RedPrairie Industry Report

July 13, 2009

The Human Side of Workforce Management: Retail Best Practices

RSR highlights the best practices of retailers who have implemented workforce automation to ensure an optimal workforce at a time when the labor budget has never been under more pressure

Retail executives, store managers, employees, and even the public at large have long been wary of efforts to automate workforce management. From current and former employees complaining to the press about losing hours, to cynical consumers expecting a reduction in service, even to resistance from store managers who see a reduction in responsibility and control, there is a lot that can go awry when implementing workforce automation.

But such automation is more important than ever. Between crumbling demand and the resultant sales pressure on labor hours, the rise in cross‐channel shopping, and an increase in non‐sales work demands on store employees, retailers must make extraordinarily accurate decisions about who to staff when, and achieve climbing productivity targets on fewer labor hours without impacting customer service.

With the relative bad reputation that workforce automation is gaining in the press, RSR decided to highlight the success stories – to look at the retailers who have implemented workforce automation, and done so not just by avoiding alienation of large swaths of constituents, but with the enthusiastic support of those constituents. What are the best practices that these retailers have in common, in order to ensure an optimal workforce at a time when the labor budget has never been under more pressure?

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