Can a single TikTok cause concern to the labour market? That’s what happened in July when Zaid Khan shared his thoughts on work in a 17-second video. In the clip, Khan introduced the term quiet quitting to a broader (and predominantly younger) audience as continuing to perform your duties but not treating a job like your whole life.
In the aftermath, the term went viral and brought the debate on work-life balance to social media – with force. Within a week, 2.6 million people watched the video in question. As of September, #QuietQuitting racked up over 17 million views on the platform.
Considering the number of people who picked up the topic – both regular Joes and experts – a question must be posed. Is quiet quitting just a trend, or is it a long-time coming result of the hustle culture?
A Passive Way of Getting Fired or an Active Call for a Change?
Jumping on the trend train, Joshua Fluke, a YouTuber known for work-related content, posted his commentary reaction to a video talking about quiet quitting. The video in question raised a point that quiet quitting comes with a critical risk — that of losing your job.
But that’s where the real conundrum takes the spotlight. Is quiet quitting about passively trying to get fired? In the grand scheme of things, that assumption would be missing the point entirely.
William Kahn, dubbed “the father of employee engagement”, was asked by Forbes to share his insights on the situation. His opinion points the reasons for quiet quitting in a different direction.
“If we’re ‘quiet quitting’, it isn’t so quiet if we’re posting it on TikTok. I see it not unlike a different version of workers taking back their own sense of autonomy and control over their work lives”.
The hustle culture is no more – particularly for younger generations.
Nowadays, people value other aspects of work than the salary – mental health, career development, or time for life outside of work.
For many, going the extra mile, even for a larger paycheque, isn’t justified if it causes them to miss out on life and leads to burnout.
Quiet Burnout
Max (named changed) worked for a big IT corporation for over a year. During that time, he sacrificed free time to upgrade skills and competencies for a promise of promotion once his employee scores reached a certain level.
After a while, he reached the magical number. But instead of getting recognised, he was told that now he needed additional points to get promoted. Burned out and disgruntled, he slowly became increasingly disengaged and eventually left the company a few months later for a better opportunity.
Employees are human – with goals and limits. In many cases, striving for better career opportunities and putting in extra work can risk having a negative impact if it doesn’t lead to any sort of progress.
As mentioned by Joshua Fluke in the video, “People aren’t quitting the idea of going above and beyond itself. People are quitting the idea of going above and beyond for no more reward”.
Quiet quitting could simply be a long-time coming result of quiet burnout. Giving the best version of yourself for little to no return.
The most recent Gallup report seems to support the claim. In the survey, only 21% of the global workforce felt engaged at work. Even worse, 44% of the surveyed reported experiencing high-stress levels at work.
Perhaps that’s why ‘the trend’ became so popular – it hit home to many out there. People realised they’re not the only ones feeling like they sacrifice their well-being and personal lives. Sometimes in vain.
Steps Organisations Can Take to Avoid Quiet Quitting
Quiet quitting may disappear as suddenly as it appeared. But it may also stay here and influence more employees to take their well-being into their own hands. Regardless of the outcome, it complicates life for companies.
To avoid this happening within your organisation, employers need to take swift action.
Ensure recognition is not an empty slogan. Make sure to regularly reward team members for a job well-done – and not only monetarily
Introduce anonymous employee satisfaction surveys to identify potential issues early on
Implement exit interviews or exit employee surveys to better understand the reasons for leaving your company
Allow flexible work schedules and mental health days to mitigate burnout
Will that be enough? Perhaps not, but it’s a good start considering what’s at stake. Mark Royal, senior director for Korn Ferry Advisory, says: “Organisations are dependent on employees doing more than a minimum” – and he’s far from wrong.
If you’d like to benefit from an engaged and productive workforce going the extra mile for your vision, you need to offer something more than the minimum yourself.
A Message Not to Be Ignored
Quiet quitting is quiet for a reason. Workers are not walking out the door with a bang because they don’t necessarily want to walk out. It’s more about sending a message that a change needs to happen.
The takeaway point employers should note is to have eyes and ears open to potential causes of dissatisfaction among their teams. The first step? Ask your own employees for feedback so that you can plan measures specifically for your organisation.
“My life isn’t worth a dead-end job”, – said a 23-year-old retail worker quoted by Washington Post. For growing numbers, a dead-end job is synonymous with working in retail and one of the reasons why retail workers are quitting.
Fruitful employment is a give-and-take situation. Your staff members will do their best and stay with you if you’re an employer who demands – but also rewards.
Retail, however, is one of the industries where the imbalance of giving and taking is present, reflected by extremely high turnover rates.According to the latest data, the American retail and sales sector saw a 69.7% employee turnover rate.
Considering the number of employees who quit voluntarily, there’s a problem.
Retail jobs are, to a great extent, entry-level. For that reason, the earnings can also leave a lot to wish for. And although any salary is better than no salary, there is a point some of us start to ponder whether our current job is worth it.
For many, it’s not.
A retail worker, Aislinn Potts, told Washington Post – “It [the pandemic] was a really dismal time, and it made me realize this isn’t worth it”.
And she wasn’t the only one concluding that the workload and effort they put into the job isn’t worth the money. 29% of the US retail employees point to compensation as one of the top reasons for leaving.
Yet, offering a pay rise won’t fix the issue.
The Customer Is Always Right
Or so the saying goes. And although this approach is excellent for your business, it can be a real pain point and the reason why your retail workers are quitting.
Zipline’s 2022 report revealed that 64% of retail staff members had noticed customers being more confrontational or verbally aggressive since March 2020. Moreover, 41% of the surveyed claimed stress coming from dealing with customers had brought them to tears.
Retail employees are on the front lines. They’re the people who bring profit to your business but also the first ones to deal with customers’ behaviours. Sometimes, that’s the breaking point even for well-seasoned employees.
In the UK, one in five retail workers considers quitting their job, partially due to abuse from customers.
As a manager or a business owner, you should empower your employees to stand their ground. And if they can’t, they should know they can always turn to you or the present shift manager to handle to situation.
What should never happen, however, is letting your staff think they’re left alone and have to take all the heat because “the customer is always right”.
Working in Retail is Not the Only Thing in Your Employee’s Life
Working shifts is an almost guaranteed characteristic of the retail industry. By accepting the job, you agree to the conditions. But what you don’t agree to is scheduling issues.
Chaotic shift scheduling or regularly asking the staff to work overtime, perhaps due to understaffing, can contribute to stress and dissatisfaction on many levels. While many can cope with that for a while, sacrificing your social or family life and not being able to plan the future can turn into a breaking point. And a quitting point.
– 64% received a schedule with less than two weeks’ notice
– 57% experienced chaotic shift changes (e.g. with one day or less notice)
Adopting responsible scheduling should be your priority. A field experiment at Gap retail clothing stores showed that putting such practices in place benefited the brand with a 5.1% increase in productivity and 3.3% bigger store sales.
What about turnover? An FSG and Hart Research Associates polled hourly workers, and the findings are telling. 83% of them would be more likely to stay with their current employer if they had more control over their work schedules.
Retail Workers Are Quitting Because They’re Drained. Physically and Mentally
While we’d like to think that working in retail is simple and undemanding, the reality is far from true. Working shifts on your feet for long hours and being happy-go-lucky no matter what can drain anyone. Retail workers are no exception.
The Industry informs that 21% of the UK’s retail staff reports feeling so exhausted at the end of each working day that they can’t enjoy their time off.Zipline’s 2022 findings further support the data. Four in ten full-time retail associates reported their mental health had worsened in the past year.
The aftermath? Almost half (48%) of the polled said they considered quitting their job in the past 12 months.
Nobody can be a productive employee when their job prevents them from having a meaningful life. To avoid losing staff, improve employee satisfaction before they start eyeing the exit door. You can do that by having regular check-ups or offering paid mental health days.
Retail Workers Are Quitting Because…
They want a well-balanced work-life. To be paid adequately for the workload and efforts they put into their work. Get support from the managers and see that their mental health is considered important.
Simply put, they want employers to treat them as valuable individuals who, to a great extent, are responsible for your business’ success. Failing to provide the staff with the respect they deserve is (or will be) likely why your retail workers are quitting.
Bias can affect the questions you ask in interviews, the resumes you choose, and the final hiring decision. It all, however, starts withbias in job descriptions. Look at a sentence taken from a job ad for a Technical Consultant. Can you spot anything biased about it?
“You are: a digital native with in-depth knowledge of Product Lifecycle Management systems.”
If you noticed the problematic area, great job! If you didn’t, no worries. At first glance, there’s nothing wrong with it. It clearly states whom the company is looking for. When analysed closely, though, it’s an example of subtle age bias, as we’ll explain later.
Bias Isn’t Always Obvious
The problem with bias in job descriptions lies in the language. More precisely, the language that, on the surface, is just fine. After all, you used gender-neutral pronouns and now look for a Chairperson rather than a Chairman. Sounds inclusive, right?
Unfortunately, some words used in job postings, even the innocent-looking ones, play into the unconscious biases of candidates and impact who sends an application. Or doesn’t.
Now, you may think that using gender-neutral pronouns and avoiding derogatory terms is enough. But bias in job descriptions can often be less obvious.
Hidden Age Bias in Job Descriptions & Losing Talent
Writing inclusive job descriptions and reaching your recruiting goals go together – whether you want to build a diverse team, or simply give yourself a chance to find an exceptional candidate. Paying attention to the language you use is therefore crucial, as it impacts who can picture themselves as a part of your team – whether a recent grad or an experienced candidate.
Particular wording may alienate people from different age groups and make them feel like they’re not what you’re looking for. A good job posting should use language appealing to a broad candidate pool to maximise the chances of objectively finding the right talent regardless of age. And you can’t do that if your job description subconsciously targets a specific age group.
Are You Subconsciously Deterring Groups of Candidates?
Nowadays, it’d be quite a challenge to find a job posting stating overtly that a company is looking for candidates of a certain age. However, such a preference is often nuanced. Let’s look at examples taken from real job postings and analyse how they might limit your talent pool to candidates from specific age groups.
A 40-year-old digital native?
Let’s go back to the example from the beginning of the post. A “digital native” is now a popular term and tends to pop up in job descriptions. In fact, just in July of 2019, the phrase appeared in 378 LinkedIn postings across the US. Although it looks innocent, its connotation is age biased. Whom do you think about when you hear that term? A 40-year-old? It’s probably not the first image that comes to your mind.
One generation specifically is referred to as “digital natives”, – and it’s Gen Z, who are currently between 9 and 24 years old. So, by stating you are looking for a “digital native”, you’re signalling that your preferred candidate is a young adult.
Yes, it can’t be argued that Gen Zers are more apt digitally. Many of them grew up in a highly digital world. That being said, you shouldn’t disqualify candidates based on their age, as they can be equally digitally proficient. And we’re not talking only about Jeff Besos or Bill Gates.
A candidate with mad skillz needed
The narrative is similar when your job description references mad skillz or bringing the hustle. Sounds hip, right? That’s the issue exactly. It sounds so hip that candidates of older ages may feel like they won’t fit into your company’s culture, as noted by Kieran Snyder from Textio during her talk for Harvard Business School.
“Well…maybe I’d apply for this job, but there’s something in the language that tells me I might not fit in at that company. I’m a 42-year-old woman; I do have mad skills, and I do bring the hustle, but I might not express it that way.”
Language evolves constantly, and there’s nothing inherently wrong with going with the flow. However, you should remember that using words and phrases that resonate with younger people might be a sign for someone from another age group that… they’re too old for you.
Ninjas, wizards & rockstars
Remember when a while back, there was a worrying increase in companies looking to hire ninjas, gurus, and rockstars? Although the trend has slowed down, it’s not gone with the wind. According to Resume.io research, just two years ago, these terms still appeared in a number of job ads:
For example, 80.3% of Gen Zers wouldn’t apply for a “guru” job, followed by 74.9% of Millennials. Interestingly, you’d get the best chance at attracting candidates aged 35-44 – as 26.7% would apply.
Apparently, most people don’t want to be the next guru. And based on the data, using fun job titles doesn’t convince people from various age groups to apply for your job – minimising your talent reach.
Age bias in job descriptions can also deter older candidates
Although many examples of hidden age bias in job descriptions lean towards attracting younger candidates, it can also work the other way around. If your job description mentions an experienced or well-seasoned candidate profile, you’ll likely lose recent graduates.
By the same token, a job description containing jargon will have a similar effect. A Monster survey from 2012 noted that 57% of respondents would feel put off by a job description including jargon. So much so that they wouldn’t apply.
Not surprisingly so. Reading about leverage, bottlenecks or unicorns will leave younger job seekers confused and feeling they’re not the ones you’re talking to. Not only does it slow down your diversity goals, but it may also make you miss out on great rising talent.
Can Anything Be Done to Avoid Age Bias in Job Descriptions?
The task you’re up to is not easy. Unconscious bias is called just that for a reason – more often than not, we simply don’t notice it. The first step in dealing with the issue is to acknowledge that, yes, age bias can sneak into job descriptions written by the best of us.
Being mindful about the language you use will certainly help. However, it’s challenging to know which words are problematic. After all, how many recruiters are also linguists?
Luckily, companies can now use software designed with one main goal in mind – making people aware of the areas where language introduces bias.
Turn to software for guidance
With the advancement of bias awareness, we’re seeing an increase in companies creating software that can help anyone and everyone pay attention to how they write job descriptions (or anything else for that matter).
Companies such as Textio (the US) or Develop Diverse (Europe) give your teams access to extensive language data highlighting areas that introduce wording and phrases sparking bias of all sorts. That way, your employees can pause and decide whether they want to keep a potentially harmful section – or change it to suggested wording instead.
Following language patterns and data insights, you can optimise the language you use to maximise the audience you reach.
The goal of every company is to amass a talent pool of competent candidates. Some employers prefer that pool to be as big as possible, and some like to attract only the best talent. But no employer wishes to discourage great talent from applying in the first place.
The choice is yours; whether you opt for using the aid of data-based software or educate yourself and your employees to be more mindful. Either way – removing age bias from job descriptions will benefit your bottom line.
Hiring sales associates, at first glance, shouldn’t be a big problem for the retail sector. Because of the nature of the job – primarily entry-level positions – the lack of candidates generally doesn’t give recruiters sleepless nights. As reported by Career Plug, in 2021, there were 60 applicants per job opening.
Thus, finding at least one suitable candidate would seem more than feasible.
And yet, the retail industry turnover rates are on the top of the list – with just about 60%, according to the National Retail Federation (US). To put it in perspective, the average turnover across all US industries hovers around 19%.
So, why is it that recruiters choose, at least seemingly, the best candidate, and yet the sector is plagued with hires that turn out to be unsatisfactory?
Why Is Hiring Sales Associates Important for the Business?
A sales associate is the point of contact between customers and a company. By being in direct contact with your clientele, they have the power to help you thrive and improve sales. In other words, they’re the face of your business.
In a nutshell, they play an essential role in shaping the customer experience daily. Hiring sales associates who can deliver on their duties excellently can make or break your business.
Who Can Be a Good Sales Associate?
Like any other retail employee, a successful sales associate should have a solid set of hard and soft skills. If you’d like to read in detail about soft skills desired in retail, feel free to check out one of our previous blog posts. As a quick reminder, such skills include:
customer-focused mindset
team player personality
good stress management ability
multitasking & prioritising
decision-making & taking initiative
Paying close attention to soft skills is beneficial on many levels. For starters, it broadens your talent pool, as soft skills arehighly transferable. Moreover, there’s a clear indication from HR professionals that they are, in fact, one of the ultimate reasons why hires fail – as admitted by 89% of the surveyed.
But soft skills, even if visibly crucial, aren’t the only guarantee of a candidate’s success. Sales associates also need to possess technical skills specific to the industry. Let’s look at what these skills include.
Product knowledge – having a vast, detailed knowledge of the products you offer to build a trustworthy relationship with customers.
Merchandise display – knowing how to display goods to attract customers and drive profits effectively.
Salesman talk – being able to actively sell goods by walking customers through the stages of the sale in a knowledgeable, non-aggressive fashion.
POS (Point of Sale) systems – understanding how to use hardware and software devices such as cash registers, scanning devices, credit card machines, etc.
Industry expertise – being knowledgeable about the specifics of your industry. Selling baked goods, clothes, and mobile devices is all retail, but you won’t conduct business the same way.
Are you worried about finding a candidate who displays the whole range of these skills? Well, the good thing is that even someone without prior retail experience can be a great fit. As long as they have the competencies to learn the technical skills, that is.
That being said, testing for soft skills and personality fit may be a more efficient option in the long run. After all, more people have the right competencies to learn fast than those with both sets of skills.
Which Assessment is Best for Hiring Sales Associates?
Did you know that 30% of the UK retail leaders struggle to find the right candidates? Many retailers globally share the same problem.
Although eliminating that problem is a complex process, the pain can be alleviated by changing your recruitment style. Or, to be more accurate, equip the recruitment process with tools that identify candidates with the right profile.
The following section will walk you through three options you have.
That being said, they can tell us about a candidate’s affinity for a certain job. Whether a sales associate, a programmer, or a chef – their duties will differ and require specific behaviours.
Using a personality test can be an addition to your recruitment practices if you want to get an insight into a candidate’s personality traits and what drives their actions. Such a test can provide important information about one’s values, work preferences, and learning styles – factors essential to determining a cultural fit, for example.
But also, they’ll tell you more about how quickly someone will adapt to new tasks and handle the work environment.
A downside of personality tests is that they’re not easy to prepare. Nor to evaluate. Thus, they’re suitable when the market is good, and you can afford to take time with the hiring process.
Otherwise, opting for other solutions may be a more suitable choice.
2. Situational Judgment Test (SJT) – test candidate’s reactions to work-related scenarios accurately
SJT is one of these options. The test measures candidates’ responses to work-related scenarios they’ll most likely face on the job. Not every person will know how to behave when a disgruntled customer comes asking for a refund. Yet, it’s a competency a successful sales associate needs to have.
By asking your candidates to solve an SJT, you’ll be able to sieve through a talent pool and decide which responses align with the expectations of your branch and the business itself. To learn more about how such tests work, dive into a more detailed description of the whole process here.
To briefly highlight the benefits of SJTs:
They are customised to your company specifically, focusing on your goals, expectations, and challenges
You assess them automatically – saving time and allowing you to go through 350+ applications quicker
You’ll uncover a candidate’s motivation, decision-making, and many other soft skills
Does it sound like something your recruitment could use? Let us take you through the whole process and highlight how your business can benefit from SJTs when hiring sales associates.
3. Structured Interviews – but you’re asking the right questions!
Not ready to commit to software doing everything for you or don’t have time to prepare suitable personality tests? Here’s an option for you.
Just like resumes don’t predict a candidate’s future performance, interviews also won’t help. That is if the questions you ask are irrelevant. But you can structure your interviews and prepare behavioural questions to tease out specific answers based on prior experience.
For example, you could ask candidates the following:
Have you ever had a situation where a customer was dissatisfied with a product and demanded a refund? What did you do?
Tell me about a time you solved a problem at work. What was it? What did you do?
Describe a time you provided excellent customer service.
Of course, behavioural questions are great when a candidate has had a chance to experience the situations you’re asking for. When talking to those without prior experience, you lose the point.
There are many unique talents you could overlook if you put too much weight on experience. People may have the competencies to solve work-related issues and act in a way a good sales associate should but never had a chance to do so.
Perhaps you can be the one to give them that chance?
Final Thoughts
Hiring sales associates, or should I say – the right ones, is critical to your business’ success. As seen by the industry turnover rates, however, the task is far from easy.
The bottom line is – one can acquire hard skills with hard work, dedication, and the right mindset. Soft skills, on the other hand, are needed to make the learning process possible and efficient.
Most employers in the restaurant industry (51%) name recruiting restaurant staff as a top challenge. If finding employees wasn’t troublesome enough, retaining staff is also a huge problem. Already in 2019, turnover in the restaurant industry was reported at a staggering 75%.
Then, following the pandemic, the situation turned from bad to worse. Between February 2020-2021, the industry took the hardest blow – nearly 3.5 million jobs in America alone became vacant.
Currently, the world is slowly recovering, and consumers are returning to restaurants. Employers’ struggles, however, didn’t end. With so many leaving jobs or being forced to do so, finding new employees seems more challenging than ever.
But can restaurant owners do anything to find competent workers and stay afloat in the business while people are less keen on taking the jobs in such a volatile industry?
Recruiting Restaurant Staff – What Works?
Effective recruitment is a two-way street. You find qualified candidates, and they find a job that satisfies them. Unfortunately, for instance, in France, 90% of the businesses in the sector admit they often lack the time or resources to recruit effectively.
But recruiting restaurant staff – or any staff at that – doesn’t need to be a never-ending struggle.
Now, let’s move on to how employers can improve efforts when recruiting restaurant staff – to speed up the process, find better quality candidates, and maximise the chances of retaining them for longer.
#1. Experience Requirements? How about assessing for soft skills instead?
Prior experience, on the surface, seems like a good asset. If a candidate worked in a similar business in the past, they’d know how to do their job for you, right? As it turns out, it’s not necessarily the case. Research proves that there’s no correlationbetween prior work experience (or education) and one’s future performance.
So, what else can give you a better insight into which candidate can be successful? Soft skills – as agreed by 92% of talent professionals who think they matter as much or more than hard skills.
To efficiently assess one’s competencies, however, you’ll need to move away from CVs and adopt tools that uncover soft skills such as decision-making, attitude, or understanding of how to deal with customers.
Situational Judgment Tests (SJT) give you that option. SJTs are accessed automatically, allowing you to efficiently screen even 350+ applicants. You’ll be able to measure an applicant’s fit for the role based on how well they respond to real-life scenarios reflecting situations they’d face on the job. Moreover, you’ll save as much as 30% of the time you’d typically spend on screening.
#2. Recruit restaurant staff through referrals
Restaurants are local businesses. Thus, your candidate pool will almost certainly consist of locals and people living in the vicinity. For many companies, hiring people from all over the world is a huge advantage. That won’t work because of the nature of your business. But you can still rely on referrals – one of your strongest advantages.
Employee referral programs have long been one of the best recruiting strategies, and for a good reason. 82% of employers say that referrals generate the best ROI, but there are even more benefits:
Working shifts is not for everybody. It can be physically straining and collide with your personal life. Particularly younger generations feel strongly about maintaining a healthy work-life balance. 33% of Gen Z-ers, for example, wouldn’t accept a job offer if they had no say over their schedule.
Although allowing schedule flexibility can be challenging with full-time employees, at least offer that for part-time workers.
When I was looking for a side-gig that’d let me focus on my other job at the same time, being able to work only in the afternoons was a significant factor. Most businesses didn’t allow that – only one was happy to accommodate my needs. The result? I stayed at the company for a long time and still recommend the place.
#4. Present the role accurately
Working in the restaurant sector is demanding. Sometimes even more than a candidate realises. A lack of understanding of what the job entails is one of the reasons for new hires to walk away even three months after being hired. In this recent survey, over 70% of job seekers said they felt surprised about the role as it differed from what they’d been led to believe.
Don’t sugarcoat the position in your job ad. If your restaurant is a busy place and has specific challenges, make it known upfront. Even if the truth deters some candidates, it’s much more profitable for you in the long run. Not only will you get motivated candidates in your funnel, but you’ll also prevent costly mis-hires.
#5. Competitive benefits will help you stand out
In the American restaurant industry, the situation is troubling. According to a survey, as many as 89% of restaurant employees state that their employer doesn’t provide them with health insurance.
In Europe, insurance is seldom an issue. That’s why it’s also not seen as a benefit per se. Thus, offer your employees attractive benefits to stand out in the market and make recruiting restaurant staff easier.
The trick is that these benefits don’t even need to be extraordinary. All you need to do is go the extra mile and show (potential) employees that you care about them.
Sometimes the ideas can be simple. Your business is in the food sector. Providing workers with beverages and a full-meal lunch for a small fee (like in the case of our Norwegian friend – Baker Hansen) should be on the top of the list if you’re still not offering it.
If your budget allows, think about a gym allowance, a stipend for commuting to work, or a possibility of upgrading to private healthcare. The options are plentiful! See what your competition offers and up that – even just a little bit. Applicants will surely take notice.
Recruiting Restaurant Staff Doesn’t Need to Be a Struggle
The restaurant industry is highly competitive. In 2018, the number of food service businesses in the EU was estimated at 890,000. All sharing at least one struggle – finding qualified staff.
Luckily, recruiting restaurant staff doesn’t need to be every employer’s constant headache. A few tweaks in your strategy – or trying alternative methods altogether – can positively impact your efforts. Save your resources and improve the quality of your hires – we can help get you through the process.
The average turnover in retail is slightly above 60%
92% of HR professionals say that soft skills matter as much or more than hard skills
89% point to lack of the right soft skills as the reason for bad hires
The retail sector is usually one of these that struggle with having too many applicants rather than too few. Now, however, the industry is still experiencing a post-pandemic labour shortage. In the US alone, the number of open positions is estimated at 956,000.
To make things worse, identifying skills retail employees should have to succeed on the job is more problematic than it seems, as portrayed by the overall turnover in the industry of over 60%.
Is a lack of interest in retail jobs the sole reason for the labour shortage? Or perhaps a lack of focus on the right skills exacerbates recruiters’ struggles? Let’s look at the top 5 skills retail employees should have to be a good fit and how your business can assess them effectively.
What Skills Retail Employees Should Have?
The necessary skills for being a successful retail employee often differ slightly depending on which retail branch you’re in. Nonetheless, 92% of talent professionals agree that soft skills are equally or more important than hard skills.
Interacting with customers can easily be considered one of the most challenging aspects of working in retail. At the same time, finding a customer-service-minded employee is essential.
Ultimately, if your staff isn’t good at selling your products and creating excellent customer relationships, your business won’t stay afloat for long.
In fact, 58% of customers globally admitted to having stopped doing business with a company due to a poor customer service experience.
Can resumés tell you whether your candidate would be good at delivering the best service to your clientele? Unfortunately, no. But there are better assessment methods that allow you to evaluate this soft skill and many others. We’ll get to that in a minute!
#2. Team player
Teamwork lies at the heart of the retail sector. Whether your business sells clothes, food, or hardware materials, your employees must know how to cooperate with other staff members.
An effective team needs all members to work with the same goal in mind and understand each other’s responsibilities. On that note, not everyone is good at working in a group. Your recruiters need tools that allow them to identify a team player as early in the process as possible.
#3. Stress management
In a fast-paced environment of working in retail, being able to cope with stress is one of those soft skills that should be high on your ‘requirements’ list. Whether struggling to meet sales targets, being understaffed on a busy day, or simply having to deal with a demanding customer – your perfect candidate needs to be resilient to pressure.
#4. Multitasking & prioritising
Retail is perhaps one of the best examples of a fast-paced environment where employees must handle several tasks simultaneously. Helping a customer while restocking shelves or answering questions while making coffee – both are far from an unlikely daily occurrence. It’s thus imperative that candidates you decide to hire can cope with the workload and prioritise tasks effectively.
#5. Decision-making & taking the initiative
Connected to multitasking is a solid skill of making decisions – and making them on your own. A successful retail employee must be ready to always be on top of things and make quick, firm decisions, very often on the spot.
Having a worker who needs to be reminded about their tasks or constantly guided about what to do is a big no-no for any business. At the end of the day, employers want an independent staff, and it’s essential that you find candidates who will deliver.
How to Assess Candidates for These Skills?
Now that you know what soft skills retail employees should have to prove beneficial to your team, you also need a good strategy for assessing them.
If your recruitment relies heavily on resumé screening, you might find yourself in a pickle. As mentioned briefly, resumés generally don’t give you much insight into one’s soft skills as they focus on different facets. After all, can you really check if someone is good at managing stress or prioritising tasks by looking at their CV?
Indeed, one’s past can shed some light. However, just because someone worked in retail for two years doesn’t necessarily mean they excelled (perhaps the employer didn’t have better options?).
Therefore, you need a more fool proof method that speeds up your screening process and allows you to assess the hard-to-assess soft skills. The solution? Situational Judgment Tests.
What is a Situational Judgment Test (SJT)?
SJT is a multiple-choice test compiling scenarios an employee would commonly face on the job. The form of the test depends on your needs. However, as a general principle, there are no right or wrong answers – the responses are weighed based on what you consider essential and appropriate in your business.
The purpose of SJTs is to evaluate candidates’ soft skills and non-academic competencies. They help uncover one’s motivation and how one would respond in daily work situations.
How does it work?
Stage 1: Candidates complete a multiple-choice test with hypothetical work-related scenarios.
Stage 2: The tests are then automatically assessed based on the criteria set by you with our help.
Stage 3: Based on the results, you get a solid overview of all candidates’ soft skills, and thus you can make a well-informed hiring decision.
How does it improve your recruitment?
Customised content – all SJTs are customised to your organisation and the position
Digital process – SJTs are developed, distributed, and evaluated digitally
Assessing the right skills – SJTs uncover motivation, decision-making, and many other soft skills
Automated assessment – all tests are automatically evaluated based on the criteria
Faster & well-informed hiring decisions – you get to quickly assess the right skills from a large candidate pool of as many as 350+ applications
The Right Method to Find the Right Retail Employee
Employees and their preparedness for the job are the foundation your business stands on. To ensure that this foundation is solid, you need a method that helps you identify individuals with the right set of crucial soft skills.
You decide to take a step forward – we help with the rest.
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