Fighting Shoplifting In Your Store

Prevention is one of the most important aspects of  loss prevention.  Trained personnel with the ability to respond effectively when a crisis arises, can save lives and money to the retail store. CCTV while providing a great help to loss prevention personnel, and being used by most retailers, is often viewed as dated technology that even when used is not used properly.  Trained personnel on the floor can be a powerful prevention “tool” for the loss prevention team, while providing a deterrent to the possible shoplifter entering your store.

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

LP101: Commitment to Loss Prevention Training & Development

As contradictory as it might sound, the stability of our loss prevention program is largely dependent on our ability to react and respond to change; and that begins with our people. The evolution of a successful and productive team is an ongoing process. Every member of our team has both personal and professional objectives and agendas, all of which will impact their approaches, their performance, their outlook and their potential.

Most managers understand the importance of getting the right players on their team, and putting those players in the right roles. We attempt to hire talented individuals, place them in positions where we feel they can be most successful, and provide them with the appropriate loss prevention training to meet the needs and expectations of the job.

Establishing and maintaining the expertise necessary to perform our required function demands that we develop the knowledge, skills, proficiencies and abilities of our team. Strong loss prevention training practices help build success. We train to cover the bases—the rules and guidelines, the fundamental competencies of the job, the essential ground rules that help to make people better at the position that they are in.

IN LOSS PREVENTION, DATA — AND YOUR GUT — IS KEY FOR DECISION MAKING

Have you ever experienced a nagging feeling before you’re about to finally make a big decision? You’ve weighed all the data, you’ve considered every angle, but something is keeping you from moving forward. Rather than ignore that nagging feeling and forge ahead, Shelley Row says we need to get to the bottom of it.

Row, an author and expert on executive decision-making, addressed a group of loss prevention professionals gathered for the NRF PROTECT Loss Prevention Conference and Expo — a group that faces difficult decisions on a daily basis, be it combating shrink, performing interrogations, investigating organized retail crime rings or responding to active shooter situations. In researching and interviewing executives about their decision-making process, Row related what she heard to neuroscience and the mechanics of how we use different parts of our brain to make different kinds of decisions.

Loss Prevention: Research Findings from Professor Martin Gill

I recently led a study looking at the future of loss prevention.

Supported by Marks and Spencer but involving representatives from loss prevention in leading retailers, the study posed questions on the scope of loss prevention work; how budgets are set and influenced and how expenditure and on going work is justified; and the perceived effectiveness of a different measures used to mitigate loss. A full copy of the report is available here.

What did the study find?

Sometimes technology is presented as an unqualified good, but this is to oversimplify the position. Sure, it offers real opportunities to better understand threats and therefore to improve the response.

But getting the right technology is tricky. There is a lot out there and determining what is best is one problem, and things change quickly; it can be difficult to keep up.

And offenders use technology too, and rather effectively, committing offences from afar. These people can be difficult to detect and even more difficult to prosecute.