How Does Your Leadership Style Impact Your Store?

Leadership. It varies from person to person and company to company. As a business owner how you lead your team impacts the overall health and prosperity of your store. Does your team work for you and follow direction out of a feeling of obligation or fear? Do your employees do what they are told to do because of a concern that failing to do so could result in the loss of their job? If this is the feeling of the store associates they may not be doing more than the minimum to get their jobs done. This affects customer service and how employees interact with patrons. Poor service results in poor sales and inefficiency in operations. Leadership is as important as customer service and I would argue the two go hand in hand. I cannot think of a customer service driven business where the delivery of customer service thrived when the managers were loud, bossy or came across as distant.  

     Personally I have attempted to incorporate in my own management style a mix of a couple leadership influences. One is advocated by John Maxwell. The first book of his I read was, “The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership”. In his book he lays out what he describes as 21 principles that apply to leaders. There were a couple of his points that I made a conscious effort to apply (some were already an integral part of who I am) when I was leading my Loss Prevention team, my freight unload/ stocking team and as a Manager on Duty. Two of the characteristics Mr. Maxwell lists, “The Law of Solid Ground” and “The Law of Empowerment” are dimensions I believe can make a major shift in how a store team functions. The first idea is that people have to trust their leader. As a leader do you follow through on commitments to your team? Do you treat every person equally and fairly and do you provide honest feedback even when it may be difficult? The second is that strong leaders are not afraid to give power to others. As you empower your team to make decisions you build their trust in you and you are developing them into leaders. This means you train your team, set expectations and as they are learning, you correct and provide recognition to them.  

     Another leadership style I embrace is servant leadership. This manager is the leader who leads by the example he/she sets. It is also a manager who invests in the development of others. I have incorporated this in the course of my careers. Rather than ask a team member to clean up after a child has been sick in the store I have done it myself. As a freight team manager I frequently came in on a day off to help my team unload a truck and push freight. It is the willingness of the leader to be seen doing the unpleasant tasks alongside the rest of the team. A 70 foot trailer gets awfully hot and humid in the south during the summer. When your team sees you willing to get in that trailer first and rotate others out to avoid exhaustion they are willing to work harder to get the tasks done. Servant leadership does not mean supervision does not take place or that discipline is not occurring. It only means that the manager/supervisor attempts to be empathetic to situations where discipline may be required. These leaders do not allow themselves to be doormats but do look at individual circumstances when the situation warrants it. Think about how an employee is likely to respond to this manager as opposed to the heavy-handed supervisor who gives orders and barks directions.  

     Leadership styles directly influence the way a business operates and how employees function on the job. Yes, you can be the owner and expect workers to do what you tell them to do, but it won’t foster a happy workforce. A leader who cares about the staff helps in their development and empowers them to make decisions will get far better results than the other leader. As customer service improves, productivity improves and the atmosphere of the building is one where shoppers enjoy spending time. It also creates a customer-focused climate where sales associates are actively engaging clients and that leads to a reduction in theft. Happy employees are also less likely to steal and that can impact up to 30% of where shortage traditionally takes place. 

     Evaluate your leadership style. Are you leading the way YOU would want to be led and are there adjustments you can make that can enhance nearly every aspect of your business? Leadership determines how successful your store can be. 

Keep Shoplifters From Stealing Your Holiday Spirit

It’s here! The holiday season and there is a spirit of goodwill that hopefully we all share towards each other. For retail owners and managers the joyful spirit is boosted when sales are good as customers are buying gifts and purchasing foods for baking and holiday meals. For the most part people seem to be a bit more patient towards each other (except maybe in a mall parking lot where drivers fight for the best parking places). It really is the most wonderful time of the year!

Unfortunately there are real Grinches out there who, for their own nefarious purposes have no compunction about committing crime that can steal your holiday spirit or that of your customers. These crooks create havoc for a store by stealing the hottest merchandise on the market or the most expensive merchandise. They may come in and take the latest video games off your shelf. They may be walking out in a new pair of sneakers or loading a couple of bottles of Grey Goose vodka under their coat at $70 a pop and waltzing out the doors. The impact is not isolated to the financial loss you experience from that particular item. The theft of your merchandise has a snowball effect that is magnified through the loss of additional sales.

I like to think of the impact of one shoplifter like the ripple effect of a rock tossed in a pond. The rock makes a splash that disturbs the water. The impact is immediate as the affect is seen with the splash. Then there are the waves that travel out from the point of impact. The water is disturbed far removed from the original landing point. When that shoplifter steals a video game you lose the $60 immediately. This is your cost plus the profit that you would have made. Now a customer comes in who wants to buy that game but it is gone and you lose a sale. You could make the argument you really have still lost only the $60 but wait a minute. You lost this sale and may have lost that paying customer from making future purchases at your store. This is the first ripple. Then no one on your staff notices that the empty spot for the game is there. They assume it was sold and wait for replenishment. How long does the store go before action is taken to replace the game? Now you have no idea how many other customers came in and did not bother to inquire about it because it wasn’t on the shelf? How generous is your return policy? Can the thief bring the game back unopened and get cash or a gift card? Now you are paying for the merchandise you already bought. You lose TWICE! The impact can be greater than even the confines of your store. Does the criminal trade it for illegal drugs and the drug dealer sells it online or to a mom and pop shop where you are undercut? That gift card may be sold online too by the way. In a sense one theft is supporting other illegal activities.

I don’t want to steal your holiday spirit but I do want you to understand that if you are not actively protecting merchandise from shoplifters they WILL steal your spirit and your merchandise. The sad part of this story to me is that many store owners could easily thwart shoplifters through a few relatively easy steps. First and foremost is a purchase of a Sensormatic security system. It is affordable! Too many owners look at it only as an expense and they don’t understand the benefits in shortage reduction. They work and they do significantly decrease theft in the store. The other step is to build a culture of customer service. We talk about it all of the time in retail but it has to be a genuine core principle in a store. Greeting customers as soon they walk into the building with a real hello is a start. Spending time finding out what they are in the store for is the way to sell and help accessorize purchases. The added bonus for the store is the deterrent effect that service has on shoplifting.

Retail crime does steal the joy from store owners and customers alike. The shopper is prevented from buying the special gift that a special person had their heart set on. The business owner is deprived of the merchandise and deals with the lingering effects of the crime. Take my advice protect merchandise with anti-theft devices, a Sensormatic security system and make customer service a priority in your store. You and your customers will truly feel the spirit of the season!


      

Employee Training And Shoplifting

After the holidays, you probably have a whole array of chores you must do to decide whether you had a good or bad year.  The holidays are behind us, and if you seem eager to have new strategies to put in place, it is not uncommon, and you are not alone.  New year resolutions are abundant during this time of year, and even though many of them are related to exercise, eating and health issues, yours can be directed completely to the business side of your life.

For a retail business owner, employee training is always an important issue they should not neglect.  There are many aspects of every business that owners must take care of to ensure a well-run business and employee training is one of those important issues they must keep in mind.

Employee training has been shown to help businesses keep more of the profits, and to reduce the shoplifting happening at their stores.  Paying for employee training is one way of investing in your business, and seeing the return of investment right away.

One of the many benefits of employee training is the certainty your employees will know what to do in case a shoplifting incident occurs.  From the way they approach the suspected shoplifter, to the way they apprehend them, their training can be the difference between a lawsuit for your store or not.  The guidelines they are supposed to follow are clear for trained employees when dealing with a difficult situation, and a dangerous situation is clearly assessed and dealt with before lives are endangered.

Employee training can also be a deterrent to shoplifters.  Shoplifters will be less eager to enter your place of business if they know they will be approached and even questioned or apprehended if they do something illegal.  Making your business a place where shoplifting is hard can get around to other shoplifters.  Sharing the names of “easy” places to shoplift is well known among them, make yours the “hard” place shoplifters are unwilling to try.

Trained employees know how shoplifters behave and how they try to get away with stolen merchandise.  They know which items may be a target for shoplifters, and which ones if the opportunity presents itself will be stolen without a second thought.


 

 

Fighting Shoplifting Locally

Across the United States, local governments are passing legislature to combat and punish shoplifting and employee theft.  The harsher sentences are supposed to deter the shoplifter while sending the message of severe persecution if caught shoplifting.  Now, small business owners are taking a new initiative.  They are uniting to fight retail theft, and being able to provide information about shoplifters and shoplifting among retailers in the area.In some areas, the increase of shoplifting is hitting businesses hard and according to them “We are fed up.”

For more about this and other topics, follow the links below.


East Coast supermarket chain finds talent in former drug dealers

PHILADELPHIA

When Jeffrey Brown looks to promote employees within his 13-store supermarket chain, he looks for people with hustle, ability, commitment, all that.

There’s another unlikely attribute that has turned out to be a predictor of success at Brown’s ShopRite and Fresh Grocer stores.

Drug dealing.

“What we realized is that a lot of the people we hired were in the drug trade,” said Brown, founder and chief executive of Brown’s Super Stores Inc. “We were surprised that some of the people we hired have fairly good business skills. The drug trade is a business. It’s an illegal business. You are buying. You are selling. You have inventory. You have some of the common problems that any retailer has. A lot of them are accelerating into management.”

That’s the kind of human capital insight that Brown would never have imagined in 2008, when, at the urging of an outspoken customer, he decided to make it his company’s mission to hire people coming out of prison.


Research Findings from Employee Theft Articles

Peer-reviewed employee theft articles can stimulate discussion and reassessment of policies among LP professionals.

As many of you know, I have been researching employee theft, occupational crime, employee dishonesty, and workplace deviance for more than 30 years. I peruse scholarly journals and academic publications regularly for relevant research studies that can help us all better understand this phenomenon. This column features a couple of employee theft articles that may shed some light on this continuing problem. I have included the full citations so you can find these publications online or in your local library to read and share with your staff. If you do not have direct access to a major research library, try using Google Scholar.

“Workplace Theft: An Analysis of Student-Employee Offenders and Job Attributes”

The first of the two employee theft articles is authored by Elizabeth Ehrhardt Mustaine (University of Central Florida) and Richard Tewksbury (University of Louisville) and published in the American Journal of Criminal Justice 27:1 (pages 111 – 127, 2002). This employee theft study surveyed a large population of college students attending a number of major universities. Since existing research suggests that many dishonest employees are younger, part-time, untenured, and dissatisfied, these two researchers concluded that college students would make an ideal sample of employees to survey about their occupational criminal behavior.


Technology And Shoplifting

Shoplifting affects everyone. As shoplifting and employee theft seem to be an unstoppable problem for the retail industry, researchers try to find different methods to prevent and combat shoplifting.  Law makers across the country try to pass laws to deter shoplifters by imposing harsher sentences. Technology has for many years now helped loss prevention personnel catch shoplifters, and prevent bigger loses for stores.  But as technology has improved, shoplifters ways have changed to account for the technology being used to catch them.  As the technology evolves, so does the shoplifter. Are you keeping abreast of the problem? Keep reading by clicking the links below.


Why hasn’t security technology put an end to shoplifting?

As the UK crime rate falls, there is one crime that is on the rise. Recent figures show that shoplifting has consistently grown by an annual 6% against a wider backdrop of reduced crime. This statistic is surprising considering the vast amount of time, money and effort that goes into developing anti-shoplifting technology. So why isn’t it working?

How does anti-shoplifting technology work?

The vast majority of retail stores are equipped with several high tech security measures. CCTV cameras are the most common. According to the College of Policing, CCTV is more effective as a method of gaining evidence to catch and convict a criminal than as a deterrent.

Many security camera providers provide monitoring services to ensure footage is captured and analysed as efficiently as possible. However, surveillance systems require careful planning; Banham Group, security experts with more than 90 years’ industry experience, advise that CCTV installation must include guidance, particularly on data protection laws and system legalities.


Through the Eyes of a Shoplifter

In the June 1968 issue of the magazine, then-managing editor John J. Sullivan tried his hand at shoplifting from a few independent stores, just to see how easy it was to get merchandise past the sales register.

He didn’t have much trouble. With prior permission from the owners, he hit six stores in and around one city in one weekend, for a total of almost $250 worth of merchandise in about an hour—more than $1,700 today. Then-editor Bob Vereen got in on the experiment too, taking nearly $25 worth of merchandise in about 10 minutes from one store.

The point wasn’t, of course, to steal product from hardworking, honest hardware retailers. It was to show how easy it was to do so.

For a quick checklist you can share with your employees to make sure everyone is working to improve store security, click here to download our Loss Prevention Checklist.


Not all businesses on board with new shoplifting proposal

QUINCY, Ill. (WGEM) –

A new proposal by the Illinois State Commission on Criminal Justice and Sentencing Reform has been met with multiple opponents.

Right now, any theft valuing over $300 will land you a felony charge in Illinois. An Illinois criminal justice reform group has asked lawmakers to raise that thievery threshold to $2,000, in an attempt to combat prison overcrowding.

Executive Director Amy Looten of the Quincy Chamber of Commerce said on Monday that there are many reasons to oppose it.

“For every product that walks out the door, they’re not paying sales tax on that.” Looten said. “So our local government, our state government is not getting that income from the sales tax.”

Quincy Menard’s Assistant General Manager Scott Warner added on Monday that shoplifting affects many more people than just the person stealing.