Driving Store Profit Requires Focused Loss Prevention Leadership

Driving retail store profit through smarter Loss Prevention requires an open mind, a willingness to change and focused Loss Prevention Leadership.
Smart Loss Prevention and shrink control is an “evolution”. It involves the use of shrink control best practices, excellent behavioral programming and the use of the right policies and technology. But, as necessary as these components are, to achieve real and lasting profit gain through smarter shrink control and store operations excellence, you must change and grow every manager’s and every supervisor’s knowledge, beliefs and behaviors.

Every manager and every supervisor is giving you what they know how to give you. They are doing their relative best to realize the profit they are asked for within the boundaries and constraints of what you are willing to accept from them. The challenge is that we need to raise or expectations.

Rule #1: If you want to grow their profit, you have to grow your managers and supervisors. Store Managers must act and behave as Total Store Managers focused on growing the business, not just fulfilling daily or weekly tasks. Rule #2: Supervisors must act and behave as Professional Store Supervisors focused on growing managers and “causing” profit. Often, the “know-how” that they have is not the “know-how” they need to get you to your goals. So, Rule #3: Every company needs a corporate plan and curriculum to grow the knowledge, skills and know-how of every key
profit-maker.

So, here are 6 Tips for Smart Loss Prevention and Shrink Control to get you started:

1. Managers need to know what profitable conditions look like. They need to be able to see their store conditions as they impact profit-making. The best managers and the best supervisors can walk into a department and see and sense if conditions promote optimal profit. Every manager needs training to help them to develop this skill.

2. Every manager needs to think and behave like a total store manager who focuses relentlessly on his/her business drivers. First on this list is smart ordering practices, inventory turnover and a crystal clear vision of what customer service excellence is.

3. Supervisors need to be in the stores teaching and coaching… doing Show and Tell… being the front line training resource and profit-producing trainer.

4. Use technology to support store manager best practices and success behaviors as well as safety and security and investigations.

5. Optimal shrink control is a company-wide initiative. Only when lead by the executive team can you achieve the collaboration required to get everyone working toward the same objectives and goals. Presidential and VP of Operations full engagement catalyst and linchpin. Clear vision, goals and standards are the tools. And, every employee must possess or develop an everyday focus on profit optimization. Profit must be everyone’s job one.

6. You need a plan! Start with a clear SWOT assessment of where you are. This will allow you to identify your Possible Points of Failure (PPOF) in your profit-making structure. This will help you to build a better mouse-trap. The old trap: doing more of what you are doing won’t really change much because what you are doing is what got you to where you are. Every manager must be taught to think like total store [business] managers with business accountability. Every supervisor must be taught to “cause” more profit by making every store and department manager smarter. Supervisors need to adopt behaviors and practices characteristic of the best Professional Store Supervisors.

These 6 tips will serve as a smart way to begin your journey to profit realization and growth through smart shrink control.

Remember: Driving retail store profit through smarter Loss Prevention and Shrink Control

requires “evolution”, not just another policy or technology. And Loss Prevention Leadership requires you to know how to get from where you are to where you need to be.