Few Retailers Believe They Effectively Manage Their Workforce, Study Finds

Customer Centricity -- the retail strategy of focusing on customer service as a way to differentiate from competition -- is putting workforce management on the front line in the battle to improve customer service in stores. A new research report from RSR Research finds that while retailers strongly believe that employees are critical to their customer-centric strategies, few have deployed tools to help store managers hire, retain or manage their workforce.

On the one hand, they say that employees are critical to their customer service strategies, and have become even more so over the last three years. On the other hand, they continue to under-invest in the tools that could help turn front-line employees into real assets to the business.

Denver, CO (PRWEB) November 6, 2007 -- According to a new RSR Research report, The State of Retail Workforce Management, released today, retailers strongly believe that employees are critical to their customer-centric strategies, but few have confidence in their ability to effectively manage their workforce.

"Retailers exhibit highly conflicting behavior when it comes to their workforce," said Nikki Baird, Managing Director of RSR and author of the report. "On the one hand, they say that employees are critical to their customer service strategies, and have become even more so over the last three years. On the other hand, they continue to under-invest in the tools that could help turn front-line employees into real assets to the business."

RSR's new publication, The State of Retail Workforce Management, identifies specialization of the workforce as a major strategy that retailers are pursuing to enable higher levels of customer service. By providing more specialized service, retailers look to address increasing customer power in the face of the overwhelming amount of product and competitive information that consumers have access to as they shop.

"Does this mean that we'll all have great shopping experiences this holiday season? Unfortunately, no," Baird commented. "To date, customer-centric strategies have primarily been focused on creating a store assortment that is tailored to the demographics of a store's customers. Before frontline employees can be an effective part of these strategies, retailers need to move away from treating their workforce as a tool of customer service and more as an asset that, when invested in and managed well, responds in kind -- happy employees that make for happy customers."

According to the report, larger retailers (those with more than 10,000 employees) are leading the charge in transforming workforce management from the purely tactical activity of scheduling and time and attendance, into a strategic weapon in the battle for customers through plans to deploy labor analytics and sales and labor budgeting, alongside recruiting tools and performance management workflows.

To obtain a complimentary copy of the report, click here or follow this link:
http://www.retailsystemsresearch.com/_document/summary/346

About Retail Systems Research
Retail Systems Research ("RSR") is the only research company run by retailers for the retail industry. RSR provides insight into business and technology challenges facing the extended retail industry, and thought leadership and advice on navigating these challenges for specific companies and the industry at large. To learn more about RSR, visit www.rsrresearch.com">www.rsrresearch.com.

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