Frontline Employee Management in a Post-COVID World

The retail industry is nearly unrecognizable from what it was at the start of 2020. The pandemic wreaked havoc on retail businesses, forcing companies to cut employee hours, furlough staff, or lay off workers altogether. Although some frontline workers were deemed “essential,” few received pay or benefits increases when working during the worst of the Covid-19 outbreak. Those that weren’t deemed essential faced massive layoffs, which resulted in a 65% retail turnover rate in 2021.  

After all, why should frontline retail workers choose to keep their job in-stores, when they can earn $13+ working fulfillment in an Amazon warehouse with less virus exposure? Modern retailers need to give employees a reason to stay with their company… especially right now. Let’s take a look at a few management strategies that retailers can implement to boost employee retention during this time of upheaval.

The Turnover Problem Has Peaked 

The retail industry is rebounding from unprecedented retail unemployment, but the turnover issue is not new. Consider that 27% of employees across industries left their jobs in 2019, prior to the pandemic. But the annual turnover rate in 2020 was a jaw-dropping 57.3% — meaning significantly more retail employees left their jobs than kept them last year. There’s a common misconception that retail workers are replaceable, but this isn’t actually the case. 

While a company may be able to find someone new to fill an open position, the cost of recruitment, learning, and work materials cost $3,328 to replace a retail employee making just $10/hour. The craziest thing about this is that nearly ¾ of retail turnover is preventable.

Boost Retention by Incentivizing Career Development 

Ready for an HR hack? Offering growth opportunities is the key to employee retention. But employees can’t move up the ladder to more skilled positions — such as shift supervisor, floor manager, display architect, etc. — without the proper education to give them those skills. All too often in retail and retail-adjacent industries, employee learning falls by the wayside in favor of hours on the selling floor.  

Fortunately, learning and selling do not have to be mutually exclusive. It’s never been easier to transform associates into brand ambassadors on the selling floor — without paying them for extra learning on their days off. On-floor learning modules can be done during associates’ downtime on the clock. Retailers can incentivize employee learning by gating access to better-paying shifts, or additional hours upon the completion of defined levels of coursework completion and badge attainment. This gives frontliners a sense of pride in their position and builds a greater emotional connection with the company, thereby reducing turnover.

Delivery Jobs Compete for Frontline Talent 

Here’s a hard pill to swallow: in today’s digital marketplace, ¼ of new job postings are in fulfillment and delivery roles. Many low-wage workers who were once frontline employees in retail stores are now working delivery. That’s because delivery jobs often pay better than working at a store. The average retail worker’s salary falls at about $9,000 less than the average delivery driver.  

It’s yet another reason why implementing advancement opportunities is key to retail retention. Employees with a passion for frontline retail will seize upon your “learning in the flow of work” opportunities to achieve more path a clear path to a higher salary in a management role, instead of defecting to a position that pays only incrementally more.  

Flexible Schedules Lead to Increased Opportunities

Empowered employees don’t quit their jobs. The issue that a lot of retailers run into when trying to empower frontline workers through technology, however, is sparse adoption and use of workforce management solutions. Frontline employees will only utilize workforce management apps when they factor into their daily/weekly tasks. The more apps employees are expected to utilize, the more likely that certain apps will fall by the wayside –– and retailer’s technology investment along with them. 

Frontline employees often juggle part-time retail work with other commitments –– school, other jobs, children, etc. As such, digital workplace solutions need to be intuitive to be practical. In striving to implement a streamlined digital workplace solution, retailers focused on simplicity will be able to provide the ease of use that leads to app adoption. One easy-to-use app will improve employee engagement, enable employers to create advancement opportunities, and give employees the scheduling flexibility that can’t be found in delivery/fulfillment roles.