As a retail manager, one of your primary jobs is making sure your employees are happy and doing the best they can while on the clock. One of the best ways to make sure your staff members are interacting with customers in a positive and helpful way is to ensure that they feel appreciated for the work they do.
Creating specialty roles for your employees will help you acknowledge their skill set and give them goals to work toward. Whether or not you attach bonuses or higher salaries to these positions, you’ll find that giving employees special tasks will improve the quality of your store and staff satisfaction. Here are a few potential roles you could offer to the members of your team:
Merchandiser
Do you have an employee who has an incredible eye for the aesthetic? Does he or she show up to work looking fabulous and continue to improve the appearance of your store fixtures throughout the day? Then you may want to consider promoting this individual to your official merchandiser. In this position, he or she will be charged with organizing clothing racks, creating attractive window displays, dressing adult and child mannequins and taking on any other tasks that relate to how your items are organized. You can put them in charge of coming up with seasonal displays as well, meaning you won’t have to keep an eye on your calendar and can focus on other duties.
Customer Liaison
This role is particularly well-suited for those workers who always have a smile on their face, even when the line at the register is out the door on Christmas Eve. Individuals who know how to handle angry customers, answer questions effectively and help shoppers find the perfect gifts have a lot to teach others. You can allow them to teach workshops for new employees to train them on proper customer service and circulate around the store to make sure shoppers have everything they need. Consider having this person field any customer complaints you receive online or over the phone. In fact, you may want to equip this individual with a cordless phone that will allow him or her to answer customer calls quickly and efficiently.
Technology Professional
In this day and age, you have to be up on technology if you want to survive in the retail market. However, updating your website and social media accounts may be too overwhelming considering the rest of your day-to-day managerial duties. Delegating these tasks to a member of your team who knows the ins and outs of basic technology can be a big time saver. You can even allow this employee to log in a few hours from home if he or she does social media posting after hours. Make sure this worker knows when the best hours are to post, how to write snappy statuses and the best ways to reflect the voice of your brand online.
Community Scout
Reaching out to your neighbors is important, especially if you live in a tight-knit community. You can assign one employee to be in charge of interacting with the community by visiting nearby stores, attending local events and spreading the word about the happenings at your own store. You’ll want someone who is outgoing, confident and knows their way around your town. It also doesn’t hurt to provide this employee with a budget that allows him or her to support community activities, such as sponsoring a little league team or contributing to a local charity.
