retail skills training

From the retail store floor to the corporate office, leaders, managers, team leads, and supervisors are adapting their strategies and focusing on enhancing their retail leadership skills as the pandemic wears on. We recently reconvened our virtual Retail & Service Leadership Exchange Forum (RSLEF) to check in with some of the top retailers in North…

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Retailers are used to upheaval and constant change. Over the past decade alone, the “retail apocalypse” has dominated the news as traditional brick-and-mortar retailers have scrambled to adapt to the competitive threat of digital disruptors and changing consumer preferences. By the end of 2019, savvy retail businesses were gaining traction in their strategies with a…

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Stress, change, and uncertainty hit retailers hard when the coronavirus pandemic upended all semblance of normal or “business as usual.” While the pandemic was an extreme example, change is an everyday reality in retail. And one of the things we know from our work using the DiSC® Profile is that, at an individual level, it…

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There’s one thing you can count on in retail: If it’s not one thing, it’s another. And that means change and new challenges are never far away. With news about coronavirus dominating the headlines, concern over the spread continues to rise. We know the health and safety of your employees and customers is the number…

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retail trends

Another year is drawing to a close, and as is usual in retail, whew, what a year! Change is always part of the retail story, but with change can come some exciting new opportunities—if you’re prepared to seize them. The evolution of brick and mortar continues, as both traditional retailers and formerly online-only retailers experiment…

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frictionless retail

More than 100 million products were purchased on Amazon Prime Day in 2019. So is it official? Is brick & mortar dead? Not hardly. During the 2018 holiday season, for example, shoppers spent twice as much in physical stores as they did on Amazon, and 93% of them went to a physical store. Looking ahead…

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Whenever there’s a tough labor market, like there is now, the spotlight returns to recruiting and interviewing skills. But retailers need to do a better job of developing a mindset of recruiting as a continual process, not an isolated event. Smart managers are building recruiting networks to find and attract the talent they need to meet…

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retail manager skills

We’re often asked what key skills and behaviors store managers, district leaders, and other retail leaders need to succeed in today’s challenging retail environment. While the retail world continues to go through disruption and upheaval, we’ve seen through our continuing research over the years that there are a few core, foundational attributes that are consistently…

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customer experience

The National Retail Federation’s Big Show is upon us, and once again, the digital transformation of retail is front and center: Topics like the latest disruptive technologies, artificial intelligence, and innovative apps and new ecommerce developments abound. At the same time, we know that tech, on its own, isn’t the cure-all for retail’s latest disruptive…

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In the scheduled breaks during our retail training programs, you’ll likely find participants rushing to their phones. Sounds like most training sessions, right? The difference is, they’re not just catching up on messages and emails; they’re often busy putting the concepts and learnings from the class to work, right then and there. Enthusiasm is always…

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