Take Employee Suggestions Seriously

Your employees are an excellent resource for suggestions about how to improve store operations. Throughout their workdays, frontline employees hear what customers say and—more valuable yet—watch what customers actually end up doing. Back office employees can spot the trends and the important exceptions to trends as those employees compile the reports that an owner/operator might be reviewing only in a summarized form.
     However, chances are your employees aren’t sharing with you all the information they might. Researchers from Cornell University, University of Texas-Austin, and Penn State say that businesspeople like you fail to accurately understand why employees withhold information. In presenting their results, the researchers aimed to debunk myths they identified:

• Myth: The most common reason employees don’t share information with managers is that they fear getting into trouble for being critical. Truth: Yes, an important motivation for not sharing information is a concern about negative consequences. About 20% of the survey respondents said they refrain from making suggestions to resolve routine problems and implement improvements because they fear they will lose out in some way for making the suggestions. However, the most common motivation for withholding is that employees conclude sharing would be a waste of their limited time. They’ve not seen sufficient evidence that managers seriously consider the suggestions.
• Myth: Employees who give ideas for improvements during meetings or via e-mail are telling you almost everything they know that would be useful to you in carrying out your management responsibilities. Truth: About 40% of the respondents in the study said they are quite open about sharing when they conclude it won’t be futile, but consciously withhold information about other topics.
• Myth: Women are more likely than men to withhold information, and employees with specialized professional skills are more likely to share than are other employees. Truth: The researchers found no significant differences between employees by gender or education level.

     It’s unrealistic to expect your employees to share with you every thought they have, just as it’s unrealistic for your employees to expect that you’ll share with them every secret of your business operations. Beyond the need for confidentiality, there’s not enough time in the retailing day for that kind of hand-holding, group-hug kumbaya.
     But make it clear to your employees that you do seriously consider suggestions they share with you.

For your profitability: Sell Well: What Really Moves Your Shoppers

Click below for more:
Look at Mean, Median, Mode, and Range
Use Consumer Attitude Survey Findings
Define Customer Service for Your People