7 Myths: a professional merchandiser needs to follow

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Mohammad Nurul Alam

Job responsibilities for a merchandiser refer to the duties and tasks of particular roles that he has to perform every day. But the individual merchandiser may not be all time a good role player for the matter that is conducted by him to make up a teamwork task. As a result, the entire production, the overall business and organizational growth could be hampered in many ways. So, 7 Myths of merchandising task are important to perform for the effective job-

1) Starting the day with a complete to-do list.   

A ‘to-do list’ is the preparation and anticipation of the total workload that has to complete in a day. Because a merchandiser has to deal with hundreds of tasks when starts the day and so he/she feels to be hot-boil tempered for the endless workload that has arrived from internal and external sources.

For a merchandiser, the busy day never can be successfully ended if no periodization of work is maintained. And work periodization is only possible by a ‘to-do list’ that has been made at the beginning of the day.

‘To-do list ‘ helps to reduce anxiety and it also provides a guideline for the day-long schedule. But in most cases merchandiser starts their day without priority work and do the work that is most urgent at the desk.

Sometimes merchandisers complete the task based on people’s demand. For example, if a production unit requires approval that needed to start production, then he/she deals with them as a top priority but there might be some other important tasks that needed to complete and should not be forgotten.

So an efficient merchandiser never starts the day unless he/she completes a ‘to-do list’ at the beginning of the day or the day before leaving the office.

2)E-mail to read and reply. 

Merchandizing communication is mostly done by e-mail and without proper e-mail attendance things never can be done appropriately. Buyer’s update, response to pending issues, and approval process all can be done through e-mail and it can only be possible if the workable communication is completed at the beginning of the day.

Most importantly there might be some sort of backward task that need to complete behind an e-mail to make an effective conversation. So, reading and replying to the mail should be the day’s top number one task.

But sometimes merchandiser feels e-mail attendance is a task that can be kept for later and meantime other urgent has to complete on an immediate basis. And this idea never is a healthy growth for the merchandiser because keeping the e-mail unread may lead him in the wrong direction that sometimes goes beyond the buyer’s thoughts.

3)Critical and burning issues to be solved. 

A merchandiser’s day starts with many complaints and matters of difficult production issue that requires immediate settlement. But there might be such issues in number many and everyone may want immediate approval or solution from the merchandiser. So the day for the merchandiser can be a hell moment if he/she fails to prioritize the urgent issues.

In many cases, the approval process involved many concerns that sometimes merchandisers cannot give the approval alone. He may need to wait for the concerned expert to get a review so the situation can be difficult to manage for him but this has to be done effectively by the merchandiser.

4)Organizing desk.

A merchandiser has to work hundreds of stuff and submissions-materials that require checking regularly for comments and review. So there might be many loose materials on the desk or many other places that needed to organize properly.

Many times, it has been seen people work with materials and kept them here and there whimsically and later on struggle to find them for urgent purposes. But the struggle makes them exhausted and fatigued in time of need because stuff is not kept in the right places.

This situation could avoid if he/she organizes the desk and work materials when the purpose has been done.

5) Scheduled phone call has to complete. 

A phone call for a regular update on work progress is one of the most important jobs for a merchandiser that should not be kept for relaxation time. The phone call can be done after the mailing task has been completed just to reconfirm that the purpose of the mail is understood by the recipient appropriately. Because in most cases people in Bangladesh at production sometime fail to understand the motives of a mail and act something differently.

There might be another important purpose that can be served by a phone call that a merchandiser fails to communicate through an e-mail. In simple words, this is a broad communication with the person to dig out a real scenario of the production progress. Because it has been observed that people provide false information through e-mail and try to hide the reality just to avoid the hassle. Actually, this is not the way of working to hide reality. So in this circumstance, a phone call can discover unknown matters easily.

6) Maintaining Diary and Notebooks. 

A notebook can help to keep a record of what is discussed and what is to be discussed with someone.

This is required because putting things in the notebook can be a good reminder for daily activities even a day ‘to-do list’ if kept in the diary then it would be a good record for the next time.

Sometimes it has been seen people are putting notes or some numbers on loose paper while discussing on phone but this is not practically good to write on a loose paper. This is good and practical to keep anything in a notebook so that things would not be lost in the time of need and can be found easily.

7)To be honest and practical. 

The person who works there might be a possibility to do a mistake or in some cases, serious blunder can happen. Whatever the situation could be behind the matter of mistake but the reality is the cost of a mistake maybe thousands of dollars. It could damage the entire business and destroy the goodwill of a person in the organization and the incident may lead the person to the demolishing of their career.

In such circumstances, the merchandiser should not be tricky to conceal the matter of what blunder has been done by him and try to convince the management to overcome the situation.

He should be honest to confess the mistake and ask apology for the loss. Because everyone loves an honest person and this might be a second chance for him in the future to continue his job in the organization.

In conclusion, it could be said a professional merchandiser never can be irrational while performing his job. He should have to be serious and sincere in every task that has been done by him. He should not be casual to conduct the responsibility and liability.