faulty employee scheduling and training

During these tough and uncertain economic times corporate managers everywhere are desperately seeking ways to effectively achieve the following: cut their costs; boost overall employee productivity; maintain the financial bottom line; increase customer sales and loyalty; reduce the overall employee headcount.In actuality the true maintainer of the theoretical bottom line, the purchasing consumer, suffers when faulty scheduling leads to a visible lack of sales staff to assist them with their purchases. Customer frustration rises and potential sales lost due to poor managerial planning.The following cautionary tale illustrates the frustration typical customers experience when no sales staffare present to assist them with their intended purchases.I recently visited one of those mega mall department stores with the intention of buying a leather wallet for myself. My current wallet had seen better days and was probably still serviceable.The compact plastic windows that originally held my credit cards needed replacement. There were now only nine insert windows remaining and they were in a somewhat tattered condition.Since these replacement windows were impossible to find the last time I needed them I was this time forced to purchase an entirely new wallet for myself. I do try to be frugal and economical.I entered this particular department store around 10:30 a.m. The interior was bright, cheery and well lit. The wallets were displayed in the mens' department and I navigated my way up to the second floor using the escalator.I meandered my way slowly to the display case where the wallets were displayed. There were a number of well known manufacturer names displayed there. I took my time and judged each wallet based on my current need and price range. The prices of many of these had been somewhat reduced. I guess sales was not that brisk.As I examined each boxed wallet I noticed a few peculiar things that many other shoppers this day were also noticing. There were no on floor sales personnel present. This made it that much harder to ask for assistance. The customers in the store knew what they wanted to buy but no one was there to assist them with their purchase.As I rummaged around the display case I also noticed that a number of the wallets lacked a sticker price and a Universal Pricing Code. It would be convenient to know the price of the object I wanted to buy so that I could make a decision based on the amount of money I wanted to spend.Five minutes passed and I scoured the sales floor to locate a sales associate. This search proved to be unsuccessful. I wanted the item and now had to track down a sales person to ring up my order. A few other customers in the mens' department also joined me on our quest to locate a store representative. There were now three of us needing assistance.At last we found an associate who could assist us. She told us that this was really not her usual department and that she and another female associate were the only ones on duty for the first hour of store operations. She also told us she was also handling the customer service register at three other on floor locations.The male customer carrying his young daughter, three dress shirts and socks decided to make his purchase another day. The older lady in front of my only wanted to purchase a birthday card for a friend. The cashier efficiently rang up her purchase.It was finally my turn to be cashiered out. The woman smiled, took the boxed wallet from my hands and proceeded to ring up my order. However, she paused and began a frantic search to locate a U.P.C. code to register the order for the sale.She apologized for this inconvenience. Then she and I returned to the display case to find a similar wallet with a price tag to complete the order. We walked past five customer assistance registers still inviting but unmanned.At the display counter we both fumbled with a number of similar and not so similar wallets which might have a sales tag and UPC code label affixed to it. This search lasted four minutes. Finally in desperation she picked up a wallet somewhat similar to the one I wanted, read the price and asked me if the price quoted on the label would be acceptable. The price read $36. I told her that would be fine.We once again returned to her customer service kiosk in the childrens' department and she rang up my order. As she rang up the order other customers in the area bombarded her with queries and questions about items in the store. She politely thanked me for my purchase, again apologized for the inconvenience and wished me a good day.In itself this was an educational experience for me. The sales associate handled herself well and her demeanor and friendly disposition turned this into a positive customer experience.On the negative side store management should not only reward this associate for her deftness and expertise in handling stress but also rethink their on site policy regarding the start times of their sales staff.Generous advertised discounts and spontaneous manager in store bargains are all well and good but top notch customer service and serving customer needs should be maintained in many managerial training seminars.

Original :: faulty employee scheduling and training