Turnover in the retail industry is high: nearly 70 percent for part-time retail employees, according to the Hay Group.1 Since it costs over $3,000 to find, hire, and train a replacement for a retail employee earning $10 per hour, retail companies lose big money each year to staff attrition.2
Many retail employees leave their jobs because of poor management. “Employees who rate their supervisor’s performance poorly are four times as likely to be job hunting,” stated TinyPulse.3
Developing effective retail managers with online retail management training could be a key to improve employee retention and reduce turnover costs.
Retail businesses that want to improve employee retention should start by elevating their best workers into managers using these online learning secrets:
A critical step to training a prospective retail manager is getting them up to speed with the latest retail management technology. To ensure future managers are comfortable leveraging this technology, companies should create or buy an online course that teaches the correct operation of the retail management technologies they use.
"Create a course that demonstrates how to use project management tools, communication apps and learning management systems (LMSs) to lead and coach reports,” advised eFront Learning.3 “For example, a course could show managers how to use an LMS to set development goals and monitor the progress of their reports."
Technology training can be incorporated into a learning path at any point, but it’s often most effective at the end of the course. By that point, future managers already understand the basics of how to lead a team and the purpose behind everything they’re doing. Once they understand that, it’s easy to teach them about the tools that will enable their work.
Job shadowing is a helpful addition to a soon-to-be manager’s LMS learning path. It creates a hands-on, blended learning experience and gives employees first-hand knowledge of what it means to work in a supervisory role.
Job shadowing should always align with what employees are learning in their online courses, so plan job shadowing days to correspond with training. For example, the day after an employee completes a module on conducting performance reviews, they could spend a few hours watching a seasoned manager actually execute this type of review. This would give the employee the opportunity to ask questions and would improve retention of the prior day’s training content.
Related Reading: 4 Biggest Employee Training Problems eLearning Solves for Enterprises
Different employees have different sales styles. When forced to use one that feels inauthentic to them, their sales may suffer.
Future managers should be familiar with various sales styles so they can coach those they supervise in the style most effective for each person. This personalized coaching will help managers ensure sales goals are achieved.
"...many times, reps who become managers early in their career instinctually adhere to one familiar style and coach their team on that selling technique,” wrote a contributor to HubSpot. “Don't fall into this trap. Remember that the most effective managers understand that their job is to bring out the best of each rep’s skill set and strengths, not shoehorn reps into a work style unsuited to their talents."
Help future managers become effective sales coaches by incorporating video-based training on various selling styles. The training should include short videos that explain sales styles throughout the business sales training course for prospective supervisors.
The challenges companies are having keeping employees engaged and remaining with the company are immense. “People do not quit their company, they quit their supervisor,” stated Chron.5 “Many retail employees leave because they do not get along with their immediate supervisor…”
Training is one way to overcome this issue. Focus retail management training on your top performing or high potential employees, teaching them to lead a team and ensure other staff members are just as successful. Use relevant online retail management training to evolve these high performers into great managers. Those managers will help improve your business and reduce turnover.
Great managers inspire their employees to improve and strive harder to reach their potential. Great managers build loyalty and drive better work products from those who work for them.
Want more information about providing retail management training online? Take a look at this.
References:
1. Bob Phibbs. 8 ways to increase employee retention in your retail store. https://www.retaildoc.com/blog/8-reasons-why-your-retail-employee-turnover-is-so-high.
2. Center for American Progress. There are significant business costs to replacing employees. https://www.americanprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/CostofTurnover.pdf.
3. TinyPulse. Employee retention report. https://www.tinypulse.com/hubfs/2018%20Employee%20Retention%20Report.pdf.
4. HubSpot. How to make the transition from sales rep to manager. https://blog.hubspot.com/sales/how-to-make-the-transition-from-sales-rep-to-manager.
5. Chron. Why do employees leave in retail? https://smallbusiness.chron.com/employees-leave-retail-10180.html.