Store Support Leadership
Leadership Skills Every Retail Store Support Leader Needs
When we’re partnering with clients on their strategic learning initiatives, the work typically initiates with the retail field organization, store leaders, and, most frequently, the multi-unit leaders — those district and regional managers who lead through others and from a distance, managing several retail store leaders and teams. After successful implementations and behavior changes start happening…
Read MoreThe Impact of Intentional Leadership in Retail: Learning to Flex with Style
Changing your personality is difficult. Changing your choices in how you communicate is not. It simply requires attention and intention when interacting with people, and not being so quick to make assumptions based on how you perceive a situation. Because sometimes your lens—your perception—is distorted, and that means it doesn’t always reflect reality. Your communication…
Read MoreFrom Burnout to Skill Deficits, A Retail Leadership Check-Up as the Pandemic Enters a New Phase
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…
Read MoreHow the DiSC Profile Can Help You Be a More Effective Retail Leader
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…
Read MoreRetail Leadership Hacks: Breaking it down and boosting results
We’ve been talking about “retail leadership hacks” with clients lately — those bite-sized nuggets of insight that can deliver a quick hit in terms of productivity, performance, and results. Sometimes a small change or genius little shortcut can make all the difference in the impact we make as leaders and in the results our teams…
Read MoreThe Essential Retail Leadership Skills for Worn-Out Multiunit Managers
“Do more with less.” Is there any more tired phrase? In retail, though, it is, without a doubt, the everyday reality. Retail multiunit managers are struggling to deal with effective execution in the stores, retention issues, labor shortages, pressures on payroll, online competition, and on and on. These issues are always present to some degree,…
Read MoreDon’t Ignore the Leadership Development Needs of Store Support Leaders
Retailers rarely question the value of spending time and money on developing leaders in their field organizations. Regionals, DMs, store managers, and even assistants in stores receive formal and informal development and resources to help them hone their leadership ability and skills. But when we conducted national research with a number of retailers, we found…
Read MoreReadying Your People for the Next Big Retail Shake-Up
From Amazon’s growing brick-and-mortar presence to the news that Michael Kors is planning to buy Versace, if there is any industry that’s experiencing shake-ups, it’s retail. Mergers and acquisitions. Right-sizing and restructuring to make a company more competitive. Relocating headquarters. Adapting to increased pressure on distribution centers. And on and on and on. They’re all part…
Read MoreHow to Maximize Retail Training’s Impact
When you send a district manager or retail store leader through a training program, it’s an investment—of time, money, and effort, not to mention the fact that they’re going to be away from their daily responsibilities. But it’s also an investment in the future of the business. It’s a down payment on the results and…
Read MoreRetail Store Support Leaders Face Unique Challenges
All leaders face a number of challenges that are simply common to the role of being a leader. But there are always some unique wrinkles faced by different leadership functions. The leaders and managers in the home office and distribution centers, for example, deal with some very different situations and issues than those who responsible for what’s happening…
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