As pure play e-Commerce retailers such as Bonobos grow into newer sales channels and add brick-and-mortar stores to their offering, they often need to hire employees that are based further away from the company’s headquarters. With the added distance between these employees and upper management, these retailers need to invest in platforms focused on fostering communication and reinforcing the importance of company culture.
In continuing its growth stage, Bonobos wanted to ensure that employees throughout its 20 guideshops were well-trained and able to keep in touch with the company’s New York headquarters at all times. In looking to improve internal communication as well as consumer engagement, the retailer selected learning management software provider Wisetail.
“We were looking for a solution that we could use as a traditional piece of learning management software, such as compliance tracking and reporting to ensure the right employees were learning the right information,” said Sasha Ludwig-Siegel, Retail Operations Senior Associate at Bonobos. “It was also really important for us that we find a solution that’s efficient and engaging.”
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In using the Wisetail solution, the retailer plans to:
- Open up a direct line of communication between remote store employees and the management;
- Learn more about its employees and their working habits so that it can put them in the best position to succeed, whether through sales or customer service;
- Use reporting to measure KPIs in real time to see exactly which areas their employees are succeeding in, in addition to monitoring where they can perform better; and
- Discover the best practices to implement throughout each store.
The two most important metrics toward getting retail learning management right, according to PK Kirwan, Director of Marketing at Wisetail, are reduced time to productivity and reduced turnover rates.
“If you provide your employees or team members with the tools to grow personally in their positions, they stay longer,” Kirwan indicated. “We’re also looking at the big picture. As far as engagement with the tool itself goes, you can measure everything from the number of active users to recognition messages to user contributions.”
Keeping Employees Informed
Once Bonobos opens up more guideshops and hires additional staff that may have never been to the headquarters, the retailer aims to use the platform to keep these staffers up to speed on the company culture.
“Our long term goal is to continue to keep that culture tight, and also continue to keep those lines of communication open,” Ludwig-Siegel said in an interview with Retail TouchPoints. “A part-time guide should feel as connected to headquarters as the store manager does.”
As Bonobos expands its store presence and adds more employees out in the field, the retailer wants to streamline all its communication channels through one platform, according to Ludwig-Siegel. With Wisetail, all employees can give feedback into what is happening in the stores, as well as what best practices are being implemented, to help foster brand consistency.
“All of our managers and guides are excited to learn and they want information to stay as close to the corporate headquarters as possible,” Ludwig-Siegel stated. “They also want to communicate between each other through the sharing of information and stories. We are still pretty new in the implementation process, so we’re not fully in the stores with it at the moment, but from all the different conversations I’ve had talking with store managers and giving them previews of the platform, they’re just happy they now have a place they can go that’s a one-stop shop for all the information.”
