5 Secrets from the Retail World To Boost Employee Morale, Engagement

From high-end fashion to dollar stores, merchandisers are masters at enticing people to respond, act, and ultimately spend.

As a leader, you can put a few of retailers’ promotional strategies to use to boost morale and engagement and inspire your people to do better at work.

Important to Boost Morale

It’s important because engaged, motivated employees perform better.  Gallup researchers found that engaged employees:

• Help increase profitability by 21%
• Reduce absenteeism by 41%, and
• Decrease turnover by 59%.

So you want to take steps (and maybe steal some cool retail strategies) to boost morale and increase engagement. Here are five approaches that work.

1. The End-Cap Special

This is where grocery and department stores put merchandise they want to move quickly, displaying it nicely on an end cap. It offers high foot traffic, high exposure – and gets the attention (and sales) it deserves.

For managers, you want to display or magnify your people’s strengths.

Everybody has skills that are average. But by highlighting what people do well, isolating their strengths, and focusing on the things people do well each day, you:

• Reinforce their sense of value of themselves and get more from them
• Display their skills for others to see, which fosters a fuller sense of appreciation, and
• Challenge others who see those strengths to improve as well.

2. Bakery by the Door

There’s nothing like the wonderful aroma of fresh-baked bread and cakes to make you hungry — and essentially buy more groceries.

This is one reason most grocery chains have you pass the bakery early in your shopping trip.

Managers can get a similar impact at work by unleashing the flow of information. Good employees are hungry to learn how things work and why.

Let information waft through your workplace, and good people will be energized and engaged.

If you’re curious about what to share, just ask them what they want to know more about. It could be anything from how to navigate your health and well-being benefits to how to develop a career plan. Or maybe they want to understand how other departments.

3. Free Samples

People appreciate a free snack of crackers and gourmet cheese while they shop. And for retailers, a free taste of a good product is the best way to get people to buy.

So, when you can give your employees a taste of how their daily work fits into the larger picture and the organization’s broader goals, they’re more inclined to do it again and again.

Try this:

1. Explain the organization’s overall goal and the benefits of achieving that goal
2. Break down your employee goals into tasks that connect with the organization’s goals
3. Review these goals regularly to see if they are being met, and
4. Hold yourself and your employees accountable.

4. A Bank or Hardware Store

It’s no coincidence full-on bank branches popped up inside grocery stores. And more recently, hardware stores have popped up next to and/or attached to grocery stores. It’s a marriage of convenience.

The grocery is betting people will come to the bank or hardware story and shop more often, too.

In the same vein, managers who offer a real work/life balance to employees actually end up with employees who work more, not less.

Balanced employees show up more, put in a greater effort (have more value to offer), and in the end are more effective!

Here are six things that’ll help achieve that balance:

1. Self management
2. Time management
3. Stress management
4. Change management
5. Technology management, and
6. Leisure management.

5. In-Store Entertainment

Did you catch that cooking show demo while standing in the checkout line?

Retailers want you to relax and enjoy your shopping experience, the perfect state of mind to pummel you with advertising.

So, why not let employees relax and be themselves?

Allowing employees to be comfortable and themselves at work puts them in the perfect frame of mind to build genuine connections. That boosts trust among colleagues and improves valuable knowledge-sharing.

Here are some ideas that can help:

• Hire well
• Send toxic people packing
• Keep the place clean, comfortable and attractive
• Create an area to relax
• Let people customize their own space
• Focus on total well-being, and
• Be flexible with work space, place and time.