my feelings, but don't say it. Now say it. Now tell me." Right.

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And then thank them and acknowledge it and then commit to it, right. But you can only do that to your point if you have the norms in place to have vulnerable conversations. Otherwise, everyone's operating in a state of fear and uncertainty.

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Munawar Quraishi:

That's a great point, Chris. I think when you get that feedback, well, typically, leaders might get feedback and go... and lose it. Like I get defensive, right. Sometimes when I have conversations with my wife, I have to be reminded, "Hey, look, she's giving me feedback. It's okay. She can be right all the time, right."

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But the point is, I think you nailed that right there and said, it's like, "Hey, make it a part of the process so that they can learn that when they give me feedback, I'm going to react in a way that puts a positive outcome out there and I can take it." So I love that. That's a great tactic.

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Chris Grouchy:

I mean, I'm drinking from a fire hose here, building the company, so I appreciate it. But it is helpful to have, once you receive the feedback, to or acknowledge the defensiveness in yourself. Right now, you're being coached, and just thank them and accept it, and then you can move past it.

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And I like to kind of say to the team, "Do you think our competitors are having vulnerable conversations at work? Do you really think so to the same degree that we are?" And the answer is wholeheartedly no. They're not. And so that's our comparative advantage as an organization right there.

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Munawar Quraishi:

100%. 100%. There's one other thing that we do. We work with a company called Excel Leadership Institute, and these guys are amazing. So every month, we have a session with them, the whole leadership team one hour. And I mean, I help to guide the topics, and we try to stay with the topic for three months a quarter so that we can reinforce it. We get a lot of learning.

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But basically, what I'm saying to the team is, "I'm committed to you, to your growth, to being a better coach every day, and let's use that hour while we're getting some sort of training." And what they do over there is they get us involved in sharing and whatnot. And I really focus on trying to share stuff that puts me out there. That says, "Hey, I am struggling with this. I want to hear your feedback, team."

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And then they see that I do it, that makes it okay for them to do it. And I think there's a line between our frontline folks, but as leaders, we don't... They say that being at the top, it's lonely at the top. But it's really sad if it's lonely at the top because there's enough leaders in an organization that that's where we got to be strong and we got to be learning from each other and bouncing stuff off, right.

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"Hey, if I'm struggling with how to give you feedback, I should go to..." I mean, we don't work together today. "But I should go to Ellio and say, 'Hey, Ellio, how do you...'" Or, however, that conversation is because maybe he's got an opportunity to or he's done something with you, and he say, "Hey, why are you even worried about what Chris is going to say?"

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He's like, "He takes feedback amazing. Go and tell him, 'Hey, I got to give you some feedback. I don't know how to say it.' And he's just going to accept it." So I think we as leaders have to have that opportunity to talk to each other more and more.

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Chris Grouchy:

It makes so much sense. I love what you said there around modeling vulnerability by admitting what you don't know and when you feel fear and anxiety for your team because I think that just builds trust.

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Munawar Quraishi:

For sure.

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Chris Grouchy:

And they will model that if they see leaders inside the company doing it. All right. I mean, let's shift gears and talk a little bit more about business. And I mean, we'll come back to culture because this is a very meaty topic that permeates all of these things. But HD Supply was recently acquired by the Home Depot. That's public news.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yep.

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Chris Grouchy:

And so, to the extent that you can share going through that acquisition process, what changed for HD Supply, maybe in terms of a macro view as a massive organization, and then specifically for you as the leader of HD Supply Canada?

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah. So, Chris, I've worked for six different companies, including companies that were bought. So in my, I don't know, 25-plus years of being in industry. I'd tell you, in that time, I've been on both sides of companies that have acquired companies and then companies that have been acquired. And I would tell you that the Home Depot, hands down, has been the best organization that I've had an opportunity to work for.

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And I think I could sum it up in the simplest ways. They're so people-focused. They understand the concept of that being an important value, how our people are going to drive the growth of our organization. Do right by your people. They will do right by the customers. The outcome of all of that is, "Hey, we continue to grow as a company." I think that's been my experience. From my experience, even as working. It's been seamless, great conversations. I'm learning.

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I think sometimes we forget, "Yeah, I'm in the B2B space. What can I learn from a retailer?" But I think there's so much to be learned. I think we've had these conversations before that, look, the reality is whether you're in the B2B space or not, people think they're consumers. So we got to create consumer experiences, and who knows consumer experience better than anybody, and that's a retailer, especially the most successful. And I would say Home Depot is definitely up there as one of the most successful retailers in history.

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Chris Grouchy:

It makes sense. And I think acquisitions, to a large degree, depend on the compatibility of the value systems of the organizations that are now getting married. And so blending culture then is a pretty big pain point and probably one of the most common failure modes for failed acquisitions. So now that you're on the inside or on the other side of the acquisition, how did you have to think about cultural change, specifically at HD Supply, in getting married with the Home Depot?

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Munawar Quraishi:

So this is really, Home Depot owned us, and then they sold us, and then they bought us again. So I think the reality is that from a culture perspective, our core culture values, how this organization is built, the culture wheel, all that stuff is that the value wheel that we have at Home Depot is essentially a succinct-

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Chris Grouchy:

A mirror.

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Munawar Quraishi:

... thing. Same thing, and years later, mirror. Exactly. So I think from that perspective, when you think about acquisitions, you're spot on. It's like you get acquired, or you do the acquiring, and it doesn't happen to work out because people didn't think about getting people from a culture... or getting organizations to culturally jive. This has been simple. It really has been.

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It's really like... It's been interesting to watch and even walk in and coming from different organizations to be able to go, "Holy smokes. The box just gets checked, checked, checked, checked right down the line." So it's been pretty interesting from that perspective.

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From my perspective coming in as that leader, the Canadian leader on the HD Supply side, it's really been, "Look, we get it. You know how it's done. Let's figure out how to make it all work. And long-term, how do we benefit together from the combined growth of two organizations?"

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Chris Grouchy:

It sounds like it was very harmonious because of the interconnected relationship in history that the Home Depot and HD Supply have had. If we're taking two organizations that haven't had the same relationship and they're trying to understand, "Hey, are we compatible for one another?"

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What are some of those boxes that executives on either side really would need to be aware of in order to ensure that it's going to be a successful acquisition or just even the right decision?

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Munawar Quraishi:

I think from my perspective on that, the one component there is really how coaches coach or leaders... how the leaders are built in the organization. How open they are to really understanding and learning the nuances of the different organizations and the things that bring them together. But oftentimes, we think that maybe the differences are deal breakers or I'm not willing to change.

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But the reality is, I think, I can't remember. I think it was Peter Diamandis. I was watching a presentation from him, and he said... I think he took like 2020 and 1920. And he goes, there were six inventions, and I can't remember all the stuff that he had showed on the page or six or seven inventions that happened in 2020. And then he started going through what happened, I think, on a particular day in 2020, and what was invented and what changed.

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And it was just exponential, the difference. And so, we're at a time where the world is changing in a moment. And so the reality is, I think, from a leader or as you think about getting either acquiring or whatever, you have to be open to saying, "Hey, we're good at what we do, but we can be better." Right. And I kind of define that from using the words smart and intelligent. And I define these two words as very different.

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Smart people think that they are the smartest people in the room. No one's smarter. Intelligent people think that, "There's a lot more smarter people than me, and I want to be able to learn from all of those people in the room," and take that information and apply it in the best way so that the outcome from that group or that team is the positive outcome. So from that perspective, that's how I like to look at things.

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So I'm here coming in as someone, yeah, I got 25 plus. I like to think I've been a high achiever in my career. I've worked with some really, really talented and intellectual people, and I know a lot about B2B. But the reality is, what can I learn from anyone in our organization, whether it's someone who does the job frontline? Because the reality is I have no idea what our frontline people have to go through every day because I'm not doing it every day. So I have to go in wanting to learn that.

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And then, from a senior level, there's stuff that they want done. And you think about someone like Henry Ford, who wanted to build a car, and he said, "Here's what I want you to do." And they're like, "It's impossible to do." He's like, "You'll figure it out." And I think that's how the V6 engine got built. But my point is that if you're open, you will be able to build a culture, do an acquisition that's pretty seamless.

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And what I mean by seamless is nothing that's ever happened was perfectly. I wish there was. But the reality is there wouldn't be any fun in anything we ever did. But if we're open and we're willing to learn, we can make that experience that much more enjoyable and allow ourselves to start moving past those limiting beliefs and move forward.

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Chris Grouchy:

There you go. I mean, that's mic-drop moment right there. I was taking notes on the definitions of smart versus intelligence, and my summary that I have scribbled down is being smart is a self-identification, right, and that could lead to arrogance or just not listening to what others have to say. Intelligence is curiosity-led, and that leads to growth. It's all upside.

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Munawar Quraishi:

100%.

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Chris Grouchy:

So choose your path, right. And I like what you're saying because if the financial model and the acquisition makes sense, we're aligned on the metrics and the growth targets that we have to hit together, the transaction can happen seamlessly.

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What truly matters then is the two cultures that will then form as one asking, "What can I learn from them, and how can I bring them as part of this journey that I'm on?" And if you have that all the way down, I think that the chances of success long-term just increase drastically. Right. You're multiplying by a number greater than one at that point.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yes. Agreed.

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Chris Grouchy:

I mean, well, we'll see. Maybe when we go public, we'll be buying companies and going through that. And I'll be listening to your advice here. I would transition a little bit into HD Supply Canada and what you're currently going through there.

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It seems like, based on conversations, that HD Supply Canada is going through a bit of a digital transformation. And so, what have been the key lessons you've learned through that digital transformation journey so far?

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Munawar Quraishi:

So from my perspective, just to give some background, we're going from older legacy on-prem technology to cloud-based technology, both ERP, third-party systems, as well as we're upgrading our website. We're doing kind of a two-stepper on our website as well. And so I think the first thing I would say in that digital transformation from a lessons perspective is you got to know what your processes are. Like what are your must.

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This is a audit process, and can the new systems, can the new technology, can it handle this stuff? And if it can't, how hard is it to if you have to modify, modify, right? Because as I went into this transformation, I had a zero mod rule, no modifications. We're going to use it as is. And I knew that wasn't realistic, but I didn't want to be 200 modifications in, and we're not using the new technology the way it's supposed to be used.

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The reality is you're going to pay for all this stuff. Why would you move if you're going to use... it's going to be the same thing? So you got to take advantage of that. So I think really knowing what those processes are way ahead of time and being able to go, "Okay, let's just make sure. Let's vet and ensure that these are going to work," and then that's a part of your vetting process. I think that's really important to be able to do that.

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I think the second thing is have strong governance around outcomes. Know exactly what outcomes you're looking for, and that you're just... they're non-negotiables. "We can't move away from this. This is the way the project kind of begin and end on these principles." And I think that's been a real good guiding principle for us. I mean, it didn't help we had to go through a pandemic through all of this, and we had to delay things because of that because it made the right sense. It was the right thing to do at that time.

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But I think it's important to know that, "Hey..." Again, I'll go back to zero mods, right. I knew in my head how many we needed to get to. And really, for us, it was more on reporting than it was anything else. But it's really, what's that goal and really sticking to it and having a process that really judges whether it should happen or it shouldn't happen? And knowing where you want to go from that perspective. I think, overall, from my perspective, we've done a pretty good job on that front, and we really minimized a lot of the things from a mod perspective. I feel pretty good about it.

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Chris Grouchy:

That's awesome. Yeah. The two takeaways there for me would be have your processes defined and then know your outcomes and then have a model for governing those outcomes or at least a feedback loop.

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"So, are we on track? Are we deviating? Why are we trying to change our behavior despite having these non-negotiables?" That kind of three-step framework makes a lot of sense to me, but no one goes through digital transformation just because it's painful. What's the objective that you are trying to achieve here?

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Munawar Quraishi:

Well, we were on legacy technology, and we wanted to be able to take advantage of upgrades to that technology advancements. And so our old system, we never took advantage of that. We were on... From where we were, I think, we're six versions to where we're going. And so because we had mods, we didn't want to test it. We didn't want to pay. Now going into the cloud, now things are a lot different.

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So we're able to, now, take enhancements and take advantage of improving our customer experience, improving the processes that drive better customer behaviors, improving processes that drive better productivity. What enhancements third party that can we add on? Long-term now, with the legacy system, you don't have those abilities, or it's a lot harder to be able to figure out how to get some of those third parties working with you to be able to take advantage of additional technology.

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So from that perspective, that was super important, from an objective perspective, is to be able to... for our business to grow with the technology that we have. And we had limitations from before, and we wanted to really take advantage of that.

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Chris Grouchy:

That makes sense to me. We started talking about partners there, and I'm very curious, in the back of your head, what some of the selection criteria looks like in evaluating partners. Of course, technology has to make sense. We have to vet that, has to align to our goals.

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But are there other things, other general decision-making criterias that you have in the back of your mind that you like to use whenever selecting and vetting partners?

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah. I think, probably, the single most important thing from my perspective is to find a partner who is willing to have a discussion and brainstorm on where the world is going. We have these good, great conversations. But they, I think, create outcomes. May not be an outcome tomorrow because you just, we're focused on these five things right now. This might be the 10th thing, but it might actually spark something to enhance something else because we want to be ready for that.

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I think that's a super important piece to have is that to be able to have those conversations and go, "Hey, this is what we're thinking of doing. This is where we're thinking of going with our business. What's your perspective? How can you help us get there?" But to have that open dialogue and be able to help shape where the technology needs to go because we're seeing this real-life trend. And I think that's a real important factor from a partner perspective.

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I think that's my number one criteria. If they're like, "Hey, no, this is how we do things." If I wanted to, this is how we do things. I would just have stuck with my old system and just kept doing it that way and became a dinosaur. And so I think it's really important to have partners like that. And I would say that we've found that we've had really big partners, big organizations, and really small organizations. And organizations that really understand that user experience and they treat us customers.

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And I think that's kind of the second piece is working with an organization that just sees us as a customer and not necessarily a means to an end. I really like organizations that are focused on coaching and developing their people because I know if they're doing that, they're going to coach and develop us too.

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Chris Grouchy:

Going back to the intelligence versus smart model, right. Curiosity. You can find learning and everything with that mindset.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Absolutely.

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Chris Grouchy:

And if I were to double click on something that you just said, it's that, I think, in particular, a lot of big companies, Fortune 500s. They get nervous working with seemingly untested partners.

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And what I can tell you is that the innovators out there are able to shape and influence roadmap to actually solve root cause problems by taking what seems to be a little bit of risk, but actually turns out to be a massive payoff because they're not just buying a box off a shelf, they're actually shaping the experience, the product to get the job done.

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And I just think that's a huge advantage to being an early adopter and innovator regardless of the technology space that you're trying to implement within.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Chris, if I can steal one from Napoleon Hill, "There's no company... there's no individual that woke up, and all of a sudden was sleeping on..." I mean, this is not a exact quote from him. "But it was sleeping on a whack of cash and was just killing it every day." They just got up, and that happened. That is in the history of, I'm sure, the universe that's never happened, right.

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The reality is, and we can take guys like Andrew Carnegie and Henry Ford, and Thomas Edison to Fred Smith, Bill Gates, and Jeff Bezos. You make any one of these people, and they all started with nothing. They had a thought, and thoughts are things, and they wrote it down. They had this definiteness of purpose. They had a belief system. They got so passionate about it. It drove everything they did. But it started, and someone had to trust them. Someone had to believe in them. They had to convince them, right.

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And I think it's a real important thing to remember, as organizations, the bigger we get is that, "Hey, innovation comes in all shapes and sizes, and it's really about trying to find the individual that you are willing to work with to do this." And I think this is the one thing I would say for people who are just starting their career, for people who are even late in their career and starting something new is the number one skillset I think every individual needs is how to influence other people.

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I think Andrew Carnegie really says it really well in that, if I can paraphrase is, if the number one thing that we can do from an influencing people perspective is to really work on that skillset and get really, really good at. Because once you build trust, there's no reason why people don't want to work with you. They don't want to deal with you. They want to be super engaged.

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"...Once you build trust, there's no reason why people don't want to work with you. They don't want to deal with you. They want to be super engaged."

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Chris Grouchy:

This dovetails into the next question, which is that innovation means change. Change is really hard. People are often initially averse to doing hard things, and they're averse to change as a result. So change management is something that becomes critically important whenever you endeavor to do something huge.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yes.

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Chris Grouchy:

How do you gain buy-in inside of your organization, and what challenges have you faced through the process of gaining buy-in something as daunting as a digital transformation?

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah, I think it's important to say start early and get stuff in front of people so they start to get used to it. They start to see it. They start to feel it, get excited about it. They start to ask questions. "Does it do this? Does it do that? How will it do this?" For us, that was the one thing. As we were going through, we had talked about it initially. But it's kind of like out of sight, out of mind, right. If they don't see it, they don't get excited.

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So we started pretty early on this year to get people to see the product. We did screenshots. This is what it looks like with the managers talking in their team meetings and started bring more and more excitement. And now we're getting closer and closer to going live. But it really starts early. Getting people to ask those questions and getting them to test it out. It's kind of like kicking tires. If you're going to buy a car, you want to test drive it, getting out there and test driving it.

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And so, that was really, really important, I think is really getting people on the tool, seeing it early. That's really helped from a digital transformation perspective. I think getting their opinions on it and asking questions about certain things that they do so that they feel like they have their input into it. And we use that methodology for a lot of the things that we do. We try to get insight.

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Certainly, there's times where you can't have that naturally because, hey, there's some things that you just... we're not having an opinion discussion on this because we got to move forward. But certainly, I think it's a really important factor where you can get more and more people involved. You want to get them involved early.

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Chris Grouchy:

Makes a lot of sense. Yeah, I think that... and there's a number of other steps in there that maybe we'll collaborate on and form into a blog post. A tactical question, though, as part of this digital transformation plan, how important is virtual inventory in B2B specifically for HD Supply? And do you expect that to play a role in your expansion, especially as things begin to move increasingly in B2B towards eCommerce?

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah. I think it's critical. I think what's interesting about virtual inventory, and I think it's really important to mention this, is that it's really not a field of dream moments. If they build it, they will come, right. Yes, that concept, you need to build it. You need to have it. But what's really important here is you need to build it in a directional methodology where you understand the right products to drive that trust in that market space so that people want to start coming back to you.

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And start to build it and organize it in a way that you become that trusted seller. Because here's what I think makes companies in, especially in the retail space really, really successful. And I think I can say this for Home Depot, is that people know when they go to Home Depot, they're going to get what they need, and someone's going to be there to help them. And so this is the same concept in our world in the B2B spaces. We need to keep that level of consistency.

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They come to us. They know that, hey, they can set their watch when they buy it from us. It's going to get there at a certain time, and they're able to... we're able to deliver on our customer promise. So I think from our perspective, this is going to be an extremely important part of our growth journey because... And we'll decide, "Hey, most of it will go virtual. But there'll be some key things that we may want to bring in because it makes sense because we want to be able to speed up the delivery of it because they need it in a little more of a next day.

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Or we work with vendors that can provide that same level of service. But it is going to be really, really important to become a trusted source for our customers, but be able to position it in a way that they think about us every time, right.

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I think if you kind throw up on them and give them all sorts of products too fast, that might confuse them. And I think you got to build it in a way that platforms it, and it makes sense for them to be able to go in and drive that. And it might be an approach for multiple different customers at the same time.

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Chris Grouchy:

Well, I think it's also fulfilling the brand promise that you have, right. If your promise is people will always find what they need regardless of what it is, and it will arrive on time, then you have to live up to that, right.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Right.

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Chris Grouchy:

And I thought one of the tactics that you and your team came up with was looking at the search results on the site and saying, "Okay, which products in these search results we have today but that people are searching for? And then let's go and figure out ways in which we can bring these products on and start offering them to the customer." Thought that was brilliant.

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Munawar Quraishi:

For sure. And I would say, if I can sum up virtual inventory. I think virtual inventory is the holy grail to creating a trusted source for your customers. It is just that enhancement that you need to be able to complete your lineup of product and to continue to drive that trusted methodology that I think every business is looking to kind of create.

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Chris Grouchy:

Well, I appreciate that, and it's something we take very seriously here at Convictional, and one that I think is the speed and agility that businesses can tap into once they have the right infrastructure in place, enables them to just do so much more, right.

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A product goes viral on TikTok, and within... by the end of the business day, you could have that product live on your site and start selling it to whoever your customer is, wherever they are.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Right.

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Chris Grouchy:

Those kinds of use cases are unthinkable in a world prior to virtual inventory.

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Munawar Quraishi:

So true.

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Chris Grouchy:

Well, I mean, I want to wrap up here, and I've got two questions and then a rapid-fire round. So we'll aim to wrap up in just a couple of minutes. But do you have a mentor or someone that you look up to who would be a B2B or retail legend in the making?

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah. It's interesting you ask that question. I think people that right now I really enjoy working with are the people at Excel Leadership Institute. I think Sarah over there who has a background in research, great coach, great mentor. I kind of lean on her. We get to riff and brainstorm, kind of like our conversations.

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She'd probably say the same thing is whenever we have this conversation. It always goes off on a tangent because we start talking about interesting things to help improve leadership and whatnot. So I think Sarah over there would probably be someone that I would say is... it would be from a leadership perspective, someone great.

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Chris Grouchy:

That's great. And any aspirational folks in B2B or retail that you'd love to learn from? We're always curious because we'd love to potentially get them on the podcast or include them in our, I guess, repertoire of learning materials that we can circulate to our audience.

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Munawar Quraishi:

Yeah. On the second one, I think that's one I'm going to have to think about a little bit, but I definitely... It's probably a few people that come to mind that I think I would want to shoot over your way, but let me put a little more thought on that one.

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Chris Grouchy:

No problem. So we'll move into the rapid-fire round. Four questions for you. Are you ready to go?

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Munawar Quraishi:

I'm ready to go.

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Chris Grouchy:

Perfect. All right. Most exciting opportunity in B2B or retail post-COVID?

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Munawar Quraishi:

I'm going to give you retail look. Look, buying groceries online has been a game-changer for me. I didn't like going the grocery store in the first place, and once kind of COVID hit, this was a game changer for me that I didn't have to go to the grocery, and I could spend more time doing other stuff that I like to do. Buying groceries online definitely was a big one for me.

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Chris Grouchy:

You'll never step into a grocery store again after upgrading that for sure. A brand you love and why?

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Munawar Quraishi:

I'm going to say the Home Depot. You know what? We really care about people. And for me, that's a big thing. Being a coach is one of the most important things for me in my life. And the fact that I get to work for an organization that allows me to do that, what I love to do, I'm going to stick with the Home Depot brand.

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Chris Grouchy:

Amazing. Most important lesson in fatherhood?

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Munawar Quraishi:

So this one I'll tell you is this. Kids stop listening when you are mad or upset at them because they fear there's judgment and consequence. So then people say, "Well, how do you..." Sometimes my dad used to get mad at me. I get it. And I would be like, "Okay, I'm not going to do it again." But what this means is that the lesson will get lost in whatever you say to them.

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So it's better to take a deep breath, have a conversation, be curious, ask questions. You're the coach. They're the player. You want them to take more shots. So identify what was good. What were the strengths of the situation, and what were the opportunities, the weaknesses? And so I think when we take that step back and be curious and learn to deescalate, I have found with my son that he responds much better to that.

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Chris Grouchy:

Thanks again to Munawar for coming on the show. And thank you for listening to the Legends of Retail podcast. If you want to get notified about future episodes of the show, subscribe on your favorite podcasting app. You can also stay updated by following Convictional on LinkedIn and on Twitter.

If you've been enjoying the show so far, please consider rating and reviewing the show on Apple Podcast or Spotify. It really helps us in getting the show in front of more listeners.

And finally, if you want to share more feedback on the show or want to suggest a guest for season two, you can follow me on Twitter @ChrisGrouchy and send me a DM there. Or you can send me an email. My email is chris@convictional.com. Thanks again for listening.