Tag: careers in retail

how to attract the best retail candidates

How we Attract the Best Candidates to our Retail Roles

Posted on | by Excel Recruitment

Recruiting the best candidates for retail roles is essential for the success of any retail business. Having the right team in place can make a significant difference in customer satisfaction, sales, and overall store performance. Below is a guide that you may find helpful to structure your recruitment process in order to attract and hire top-notch talent for your retail positions.

Write Your Job Spec 

Creating a comprehensive job specification is the first step in attracting the right candidates. It ensures that both you and the candidates share the same expectations about the position. Your job spec should include the job title, general duties, day-to-day responsibilities, a brief company overview outlining your company’s culture and values, job location, and working hours, including likely shift patterns and contracted hours. Including these elements ensures candidates have a clear understanding of what the role involves and whether it aligns with their expectations and career goals. 

List Your Must-Have Skills and Attributes 

Identifying the essential skills and attributes for the role is critical. These should be based on the duties listed in your job spec and the characteristics of successful past hires. Some examples of “Must have” skills might include the ability to work certain shift, a particular visa, command of the English language and some customer-facing experience. Your “would like to have” attributes could range from previous experience in a deli or food retail store to experience using a particular POS system, or leadership potential.  

Compile Your Questions to Reflect Your Desired Attributes 

To effectively assess candidates, develop a set of questions that reflect the skills and attributes you are looking for. For example, if Customer Service Skills is high on your must-have list perhaps you include a question such as  “Can you describe a time when you turned a dissatisfied customer into a happy one?”. You can choose the skills that are most valued by you and compose a question on each topic.  By scoring each answer, you can objectively compare candidates and ensure you are making the best hiring decision. 

Prepare Your Pitch 

The interview is a two-way process.  While an interview is an important opportunity for you to fully screen candidates, it’s equally important to sell the role and your company to them. The second half of the interview should involve: 

→ Detailed Role Explanation: Clearly explain what the job entails, including tasks, responsibilities, and expectations. 

→ Benefits and Opportunities: Highlight the benefits of working with your company, such as employee discounts, health benefits, training programs, and career progression opportunities. 

→ Success Stories: Share examples of employees who have thrived in your company, demonstrating the potential for growth and success. 

This not only gives candidates a clear picture of what to expect but also gives you the chance to portray your company as an attractive place to work.  

Reply to Each Candidate Promptly 

Prompt communication is crucial. Whether you are offering the job, rejecting a candidate, or inviting them for a second interview, timely responses are essential. News travels fast, and a local store that doesn’t respond to applications or inform candidates of their status after an interview will likely see a drop in applications as word spreads. Additionally, as a retailer recently pointed out to me, these job seekers are often our customers first. Therefore, it’s crucial to protect the store’s reputation, regardless of the interview outcome! Clear and respectful communication enhances your company’s reputation and ensures candidates are not left in limbo. 

Job Offer 

When making a job offer, be enthusiastic and positive. Outline all benefits, big or small, to show the full value of the offer. Follow up verbal offers with a detailed written offer letter which includes; job details, salary, all immediate or long-term benefits, acceptance deadline, start date, and next steps.  

Call for Backup 

For junior roles, having a second opinion in the same interview can be beneficial. For more senior roles, conducting a second interview with another interviewer helps ensure a well-rounded assessment of the candidate. 

Trust Your Gut 

While structured interviews and scoring matter, trusting your gut is important too. If a candidate feels like a great cultural fit and matches your company values, that’s a strong sign they are right for you!  

For more information call us on 01 814 8747 or email nikki@excelrecruitment.com.

childcare in retail

The realities of juggling childcare while working in retail

Posted on | by Editorial Team

With the summer holidays upon us, our Director of Grocery Retail, Nikki Murran, reflects on the realities of juggling childcare while working in retail and looks at what the government could do to help parents and carers in this situation

This summer we planned out our childcare for my 8-year-old – it was like a military operation; involving spreadsheets, booking summer camps (these can be harder to secure than Taylor Swift tickets!), carpool agreements with neighbours, and roping in of grandparents to make up the difference. It was going to be a balancing act, but we were confident we had it covered and my kiddo would likely be a football star by the end of it. (Based on the number of hours he would be playing and the amount of money we were spending anyway!)

The first day of the first camp started with thunderstorms and a cancelled camp. Thankfully Nana was happy to help, and we figured it was a once-off. Day 2 he fractured his wrist. After the doctor explained it was 4-6 weeks of downtime my devastated son asked in the car – what about football camp? GAA camp? Golf camp? Hurling Camp? Athletics Camp?  “What indeed!” I thought!

We went back to the spreadsheets, back to the grandparents, and back to our bosses. We both shifted our summer to add a little working from home and within a few hours – problem solved.

It made me think, though – what if I was still working in retail? Working from home would not have been an option. What if we both were? What about the 300,000 people working in retail in Ireland this summer? How many of them have kids? What do they do on thundery days or when an arm gets fractured, or a chickenpox appears?

In a recent survey conducted by Excel Recruitment, it was found that 6 in 10 workers feel the cost of childcare is unaffordable. The survey also found that 58% of couples with children said their partner had to give up work due to the cost of childcare – and in 62% of these cases, the person that left the workforce was female.

My 3-year-old daughter is in a wonderful creche – they love her, she loves them, they paint, dance, go to the beach, the park, and plenty more. It’s expensive, like a second mortgage expensive, but they have early drop-off and late collection. However, it still means that one of us does a later shift so we can drop – and the other does an earlier shift to be back in time for collection. If one of us worked in retail, I can’t help but wonder how we would manage.

How do single parents, working in retail or hospitality juggle it all? How do they find childcare at the weekend? In evenings? On Christmas Eve? New Years Eve? All these peak trading days?

With a continued staffing crisis, and Ireland reaching its lowest level of unemployment in 20 years it’s imperative that all is done to ensure those willing to work are given the opportunities to. But with the current cost of childcare and the lack of childcare outside office hours, we are blocking a large cohort of available talent from the retail sector.

The government should do more, it should fall to them to make childcare more affordable, give better support to childcare providers, incentivize more flexibility from employers, and look for more novel approaches to combat this issue.

However, the government moves slowly, and the staffing crisis is upon us now, so it falls to retailers to look for workarounds. In recent months, more and more of my clients are adjusting their hiring practice to welcome part-time staff for full-time roles. I have placed a handful of Deli Managers working 4 days, an Assistant Manager who needs Wednesday nights and Thursday mornings off while his partner (a Nurse) does her long shift, and a Store Manager who needs most Saturdays off as he coaches his daughter’s GAA team. These candidates would have been unplaceable a couple of years ago, during a time when retailers were demanding full flexibility from employees. But the time has arrived where it is now employees demanding this flexibility from employers!

The main tool retailers have in their arsenal to tackle this issue is their store rota. What is working for many retailers is doing the rota weeks in advance, rather than just for the following week – often this extra notice is enough for parents to adjust childcare needs. I’ve also heard of successes with partnering, particularly in local stores – where a role is divided between two staff members – both with kids in the same school – here, they split their job, and both worked a 3-day week – covering the store for 6 days rather than 5 and they minded each other’s kids on the respective days off – it was a win-win for all.

From the feedback we have gotten from retailers making these adjustments – the best advice on offer seems to be open-mindedness – ruling nothing out and spending just a little longer on the scheduling and giving staff more input into the rota from the outset. These tweaks may cost a little time each week, but ultimately may result in a more dedicated, loyal workforce – seems a worthwhile trade to me!

You can check out this feature in the most recent edition of ShelfLife Magazine here. For more information call us on 01 814 8747 or email nikki@excelrecruitment.com

You can view all of our live jobs here

 

Online Interview

How to ace an online interview – Nikki Murran, Director | Grocery Retail

Posted on | by Editorial Team

Post-Covid, online interviews have become a much more commonplace occurrence. Here, our Director of Grocery Retail Recruitment, Nikki Murran, shares her top tips to ensure you create a positive impression during your online interview

There have been many residual factors left in our post-Covid lives, from the normalisation of working from home to a nostalgic fondness for homemade banana bread. One of the main shifts we saw in the recruitment industry was the acceptance of online interviews.

Pre-Covid I can’t think of one client who would have been satisfied to move to the job-offer stage without looking the candidate in the eye and shaking hands. But now, we still have about 35% of our interviews held online. Of that number, 20% of those are concluding their process, whether it be an offer or rejection, without having ever met the candidate face to face.

In March 2020 I was scrambling to understand the world of Zoom and Teams. I had used them previously but was by no means an expert. One of the first interviews I had set up was for a candidate who was amazing at baking and could run a high-volume, fast-paced bakery with his eyes closed but could absolutely not work email. I had to talk him through every step, and this was his first ever time using a laptop – I promise we laughed more than we cried but I think we have all become so much more proficient around online meetings now! (He got the job by the way!)

So, it would seem that online interviews are here to stay, in some capacity anyway. In many ways, they offer countless benefits to the recruitment procedure. They allow candidates to interview on lunch breaks or shortly before or after their shifts, they speed up the entire recruitment process, and they cut down on travel time and cost. But is there a downside? Do candidates who travel to interviews and attend in person have an upper hand over those who log on? Our figures would show that they do. Often the candidate attending in person has made more of an effort and thereby indicates more of an interest in the role and ultimately, in a potential hire, this is always more attractive.

So, the question remains – Do candidates really get a full chance to get their skills, experience, and personality across through a screen? I think this really depends, so, over the last couple of years we have been compiling the following tips for online interviews to help candidates bridge that gap between the real world and the digital one!

Suited and booted: When it comes to what you wear, the same rules apply as an in-person interview – well at least for your top half!

Profile picture: This is your new handshake! Make sure it is appropriate as this will be your first impression while they wait for you to log on!

Accept invitations: If the interviewer sends you an invitation on MSTeams – click to accept in a timely manner – not mere moments ahead of the interview. It confirms your attendance and interest. You can also add a note when replying saying thank you for the invitation and that you are looking forward to meeting them.

Can you hear me? This is frustrating for everyone – test out your platform (Teams/Zoom etc) with a pal and make sure you are up and running on audio and video beforehand. Technical issues nearly always cause candidates to fluster and throw them off before interviewing.

Technical issues: If you do have technical issues – don’t get flustered. If they can see you are trying to log on most interviewers are happy to bear with you while you get sorted or re-arrange if you can’t. Just be sure to contact them in real-time to let them know you are trying to log on.

Eye contact: It is very tempting to watch yourself or your interviewer during an online interview, but looking directly into the camera is the only way to appear as though you are keeping eye contact.

Backdrops: Ideally choose a neutral backdrop, a plain wall without lots of pictures, try not to sit in your childhood bedroom with your boy band posters surrounding you, or opt for the space backdrop with shooting stars behind you! If you have no blank wall – just opt for the blurred background setting.

Close all other apps on your computer: Getting email notifications during your interview is distracting and can make noise causing you to lose sound. Close everything!

Prepare, prepare, prepare: The level of preparation that is done for an in-person interview is the same level that should be completed for an online interview. Investigate who you will be interviewing with, research the company via their website and be aware of the latest news about them. Visit their stores and their competition. Have a copy of your CV, the job description, and questions you would like to ask. Be prepared for questions about your salary expectations, reasons why you are leaving your current role, length of your notice period, your motivation to move on (if employed), your career ambitions, etc. (Know your CV!)

Bad habits: Don’t eat, chew gum, smoke, or vape – this is still an interview!

Avoid interruptions: Be sure all pets and small children are locked up. Well, no, but perhaps ensure you have a quiet space where you will not be disturbed or distracted by snack requests.

Body language: Don’t slouch or squirm too much (it comes across as disinterested) even if your chair is uncomfortable.

Pick a comfortable chair.

Before you say goodbye: Ensure you’ve expressed your interest in the role and thank them for their time – oh and keep your fingers crossed!

You can check out this feature in the most recent edition of ShelfLife magazine here. You can view all our live jobs here. For more information call us on 01 814 8747 or email info@excelrecruitment.com

Aislinn Lea, Head of Fashion & Non-Food, Excel Recruitment

Retail University

Posted on | by Aisling Rafferty | Leave a Comment on Retail University

Excel’s Fashion and Non-Food Director Aislinn Lea on why a retail career is the one for anyone looking to learn and the world of opportunities retail jobs offer

The term university I believe comes from the Latin universitas magistrorum et scholarium which roughly means “an association of teachers and scholars” which to me, is exactly what the retailing world is. A retail career is a world of opportunity. It is an ever changing world of diversity, excitement, pace, people, leadership and growth. I struggle to think of another industry or career path that can offer you the diversity of skills and experiences that retail can. Depending on your skills and interests, retail offers you the opportunity to:

  • Be a decision maker: insight of managing and leading a business like it is your own
  • Be a teacher: instrumental in training, motivating and encouragement
  • Be a financial wizard: managing controllable costs, analysing your trading reports improve sales growth and create a profitable store / business
  • Be a magician and juggler- learn the art of multi-tasking and managing the needs of the business, of your customers and your team without breaking a sweat
  • Be creative – to allow for change by understanding your people, your customer, company culture
  • Be everything to everyone – a leader, a manager, a friend, a personal shopper, a coach, an inspiration and ultimately to be part of the art in delivering the ultimate shopping experience

I recently received an email from a candidate that I placed in a new management role letting me know how he was finding his new job. In it, he described his new company as a “University of Retail” which struck me firstly, as a fantastic compliment for our client. Secondly, it highlighted just how unique retail is as an industry for precisely this reason: in retail, every day’s a school day.

Retail management is one of the most progressive careers in the market, an industry where the opportunities and careers available are as ever-changing as the products we sell and customers we serve. To a hardworking and passionate individual pursuing a retail career the doors that open are endless and a result, exciting, challenging and rewarding. From Management, Head Office or Buying to HR, Marketing, E-Tailing and Visual Merchandising there are exciting career opportunities and career paths across Grocery, Fashion and Non-Food retailing along with countless chances to learn, meet new people, try new things, and see new places. On top of this, it’s an extremely fast-paced industry, constantly innovating and evolving, which provides anybody who wants to embrace new ideas and technologies the opportunity to really make their mark.

Retail is Ireland’s largest indigenous industry employing over 280,000 people and accounting for a large contribution to the Irish economy. Its also one of the fastest evolving industries there is. As retail continues to grow, we need to continue to attract new talent and new leaders into the world of retail. Equally we need to hold on to our current talent, our scholars in retail who can mentor, train and develop the new recruits, the new team, the new leaders.