Hiring in the retail industry can be quite a challenging feat! 86% of retail companies said in a recent survey that they have to fight against several factors to hire great people.
Some of the most critical ones which affect USA staffing in the retail industry include high turnover, low retention, dropping in application rates, and much more. This situation immensely exacerbates during the high-volume hiring season of retail businesses, i.e., the ongoing holiday season now!
Along with the issues above, many retail companies have to hire more quickly during this season. Hence, staffing agencies must implement an out-of-the-box process to hire top talents as the holiday season is already there. So, is your staffing agency ready for it?
This blog will discuss some most proactive and practical retail resource staffing tips that can help you boost your recruiting efforts tremendously and attract high-quality talents. Explore the best staffing solutions to create a successful retail hiring strategy.
What are the Best Tips to Recruit Amazing Talents for Any Retail Business?
Unfortunately, the retail industry in the US experiences a very high turnover rate of 60% compared to the world average of 15%. This calls for a constant need to hire new people! Keeping this daunting statistic in mind, it is imperative to transform your retail staffing strategies right now before it’s high time! So, here are some of the best tips for your staffing agency to hire the most competent candidates for a retail business.
- Hire Those Who Work More Hours
Although you might have heard this advice many times, hiring many contingent workers is a brilliant idea to increase your flexibility. But with this, you will end up with more associates who are not engaged with your brand’s success. That’s because if they work two to three jobs every day, they will not have the time to settle into the workplace culture.
Instead, if you hire people ready to invest the maximum of their time at your client’s workplace, they will be more connected with the business. And it will eventually give them a sense of belonging, and they will turn into their employer’s true brand ambassadors.
- Look for Employees Who Gel Well
When it comes to hiring for retail businesses, it’s crucial to have people with outside interests and hobbies who are good at communicating with people. The retail industry requires precisely those kinds of candidates.
The suitable candidates for a retail company should be those engaged in the real world. So, you must ensure that you are crafting the interview questions accordingly.
- Try to Understand Candidates’ Past Behavior
Knowing the goals and plans of what candidates hope to do in their job in the future. But deciding your retail interview questions only centered on this aspect is not the correct gauge to measure how an applicant will work in reality.
Instead, make sure your questions are crafted around specifics. If applicants can’t answer you with such details, it is entirely unsure they will do that for your customers. Likewise, if you find candidates who can tell you specifics based on their past experiences, you must prefer them more. Because they know what that desired customer experience looks like and how they can deliver it.
- Let the Cooling-Off Period Pass
You’ve indeed had that experience when you meet a candidate who clicks immediately! But whatever the situation might be, don’t hire on the spot. As we have already discussed above, there is a tremendous turnover rate in the retail industry. So, everything that looks good might not always be so. Thus, when hiring for a retail business, make sure either you are calling the candidate or they are calling you back minimum after 24 hours. Talk to them back:
- After you have spoken with the references
- After you have interviewed other people
- After the candidates have sweated a bit thinking if you will hire them
Doing this will keep you strong as an employer.
- Don’t Go with Your Gut
To hire good retail employees, you must first filter out the posers. If you throw curveballs, it will force candidates to give a genuine and unrehearsed reply. So, if you find an applicant is precisely giving you the answers you wanted to hear about their skills and successes, try to find something you will not like.
Listening to your gut instincts might end in a mistake in hiring. So, ask something like this to a candidate who seems perfect: “We all know no one can be perfect. Can you tell us about a time you didn’t serve your customers perfectly and how you handled the situation?”
Competent candidates can pinpoint a time like this and tell you what they did uniquely to solve an issue like this. However, if an incompetent employee is sitting in front of you who is just pretending to be efficient, they will tell you that it never happened.
Over to You
So, what are you waiting for? If you want to recruit the best and most capable employees for your retail client, follow the above proven hiring tips. With these excellent retail hiring strategies, we at Rekrooting hired some of the best contingent candidates for a couple of our premium retail clients whom the employer retained for extended periods.
