One-to-one consultancy for retail executives
Retail is a tough industry to learn. It was traditionally the ‘school of hard-knocks,’ but the classic hierarchies of the big retailers were a good way to learn your trade in the essential roles of retailing. Excellent negotiators were moulded in the buying department, merchandisers learnt the hard way to know their numbers and check them endlessly, shopkeepers evolved their selling patter and ruled their shopfloors as their kingdoms.
In this age of disruption, how and where do new entrants to the retail world learn their trade if indeed there is a trade to learn anymore? Though an expert One-to-One Consultancy.
Re-inventing the retail learning hierarchy
Retail today is more about ‘soft-skills’ such as being customer focused, data driven, quick-to-market, decisive to act. Traditional retailers at all levels, particularly the higher ones, are now the ones on a steep learning curve. Ironically, they learn from their teams, or externally from support agencies the new expertise they require.
The retail knowledge hierarchy is turning on its head.
Learning ‘the old’ & ‘the new.’
However, so long as there is retail that is still based on selling physical product, and the fundamentals of buying & selling remain as the tools to making profit, then of course fundamental retailing skills are still ‘part and parcel’ of the industry.
They are ‘part and parcel’ of One-to-One Consultancy.
Pureplay start-ups and ‘accidental retailers’ selling from a passion for life, rather than a heritage in retail need to learn these skills and learn fast. But learning is difficult when you are no longer immersed in a team of experienced retail professionals.
Learning fast
The ‘learning fast’ is a problem for many as the time pressures of any normal day do not allow for learning, even in established retailers. The dynamics get ever faster, and personal contact and mentoring ever more remote.
More and more of what we would now call the retail industry is made up of a fragmented groundswell of individuals, working at pace, devoid of traditional learning structures, ever adapting to new retail models and principles, more rapidly than ever flitting between different businesses.
The new entrepreneurial retailer is born in a world of One-to-One Consultancy.
The old are trying to learn the ‘new ways’ The new are attempting to understand some of the valuable ‘old ways.’ Everyone is trying to find their own ways.
One-to-One consultancy
One-to-One Consultancy helps to bridge the retail knowledge gap by helping individuals thrown into the deep end of retailing to find their feet. On the one hand we have ‘Bespoke Retail Training’ to quickly inject the required knowledge and awareness, and then we have ‘COLAB Personal collaboration’ which offers ongoing support and advice for retail professionals as they advance on their daily retail journeys.
Find out more about Bespoke Retail Training
Discover our COLAB personal support package
Once upon a time there were ‘Retail Business Projects’ and now there are ‘Individual Retail People projects’
Retail is a tough industry to learn. Join the club.
Perhaps you don’t require any external help at all. Maybe just a little re-assurance. That’s great. I’m happy to help you come to that conclusion through an informal chat. If you decide that you could do with a hand, be assured that our assistance will be appropriate, workable, collaborative, affordable and achieve the goals you require.
It can be as open and corporate as you wish. As private and confidential as you wish. it will always be One-to-One consultancy.
Why not take a look at our One-to-One Consultancy overview…
If you are interested in that re-assuring chat, then please get in touch.