4 tips to deal with the labour shortage

Is the labour shortage impacting your company? Are you wondering how to adapt to this situation?

The labour shortage that took off during the pandemic is far from over. According to Statistics Canada, there were 915,500 unfilled positions in the fourth quarter of 2021. That’s up by 63 percent compared to 2020!

As many companies are looking to hire, it becomes more and more difficult to recruit new employees. Businesses need to find ways to address labour shortages and get creative with recruitment.

An important question to be asked is: Do you want to struggle with a growing problem that puts you in competition with other companies every day?

At allsales.ca, we think that the better solution is to do more with fewer employees.

Here are 4 ideas that will help you deal with the labour shortage in a sustainable way.

1. Simplify your product offering

By simplifying your offerings, your customers will be able to make decisions without your employees’ help. Here are some examples:

Offer fewer products by keeping only the most popular.
Put your best selling products in front of shoppers, knowing that this will meet the needs of the majority.
Clearly state the prices and benefits of each product.
Add comparison sheets so customers can easily compare products without any help.

2. Simplify processes for employees

Simplify your company’s processes to improve your team’s productivity. Ask your employees to share their ideas on how to simplify processes.

Review every step of each of your company’s processes (purchase, sale, invoicing, accounting, etc.).
Identify steps that you can easily improve or eliminate.
Keep your employees informed of changes in processes.

3. Automation

As you review your processes, ask yourself which steps can be automated. The first tasks to automate are repetitive tasks like filling out forms, updating files, entering data, etc. Here are some automation examples:

Use tablets for sales to increase productivity, eliminate paper invoices, build online forms and centralize the information.
Marketing emails: use email campaign tools like Mailchimp and Campaign Monitor to send mass mail campaigns and send automated emails triggered by subscriber’s activity.
Create a frequently asked questions section, or get an automated response system like Freshdesk or Zendesk that will give customers easy-to-find answers or redirect messages to staff members.

4. Empower your customers

Give your customers the information and the tools they need to make a decision. By giving them resources and options, you’re providing them with a much better buying experience and allowing them to determine what they want to buy. This will reduce your employees’ workload and you will be able to serve the same amount of customers with a reduced staff.

Make all merchandise accessible in the store to prevent customers from requiring employee assistance with merchandise in the back store or in the warehouse.
If you have simplified your offerings and clearly indicated your products’ prices as suggested above, more customers will be able to make a decision without a salesperson.
Set up self-service checkouts.
Have your customers sign up for your mailing list themselves by providing them with a QR code that opens your sign-up page. Or you can have a tablet at the cashier, already opened to your mailing sign-up page.

Even if some of the solutions suggested above can be costly in the short term, they will be beneficial in the long run since they will allow you to offer the same service with a reduced workforce.

These improvements will also save you a lot of expenses in finding employees, making interviews, and employee onboarding and training. Plus, they will allow you to face the labour shortage in a sustainable way and give you an advantage over other companies, who are always competing to attract new employees.

Above all, it will certainly save you many sleepless nights!

If you like our ideas and want help from our specialists, contact us now!

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