Happy colleagues create happy customers, and happy customers spend more. It sounds obvious. Yet retail has some of the lowest engagement scores of any industry, and few businesses have a real plan to change that.
The Service Profit Chain
The Service Profit Chain is a well-established model that links colleague satisfaction to customer satisfaction, loyalty and profit. In plain terms: it will be very hard to improve customer satisfaction if your colleagues are unengaged and unmotivated.
Customers will never love a company until its colleagues love it first.
This is a customer issue as much as an HR one, which is why I've always treated it as part of the customer plan. A good Great Place to Work strategy rests on four things.
1. Develop
Colleagues need the right tools, skills and training to do the job. That includes mentoring, a personal development plan and the chance to work in different parts of the business. Good succession planning helps you find tomorrow's leaders. Celebrate people who move into bigger roles.
2. Voice
Good communication between colleagues and managers is the fuel that keeps a company running. Give people a way to feed back ideas and frustrations, and then act on it with a visible "you said, we did" response.
It's especially empowering when an idea from the shop floor is adopted across the business. Technology can connect the shop floor and the boardroom in real time.
3. Valued
People need to feel appreciated. That starts with regular one-to-ones, a fair annual review and a fair wage. Recognise great performance quickly: instant feedback when someone goes above and beyond is the most effective kind. Ultimately, link reward to the customer satisfaction colleagues deliver.
4. Contribution
Every colleague should know the part they play in making the business successful. Their objectives should be clear and should add up to the wider company plan. Too many businesses focus only on the "what". The "how" matters just as much.
Recruit for kindness
Product knowledge can be taught. Kindness can't. A colleague who shows empathy and listens to what a customer needs will lift conversion and satisfaction. So look for it when you hire.
In a high-ticket retailer where fewer than half of visitors buy, a knowledgeable, kind colleague is the difference between a sale and a walk-out. It's also something online-only competitors can't copy.
Involve colleagues in change
When you introduce new technology, whether for scheduling, stock or checkouts, involve the people who will use it. Too often senior teams design a solution behind closed doors, and colleagues end up with something that doesn't fit the job and a feeling that nobody asked them.
What it delivers
Get this right and you should see higher productivity, better morale, lower staff turnover and lower recruitment costs. Above all, you'll see it in customer satisfaction and sales. I'd treat it as an essential investment, not a nice-to-have.