Unlocking Success - Navigating Employee Training

In episode 12 of Retail Checks and Balances, Kevin Spencer delves into the dynamic world of training programs in the retail and hospitality industry. He highlights the strategies, challenges, and success stories that shape the training landscape of these crucial sectors. From evolving customer behaviors to conflict resolution, Kevin discusses how to build a strong foundation for your business through effective training.

Tune in for informative and inspiring insights that will help you grow your business and win in the bustling world of commerce and culinary delights. 

TIMESTAMPS

[00:03:00] Importance of Customer Service.

[00:07:11] Tracking Employee Performance.

[00:13:08] Training Programs and Technology.

[00:15:42] Building Relationships in Hospitality.

[00:21:10] Evolving Customer, Consumer Behaviors.

In this episode, Kevin Spencer suggests that incorporating real-life issues or problems that occur in customer service or conflicts between employees and customers can be instrumental in building a successful business. This highlights the need for training strategies to address these specific situations and equip employees with the skills and knowledge to handle them effectively.

Furthermore, Kevin emphasizes the importance of well-crafted training in enhancing employee performance, customer satisfaction, and overall business success. Despite acknowledging the high turnover rates in the retail and hospitality industries, he emphasizes the necessity of delivering a consistent experience to customers. This implies that training strategies should focus on equipping employees with the necessary skills to meet evolving customer expectations and behaviors.

QUOTES

• "The most important step of your first training program should be customer service. Customer service is important, and the incentive of employees going through that program."
• “Most of the time we try humor, of course. But the most important thing is to build your own standard. Build that standard so every time an employee walks in to your establishment, they go through this program before you expose them to the public.”
• “‘Let me see if I can make your experience great.’ You know, that's fundamentally a good approach. And we don't see that every day. But wouldn't we appreciate if somebody gave us a compliment without having to gain anything from it? And you would see, based on that, and I talked about customer loyalty before, customers will see that as a value to come to your store.”

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS

Kevin Spencer

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kspencer007/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevinspencer007/

WEBSITE

Rod Plus Solutions: https://rodplussolutions.com/

Transcript

Welcome to Retail Checks and Balances, a podcast that takes you behind the scenes of the bustling world of commerce and culinary delights to help you grow your business and win. Join us as we explore the fascinating stories, trends, and challenges that shape the retail and hospitality industry, from cozy corner cafes to sprawling shopping malls and everything in between. And now, here's your host, Kevin Spencer. 

Welcome, welcome again to another episode of Retail Checks and Balances, baby. Today, we're delving into the dynamic world of training programs in the retail and hospitality industry. Join us today as we explore the strategies, challenges, and success stories that shape the training landscape of these crucial sectors. Let's talk about the importance. Let's talk about why it is essential. We'll dive into the impact of well-crafted training on employee performance, customer satisfaction, and overall business success. You know, a lot of retailers, as well as restauranters, don't really focus on this because they believe that the turnover in this industry is too high to have these sort of programs. And yes, the turnover is high, but, however, you want to make sure you deliver standard, standard to your customers. a standard experience, whether they're shopping or they're having a meal at your restaurant. You know, each industry has its unique set of challenges. Let's navigate through this. Let's explore hurdles that these training programs face in retail and hospitality. As I said, whether it's the high turnover rates, adapting to technological advancements, or ensuring consistency across diverse teams, we'll uncover effective solutions to overcome these obstacles. For example, let's talk about, at first, you walk into a restaurant. What do you expect? The host is to give you an immaculate greeting, making you feel welcome, making you feel that they are there for you. You sit down at the table and that experience needs to keep going. You don't want to have to wait more than two, three minutes for somebody to come and greet you and say, how are you today? What are you having to drink? What are you having as an appetizer? You know. In the supermarket, the same. You walk in, sometimes you don't get somebody to greet you, but wouldn't it be important if somebody just looked at you and said, welcome to our X supermarket. If you need anything, please let us know. That's fundamental, I believe. You know, over the Christmas season, I walked into several chains. And there was only one. And I walked in, and they said, welcome. Merry Christmas. Have a great shopping experience. And that little thing made me say, you know what? every time I go back, every time I need something of this specific nature, I'm going to go to that store. And you know, I went to that store three times over the December month. And every time that I walked into the store, that standard, it can be from a cashier, it could be from even the security guard, who is not an employee of that establishment, but they roped him in. to providing that service. So, I think that's the most important step. The most important step of your first training program should be customer service. Customer service is important. And the incentive of employees going through that program, and it could be developed by yourself, you can hire a third-party company to help you with building that customer service program. And then you award your employees points, or even at the end of that program, giving them a paper certificate. It could be electronically, but they having achieved something based on being in that program is a wonderful feeling. I remember the first time I did a training program when I was back at IBM. I got a certificate and it was a great feeling because I worked for a global company and they gave me a certificate based on this program I did. And it gave me a sense of gratitude and I still have that certificate today in a folder. You know, we want to get ready to put ourselves in a position with leaders in that particular program. And we can be doing the same thing over and over. And then we need to evolve these programs and to even put in some sort of technology in there. You know, somebody walks into the store, their shop, they get an email receipt, Or you could even use that technology to even make the employee look at transactions they did. For example, follow me here for a minute. If a cashier or a server which is a goal of so many transactions. And I'm not talking about money, I'm talking about quantity. We can look at money as well, but quantity in the turnover, the amount of transactions they did. Let's say they did 100 transactions on their shift. We reward that employee saying, wow, you did 100 transactions on your shift. Congratulations. Here's a gift card. Whatever currency. And it can be a small amount. It doesn't have to be a large amount. And it could be based on transactions. You want your employees to help you push transaction size. You know, even at a supermarket, you want to be able to say, oh, do you see our special on this while they're checking out? Or impulse them right there where you have the impulse shelves. Oh, we have a special on this chocolate today. Or in a restaurant, we say, hey, you want to try our special today? Because that's the special that we make good matchings on. Try this special today. It's amazing. And tracking these types of performances would be a great impact on your revenue, on your customer service, your customer's experience. And this is not as simple as that. You need to train your employees how to read the situations, because not all customers are the same. Some people might not be in a good mood, You gotta find ways to bring them in a good mood. You know, most of the times we try humor, of course. But the most important thing is to build your own standard. Build that standard so every time an employee walks in to your establishment, they go through this program before you expose them to the public. And it can be very short, maybe a couple days before they actually go to the front end or go to the hostess or start serving people. One of the things I did in the past when I started in this industry is that I did the following. I went to one of my existing customers. Well, I took over from somebody else and I went to this existing customers that the company had. It was a hotel and I worked in that hotel for the day. I worked at the front. I just observed. Sorry, I shouldn't say work because I didn't get paid. But I observed how they greeted a customer at the front desk, how they checked out a customer at the front desk. I went to their groups department or sales department. How do they manage seminars? How do they manage meeting, events? How do they reach out to customers via their email threads? I then went to a supermarket chain. I went to see their operations from a head office perspective. Then I went to a store and looked at how they packed the shelves, how did they price the items on the shelves. How did they greet customers at the front end? Because I wanted to understand this industry to a point that when I go to visit any particular customer, I am able to talk their jargon, to talk their language, because that's the most important thing. I even went on to work in a restaurant. I already worked in a restaurant before. you know, in the back of the house. I could always remember cutting onions and learning how to hold a chef knife. I still remember that to this day. I actually remember that last night while I was chopping some onions to make dinner. By the way, I hate onions, but if it's crunched up small enough and I put it in a hot dog, that's the only way I eat it. But crazy, but true. But coming back to what I'm saying, you know, we got to make sure that we build these programs. and follow them through with each potential employee or each employee that has to master this particular standard when you engage them in your organization. And of course, the turnover is going to come, but every new person you get in. And if you reward or you show people that based on their training, they're going to be rewarded, then your turnover would not be as high. I've seen this with a couple of customers, their turnover is not as high. Because I walk into the store and I see the same people after years. And that is an important factor that we must consider. And of course, these training programs can, we can use technology, it can be delivered via some online platform that or university that I like to say you know this is our store's university platform you learn everything here and you let the employee keep going back to that platform and it could be something that they can use from their their mobile phone they can use it on their computer it could be anywhere that they are at any point in time And you'll be very surprised that some people may even do that on their own time if they are very committed to the organization and its success. Because the employee is supposed to seek the directors of the organization's interests. And if you give them the tools to do so, they will do so. And we can get deep in these cutting edge technologies that have been integrated into training programs. Virtual reality, augmented reality, and other technological solutions that are changing the game. And you can find a bunch of these all over the internet. And it's as simple as re-engaging, you know. You hear it all the time when telemarketers call you. I mean, most of the times we're probably hung up because we're not interested, right? But sometimes we listen based on how they approach you. I mean, I do that sometimes if they ask a specific question and they only greet you, hello, good morning. Can you spare just a minute for me? And by telling them you spare that minute, if they grab you within that minute, then it will go on further. But if they don't, then you hang up and say, I'm going to block this caller. But at the same time, you know, That particular training has to get the employee to the point that they must be passionate about what they deliver in terms of their job. And I'm talking about front-end, but we can talk about from the back-end perspective as well. People who do marketing, people who do accounts receivable, people who take orders from your corporate customers. Building that relationship brings it to a whole vast of opportunities that you would not believe. You know, some restaurants have corporate customers. They have our corporate account. And the boss tells, we have a corporate account at this restaurant. Go eat there, charge it. If it's a sales organization, they would take customers there because they want them to experience that great experience of dining in that restaurant to close that deal. So indirectly, you as a restauranteur are helping your customers close deals. And that's the beauty of this industry. You know, we can talk about supermarkets, we could talk about restaurants, they're two unique industries. They're branded together because sometimes, you know, from a retail perspective, you may have a restaurant inside of your supermarket. Some people do. Some people have somebody serving lunch, you know. But the most important thing we have to remember is balancing consistency and individuality. And follow me here. One challenge many training programs face is maintaining consistency across the brand while still allowing for individuality. And what do I mean by that? Let's discuss it as a strategy for striking the right balance and creating training programs that resonate with the employee on a personal level while aligning with the company's values. For example, one person might be within that standard training itself. Some people might evolve. They might evolve by bringing their own recipe into the training program, but still representing the core values of the training program. And what that is, more or less, is, for example, we're supposed to greet the customer. And I'm going back to my original example. Somebody walks in. You said, welcome to X store. I hope you have a fantastic experience. Oh, magnificent shoes. You just complimented somebody. walking into your store and make them feel good because let's say for example they bought that shoes or they might you know some of our wives or some of us as men we take probably half an hour to decide if we're gonna buy a piece of clothing especially shoes you know i have a bunch of shoes that's one of my hobbies all of a sudden but that's another story for another day But, I want you to focus on that, you know, somebody in the aisle. You're scanning and changing prices on the aisle in the supermarket. You see a customer looking, and they look puzzled. He said, can I help you? What are you looking for today? Let me see if I can make your experience great. You know, that's fundamentally a good approach. And we don't see that every day. But wouldn't we appreciate if somebody gave us a compliment without having to gain anything from it? And you would see, based on that, and I talked about customer loyalty before, customers will see that as a value to come to your store. Because they can say, the staff at that store is so helpful. And the future of building these training programs in the Retinal Hospitality Industry is huge. You can go anywhere you want with it. You know, you can say you're a gold star in this particular program because you achieved 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 programs within our company and it doesn't have to be something specific to your job it could be something separate to your job and once employers see that you are trying to get on board that's how you move up and that's a measuring stick for you as the restauranteur as the business owner of the retail establishment or even a hotel you would see that this person took this amount of time and taste these particular topics or subjects. And that is fundamentally what you need. And then your HR and people can evaluate these employees based on taking those metrics and saying, all right, this employee has been here for three years and he's accomplished these different programs. Let's promote him based on the fact that he is committed to this organization. Good for thought, right? And of course, you know, as we wrap up here, let's pay into that crystal ball and discuss any future programs in these industries. What trends can you expect? How will evolving customer, consumer behaviors impact training strategies? And that's important. Using real-life issues or problems that would have occurred, whether it's a customer service issue, whether it's a conflict between two employees, whether it's a conflict between an employee and a customer, These are fundamental to help you build your business. And you know, that's it for today. You know, we really took a small dive into this, but I'm sure you can go to the experts in those particular programs and help you push forward into the future. I hope you found this episode informative as well as inspiring. As always, many thanks for joining this episode and listening. God bless you all and keep you safe. 

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