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5 episodes with april sabral
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2 episodes with april sabral
Bob Phibbs hosts April Sabral to discuss key retail challenges. Topics include: overcoming the stigma of retail careers, motivating employees, managing accountability, acquiring new customers, and balancing manager-employee relationships. The experts share practical tips for small business owners and retail managers on leadership, customer service, and driving sales. Includes Q&A addressing common retail management issues.
The human touch is vital in tech-driven retail! Matthew Adam Smith and April Sabral, Founder and CEO of RetailU, dissect the connection between people and stores, focusing on maintaining humanity in an age of technology and AI. Hear April's insights on the future of retail leadership, the impact of AI, and the essential role of people in building successful retail brands. Key Insights: - Human-Centered Leadership: Learn how RetailU teaches managers custom strategies to inspire, coach, and retain teams in various store types. - Ongoing Support: Explore the importance of continuous coaching and how both online platforms and live workshops sustain leadership development. - Technology and AI in Retail: Discover the potential benefits and challenges of integrating AI into training and coaching, and how it can enhance but not replace human interaction. - Accountability and Performance: Understand the significance of accountability in retail settings and the steps to create a standardized approach that drives team performance. Ready to join the GRL community? Nominate yourself or another retail executive to join the community today: http://www.globalretailleaders.com
The human touch is vital in tech-driven retail! Matthew Adam Smith and April Sabral, Founder and CEO of RetailU, dissect the connection between people and stores, focusing on maintaining humanity in an age of technology and AI. Hear April's insights on the future of retail leadership, the impact of AI, and the essential role of people in building successful retail brands. Key Insights: - Human-Centered Leadership: Learn how RetailU teaches managers custom strategies to inspire, coach, and retain teams in various store types. - Ongoing Support: Explore the importance of continuous coaching and how both online platforms and live workshops sustain leadership development. - Technology and AI in Retail: Discover the potential benefits and challenges of integrating AI into training and coaching, and how it can enhance but not replace human interaction. - Accountability and Performance: Understand the significance of accountability in retail settings and the steps to create a standardized approach that drives team performance. Ready to join the GRL community? Nominate yourself or another retail executive to join the community today: http://www.globalretailleaders.com
In this episode of The E-commerce Toolbox: Expert Perspectives, host Kailin Noivo is joined by April Sabral, CEO at April Sabral Leadership and Founder at Retailu. Together, they explore the evolving leadership landscape in retail, emphasizing the importance of mindset training and development for retail leaders, and their role towards embracing technological advancements. She also highlights strategies for fostering engagement, retaining talent, and avoiding common hiring mistakes in the rapidly changing retail industry.
AI is eliminating friction points and transforming self-checkout - making age verification and product recognition faster and more efficient than ever before. Join us on our latest Rethink Retail Podcast, with host and Top Retail Expert, April Sabral, as we delve into insightful discussions with Ohad Elzur of O+O Store & Promotion Technology Director at AS Watson and Arvin Jawa VP Global Retail Strategy and Regional VP Americas Retail at Diebold Nixdorf. They're unpacking exclusive insights and cutting-edge strategies in AI, self-checkout, and sustainable retail that are reshaping modern customer experiences. Tune in to learn how these innovations can drive your business forward and keep you ahead in the ever-evolving retail game.
In this episode of Retail Razor Show, hosts Ricardo Belmar and Casey Golden talk about preparing for NRF 2024, celebrate being a finalist in the Vendors in Partnership gala for The Retail Voice Award, and bring the latest episode of Blade to Greatness, all in under an hour!They host a special “Taylor's Version” replay of a prior interview with Andy Laudato, COO of The Vitamin Shoppe, sharing his comprehensive guide for maximizing your attendance at the NRF Big Show. Andy returns to the show for a new discussion of his anticipation for the combined NRF and supply chain shows, and the buzz surrounding AI, plus expectations for a great RetailROI Super Saturday event. In the latest episode of the ‘Blade to Greatness' segment, April Sabral, founder of retailu and The Positivity Company, returns to share her insights on leadership and how to counteract negativity in the retail industry She explains why retail leaders need to stop enrolling in negativity and reinforce a positive attitude with their teams. After listening to this episode, you, too, will be ready for #NRF2024 in January in New York City!NEWS! We are thrilled to report that our fans support propelled us as a finalist in The Retail Voice Award for the Vendors In Partnership award gala at NRF 2024! You're votes made a difference and we're honored to be one of 3 finalists for this prestigious award!WOW! As we march into our 3rd year on the show, we're honored and humbled to have hit the top of the charts on the Goodpodspodcast platform!#1 in the Top 100 Indie Management Monthly chart#2 in the Top 100 Indie Management Weekly chart#2 in the Top 100 Indie Marketing Weekly chart#3 in the Top 100 Marketing Weekly chart#4 in the Top 100 Marketing Monthly chartWe can't thank our Goodpods listeners enough! We love your support! Please continue giving us those 5-star ratings and send us your comments!Meet your hosts, helping you cut through the clutter in retail & retail tech:Ricardo Belmar, a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Influencer for 2023, 2022 & 2021, RIS News Top Movers and Shakers in Retail for 2021, advisory council member at George Mason University's Center for Retail Transformation, and director partner marketing for retail & consumer goods at Microsoft.Casey Golden, CEO of Luxlock, and RETHINK Retail Top Retail Influencer for 2023. Obsessed with the customer relationship between the brand and the consumer. After a career on the fashion and supply chain technology side of the business, now slaying franken-stacks and building retail tech!Includes music provided by imunobeats.com, featuring Overclocked, E-Motive, and Swag, Tag & Brag from the album Beat Hype, written by Hestron Mimms, published by Imuno.The Retail Razor ShowFollow us on Goodpods: https://bit.ly/TRRSgoodpodsFollow us on Instagram: https://bit.ly/TRRSinstaFollow us on Threads: https://bit.ly/TRRSthreadsFollow us on Twitter: https://bit.ly/TwRRazorConnect with us on LinkedIn: https://bit.ly/LI-RRazorSubscribe on YouTube: https://bit.ly/RRShowYouTubeSubscribe on Apple Podcasts: https://bit.ly/RetailRazorShowRetail Razor Show Episode Page: https://bit.ly/RRShowPodHost → Ricardo Belmar,Follow on Twitter - https://bit.ly/twRBelmarConnect on LinkedIn - https://bit.ly/LIRBelmarCo-host → Casey Golden,Follow on Twitter - https://bit.ly/twCaseyConnect on LinkedIn - https://bit.ly/LICasey
Hosts Ricardo Belmar and Casey Golden explore the diverse applications and benefits of RFID technology in the retail landscape, unlocking the potential for innovation from supply chain to in-store operations. Special guest John Pierre Kamel, managing director of RFID Sherpas, demonstrates how RFID excels in offering inventory visibility and accuracy to drive significant performance increases in retail business operations and sales.We also bring you the latest episode in our "Blade to Greatness" mini-series. In this segment, we invite a retail industry leader to offer one skill or trait that all retail executives need to become great leaders. Whether in stores or at corporate, we'll uncover valuable tips and advice that you can apply to your own retail career path. April Sabral, founder of retailu.ca, an online leadership development portal for field leaders and the author of two books, The Positive Effect, and her latest, Incurable Positivity, joins us to share her insights on an incredibly important topic that every retail leader needs to master: how to cultivate a positive culture for your retail employees!NEWS! We are pleased to announce that the Retail Razor Show is a Vendors In Partnership Awards nominee for The Retail Voice Award at the upcoming NRF Big Show 2024! We're asking all our listeners and YouTube viewers to help us win by showing your love for our show in the voting polls:Here's how you can help by voting:1. Visit https://bit.ly/3QlKr4X2. Register to vote.3. Vote for The Retail Razor Show in The Retail Voice Award category.WOW! As we zoom past our 2-year anniversary on the show, we're honored and humbled to have hit the top of the charts on the Goodpods podcast platform!We can't thank our Goodpods listeners enough! We love your support! Please continue giving us those 5-star ratings and send us your comments!About our Guest:With over two decades of experience, JP Kamel is a seasoned retail technology veteran, with a keen focus on RFID, Mobility and Omni solutions. As the Managing Director of RFID Sherpas since 2010, JP has been a driving force behind transformative change for global retailers, branded suppliers, and technology companies implementing RFID. He specializes in helping to effect transformational change for his clients by harnessing the power of data, inventory accuracy & visibility, process re-engineering, and Artificial Intelligence. JP is a regular contributor to leading retail publications on the value of Inventory Accuracy and Visibility and has been a guest speaker and keynote at multiple conferences around the world. Meet your hosts, helping you cut through the clutter in retail & retail tech:Ricardo Belmar, a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Influencer for 2023, 2022 & 2021, RIS News Top Movers and Shakers in Retail for 2021, advisory council member at George Mason University's Center for Retail Transformation, and director partner marketing for retail & consumer goods at Microsoft.Casey Golden, CEO of Luxlock, and RETHINK Retail Top Retail Influencer for 2023. Obsessed with the customer relationship between the brand and the consumer. After a career on the fashion and supply chain technology side of the business, now slaying franken-stacks and building retail tech!Includes music provided by imunobeats.com, featuring Overclocked, E-Motive, and Swag, Tag, And Brag from the album Beat Hype, written by Hestron Mimms, published by Imuno. The Retail Razor ShowFollow us on Goodpods: https://bit.ly/TRRSgoodpodsFollow us on Instagram: https://bit.ly/TRRSinstaFollow us on Threads: https://bit.ly/TRRSthreadsFollow us on Twitter: https://bit.ly/TwRRazorConnect with us on LinkedIn: https://bit.ly/LI-RRazorSubscribe on YouTube: https://bit.ly/RRShowYouTubeSubscribe on Apple Podcasts: https://bit.ly/RetailRazorShowRetail Razor Show Episode Page: https://bit.ly/RRShowPodHost → Ricardo Belmar,Follow on Twitter - https://bit.ly/twRBelmarConnect on LinkedIn - https://bit.ly/LIRBelmarCo-host → Casey Golden,Follow on Twitter - https://bit.ly/twCaseyConnect on LinkedIn - https://bit.ly/LICasey
We return to our anywhere commerce theme for this season and shine a light on the future of in-car commerce! We're answering a very important question - Will shopping on the go become the most important commerce channel for product discovery? We'll dig into what's new and what's next for in-car product recommendation, BOPIS, and its impact on local search by meeting our latest Retail Transformer – Cynthia Hollen, CEO & co-founder of mavi.io! If you thought your mobile phone was all the mobile commerce you needed, you'll think again after listening to this episode. Join us as we uncover the connection between car manufacturers, consumers, retailers, and brands that will deliver a new way of shopping from the convenience of your car. Did we mention how this will automate your routine shopping habits? And did you know that retail media networks have an important role to play in your car? All this and more in a fully loaded podcast episode!Plus, we have the third topic in our new leadership segment– ‘Blade to Greatness'! In this segment, we invite a retail industry leader to offer one skill or trait that all retail executives need to become great leaders. Whether in stores or at corporate, we'll uncover valuable tips and advice that you can apply to your own retail career path. April Sabral, founder of retailu.ca, an online leadership development portal for field leaders and author of two books, The Positive Effect, and her latest, Incurable Positivity, joins us to share her valuable insights into an incredibly important skill every retail leader needs to master: why having a positive mindset is an advantage in growing your business!We're currently at No. 18 on the Feedspot Top 60 Best Retail podcasts list – if you enjoy our show, please consider giving us a 5-star review in Apple Podcasts and help us continue our climb up the Top 20! https://blog.feedspot.com/retail_podcasts/Join us in celebrating our latest top of the charts achievements on the Goodpods podcast player!#2 in the Top Indie Management Podcasts chart#9 in the Top Management Podcasts chart#7 in the Top Indie Marketing Podcasts chartsThank you Goodpods listeners! We love your support! Please continue giving us those 5-star ratings and send us your comments!Meet your hosts, helping you cut through the clutter in retail & retail tech:Ricardo Belmar, a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Influencer for 2023, 2022 & 2021, RIS News Top Movers and Shakers in Retail for 2021, advisory council member at George Mason University's Center for Retail Transformation, and director partner marketing for retail & consumer goods at Microsoft.Casey Golden, CEO of Luxlock, and RETHINK Retail Top Retail Influencer for 2023. Obsessed with the customer relationship between the brand and the consumer. After a career on the fashion and supply chain technology side of the business, now slaying franken-stacks and building retail tech!Includes music provided by imunobeats.com, featuring Overclocked, E-Motive, and Swag, Tag & Brag from the album Beat Hype, written by Hestron Mimms, published by Imuno. The Retail Razor ShowFollow us on Goodpods: https://bit.ly/TRRSgoodpodsFollow us on Twitter: https://bit.ly/TwRRazorConnect with us on LinkedIn: https://bit.ly/LI-RRazorSubscribe on YouTube: https://bit.ly/RRShowYouTubeSubscribe on Apple Podcasts: https://bit.ly/RetailRazorShowRetail Razor Show Episode Page: https://bit.ly/RRShowPodHost → Ricardo Belmar,Follow on Twitter - https://bit.ly/twRBelmarConnect on LinkedIn - https://bit.ly/LIRBelmarCo-host → Casey Golden,Follow on Twitter - https://bit.ly/twCaseyConnect on LinkedIn - https://bit.ly/LICasey
Amazon Book Whether your life is exactly where you want it to be or you are struggling to craft the kind of existence you crave, you are likely struggling with negative thoughts. We all do. After all, negativity is everywhere we turn whether it shows up as family concerns, political upheaval, or just dealing with our own inner turmoil. The power to control and direct your thinking is one of the greatest quests a person can embark upon. And the benefits that come with mastering your thoughts are immense and life-altering.In this book, April Sabral, author of "The Positive Effect," unlocks the secrets that have shaped her mindset from a negative perspective to a positive one. And it is that mindset that has rocketed her to enormous, worldwide success. You will learn a seven step process that can be completed in just seven days and then practiced for a lifetime. The results:Better mental and emotional health.Proven benefits to your physical wellbeingAttracting the people, resources and opportunities you desireMore happiness, mindfulness, and contentment.In this easy to read book lies the answers to many of the questions you have been asking about how to turn off the stream of negativity and open a wellspring of incurable positivity.
Welcome to The Voice of Retail podcast. My name is Michael LeBlanc, and I am your host, I believe in the power of storytelling to bring the retail industry to life. I'll bring insights, perspectives and experiences from some of the retail industry's most innovative and influential voices each week. This podcast is produced in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada.Veteran retailer April Sabral is back on the podcast to tell us about her new second book, "Incurable Positivity." She talks about her seven-step process, which can be completed in just seven days and then practiced for a lifetime, to generate better physical and emotional health, proven benefits to your physical well-being, attract the people, resources and opportunities you desire, and create more happiness, mindfulness, and contentment. April also shares her advice for retailers as they work to bring new people into the business and, importantly, keep their talent engaged and loyal.About AprilApril Sabral served as a senior executive and has worked in retail for over 30 years, leading sales and operations teams on three continents, including the UK, USA, and CANADA working for brands such as; Paul Smith, Apple, Starbucks, Gap, Banana Republic, Holt Renfrew, Laura Canada, Armani Exchange, and DAVIDsTEA. Working her way up after being kicked out of home at 17 from a PT sales job to a Senior Vice President of 300 stores. April put the name on the cup back in 2000 as a Starbucks Manager, she has always created positive change that rippled throughout organizations which she attributes to her success.In 2018, April decided to take all of her expertise and experience and founded retailu.ca an online on-demand leadership development portal for field leaders. retailu develops leadership competencies through micro-sized learning modules and practical activities that store teams can integrate into their week to develop the necessary skills for leading people. Read reviews HERE.She then went on to study and achieved multiple coaching certifications, such as John C. Maxwell, The World Association of business coaching, and is now a member of the Forbes coaching council. She was named one of the emerging leaders to look out for in the Marques Who's Who directory in 2019.Following this April wrote her first book and launched April Sabral leadership, introducing leadership tools such as self-coaching cards and a self-development workbook to accompany her book 'The Positive Effect". April now coaches, speaks and facilitates sessions on leadership, specifically the power of positive leadership. In 2023 April was named one of the top retail influencers by RETHINK retail in 2022 and 2023, a global media organization and is often asked for her perspective on retail stores, trends and the power of leadership.Aprils current clients include Jimmy Choo, L'Oreal, Victoria Secrets to name a few.April is currently studying her bachelors in Metaphysics with the University of Sedona. About Michael Michael is the Founder & President of M.E. LeBlanc & Company Inc. and a Senior Advisor to Retail Council of Canada and the Bank of Canada as part of his advisory and consulting practice. He brings 25+ years of brand/retail/marketing & eCommerce leadership experience with Levi's, Black & Decker, Hudson's Bay, Today's Shopping Choice and Pandora Jewellery. Michael has been on the front lines of retail industry change for his entire career. He has delivered keynotes, hosted fire-side discussions with C-level executives and participated worldwide in thought leadership panels. ReThink Retail has added Michael to their prestigious Top Global Retail Influencers list for 2023 for the third year in a row. Michael is also the president of Maven Media, producing a network of leading trade podcasts, including Canada's top retail industry podcast, The Voice of Retail. He produces and co-hosts Remarkable Retail with best-selling author Steve Dennis, now ranked one of the top retail podcasts in the world. Based in San Francisco, Global eCommerce Leaders podcast explores global cross-border issues and opportunities for eCommerce brands and retailers. Last but not least, Michael is the producer and host of the "Last Request Barbeque" channel on YouTube, where he cooks meals to die for - and collaborates with top brands as a food and product influencer across North America.
Retail is the heartbeat of a thriving economy and community, and our guest's mission is to inspire a new era of leadership, one that teaches leaders to value their most precious asset, their people. In this episode, host CMA's David Ciullo discusses with April Sabral, author of her new book The Positive Effect: A Retail Leaders Guide to Changing the World.April shares her personal journey, lessons learned, and how to lead with a positive attitude against all the odds.
Andrew is solo this week and joined by fellow retail influencers April Sabral and Ron Thurston to talk about their current happenings and past experiences on the retail front line.
The Positive Effect - A retail leaders guide to changing the world
Lynn Mione is a seasoned retail leader who enormously impacted the people and businesses she leads. In this interview, Lynn shares her most memorable mentors and what she learned from them. She also shares some wisdom about growing from a Sales Person to a Senior Vice President, who now owns her own consulting practice. After a couple of decades of leading retail brands and teams, Lynn is now public speaking, coaching, and consulting, taking all of her knowledge of running her own wine bar and building a business to assist others who dream of owning a business. You can reach Lynn at www.lynnmione.com and by calling her on 516 974 3599. We enjoyed Lynn's energy and mentorship during this lively, positive discussion with host April Sabral. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/april477/support
April Sabral is the founder and CEO of retailu, an online, on-demand leadership development platform for retail professionals. She is also the author of The Positive Effect, where she details her journey working in retail. In the episode today, we talk about the biggest lessons April has to share about leadership in the retail industry, including her ACT model that she uses to teach retail professionals how to build strong teams. Topics discussed: April's background and about retailu About April's book, the Positive Effect The ACT model and how it helps you build a strong team in the retail industry. Biggest leadership lessons from all of April's work in the retail space Why being nice actually helps you get your way in life Riding the highs and lows of day-to-day working in retail Managing conflict and difficult conversations as a leader Staying focused on the most important asset in your store - people
S1E13 – Razor's Edge: The Season 1 Finale!Welcome to Season 1, Episode 13 of The Retail Razor Show – the season one finale!It's been an amazing opening season for the show, but now we have reached the Razor's Edge – the end of our first season! Ready to finish with a bang? We've got a special guest host – yes, that's right, guest host – Liza Amlani, principal and founder of Retail Strategy Group and The Merchant Life newsletter!Liza turns the tables on our regular hosts, Ricardo Belmar and Casey Golden, to hold a mid-year check in on their Top 10 Predictions for 2022 from Episode 4. Then, Liza walks our guests through highlights from throughout the season, remembering great moments with Andy Laudato, COO of The Vitamin Shoppe, Ron Thurston, author of Retail Pride and host of the Retail in America tour and podcast, and Gautham Vadakkepatt, director of the Center for Retail Transformation at George Mason University. Listen in to see if your favorite moments from Season 1 made it to the Razor's Edge!Have you heard the news! We're up to #20 on the Feedspot Top 60 Retail podcasts list, so please keep those 5-star reviews in Apple Podcasts coming! With your loyal help, we'll be moving our way up the Top 20 in no time! Leave us a review and we'll mention you in a future episode! https://blog.feedspot.com/retail_podcasts/Meet your hosts turned guests, helping you cut through the clutter in retail and retail tech:I'm Ricardo Belmar, a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Influencer for 2022 & 2021, RIS News Top Movers and Shakers in Retail for 2021, a Top 12 ecommerce influencer, advisory council member at George Mason University's Center for Retail Transformation, and lead partner marketing advisor for retail & consumer goods at Microsoft.And I'm Casey Golden, CEO of Luxlock. Obsessed with the customer relationship between the brand and the consumer. I've spent my career on the fashion and supply chain technology side of the business. Now I slay franken-stacks!The Retail Razor ShowFollow us on Twitter: https://bit.ly/TwRRazorConnect with us on LinkedIn: https://bit.ly/LI-RRazorJoin our club on Clubhouse: http://bit.ly/RRazorClubListen to us on Callin: https://bit.ly/RRCallinSubscribe on YouTube: https://bit.ly/RRShowYouTubeSubscribe on Apple Podcasts: https://bit.ly/RetailRazorShowRetail Razor Show Episode Page: https://bit.ly/RRShowPodHost → Ricardo Belmar,Follow on Twitter - https://bit.ly/twRBelmarConnect on LinkedIn - https://bit.ly/LIRBelmarRead my comments on RetailWire - https://bit.ly/RWRBelmarCo-host → Casey Golden,Follow on Twitter - https://bit.ly/twCaseyConnect on LinkedIn - https://bit.ly/LICaseyRead my comments on RetailWire - https://bit.ly/RWCaseyTRANSCRIPTS1E13 Razor's Edge: The Season 1 Finale![00:00:00] Introduction[00:00:00] Liza Amlani: Hello, retail, razor listeners. Welcome to the season one grand finale episode. As you can tell, I'm not one of your usual hosts. I'm Liza Amlani principal and co-founder of retail strategy group and the merchant life newsletter. And I am your guest host today where I'll be turning the tables on your usual host and interviewing them.[00:00:41] So let's bring them in Ricardo Belmar and Casey golden, Casey and Ricardo. Thank you so much for having me guest host today.[00:00:48] Ricardo Belmar: Hey, Liza, it's awesome to have you here.[00:00:50] Casey Golden: So amazing to have you off of Twitter for a moment, on the podcast.[00:00:55] Liza Amlani: Of course we're, we're changing. We're changing it[00:00:57] Ricardo Belmar: Of[00:00:57] Liza Amlani: little bit. so how does it feel being on the other side of the mic today?[00:01:02] Casey Golden: It's a little different, somehow it doesn't feel like being a guest on somebody else's podcast. So it's a little bit strange, [00:01:07] but, [00:01:08] this was one of our most popular topics. So[00:01:10] Ricardo Belmar: That's true. Yeah, that's true. I mean, I, I would kinda say the same thing. It's a little, a little weird, not being the one, asking the questions like we usually do on, on the show. But this will be fun. This will be something different. And you're totally right. It doesn't feel the same as being a guest on somebody else's podcast.[00:01:24] So this will be an interesting one this time around.[00:01:26] Liza Amlani: Well, I'm excited to get you guys in the hot seat. So let's dive in. First I'm gonna run through the top 10 predictions you guys made in episode four. And we'll consider this a mid-year check-in. And just because I wanna keep you guys on your toes cuz you know, that's how I roll. I'm gonna keep score on whose predictions are performing better.[00:01:44] Nothing like a little competition to mix things up.[00:01:47] Ricardo Belmar: Well, this could get ugly, then Casey's so super competitive. it's a good thing. We're all remote. And there's no risks of things being thrown around the room.[00:01:55] Casey Golden: Yeah. Well, I mean, maybe not your room I think it's pretty obvious who's gonna have the, have the better record, but there's a reason you know, Ricardo and I are on here. I mean, I think we had a few times where we're like, no, you have to change it. Cuz we can't have everything the same. so.[00:02:12] Liza Amlani: well, this is definitely gonna be better than I expected. I love it. Okay, so let's not get ahead of ourselves. And the second part, I'm also gonna ask you both what your favorite parts of the season were, and a few other surprise questions about the season. So let's get started with the season one finale.[00:02:31] Revisiting the Top 10 Predictions for 2022 [00:02:31] Liza Amlani: Okay. The first prediction was about retail media networks. Ricardo, let's start with you.[00:02:36] Ricardo Belmar: Well, I think this one's definitely a winner because let's see, since we did episode four, there must be at least, I don't know, like another 50 retail media networks that have been announced by retailers this year. I don't know ranging from what. Like ulta beauty hadn't been announced when we recorded that.[00:02:49] That's the one that everybody wanted to talk about. I mean, just about, everybody that's either a a big box retailer. I mean, a bunch of specialty ones, that maybe we wouldn't have expected. I think this one's just continuing to grow, so I'm thinking I'm good on that one.[00:03:02] Liza Amlani: Okay, Casey, let's talk about brick, expansions. I love this one, cuz you know, I'm a big fan of physical retail. [00:03:08] Casey Golden: yeah, and I kind of focus on digital these days. So it's kind of nice to pop into bricks every once in a while. It's where we all started, right? [00:03:16] there was barely an internet.[00:03:18] not saying that anybody's old here, but you know, there wasn't very many commerce stories in the beginning, so the passion started on the floor. It's been interesting with Amazon's new, they're still kind of expanding on these, these in stores, reimagining the shopping and buying experience. I've actually seen a lot more traction in that, you know, with all of these tech enabled spaces and a lot more experimenting.[00:03:45] So, I mean, I think we kind of nailed that this is really going to be a tech enabled opportunity for a lot of bricks and changing the traditional big box. For more entertaining showrooms kind of tagged Glossier as the winner. There's been a lot of changes over there too. So there's a lot of opportunity here for somebody, for a whole group of people to really win on bricks.[00:04:07] Liza Amlani: Definitely. I also just placed a Glossier order yesterday.[00:04:11] Social commerce and live streaming, Ricardo., [00:04:14] Ricardo Belmar: Oh, this is S definitely one of my favorite topics. Still may, maybe second, only the retail media networks. I think it's still growing, right? I guess one of the big things in the prediction I talked about was this idea that retailers would start relying more on their store associates as the live streamers, as the way of really promoting the whole idea of, of live shopping that way. And I think overall, this one's still building momentum and, and gaining steam. all the social media networks are certainly still putting out more features what Twitter added a new shopping capabilities, which maybe we wouldn't have expected Twitter to do.[00:04:46] In episode 12, we even talked about Pinterest and, and their new capabilities. So I think there's a lot happening there. And if anything, maybe hasn't come true yet, but I'm gonna still hold out hope here for later in the year is when we start seeing more frontline store associates doing the live streams, and maybe that's picking up steam, I think in more of a, a one to one kind of shopping experience versus a one to many. But I still think that we're gonna see that. I just think it's a natural extension and we might see it first coming from smaller retailers. I, I think because it's easier for them to be more nimble with that and get somebody recording and going live whereas big retailers are just naturally have this motion where they're gonna want to go big and, have big production values and bring in lots of equipment.[00:05:25] And that's gonna slow them down a bit. But I think we'll still see it happen.[00:05:28] Liza Amlani: Yeah, I think[00:05:29] Casey Golden: Yeah. I mean, I. But I put a lot of emphasis on TikTok commerce, because I've been watching that [00:05:35] beta program since[00:05:36] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah. Yeah.[00:05:37] Casey Golden: Asia and then pulling out of the us and Europe last week, that announcement I think it's, gonna probably be better for smaller brands than the big ones, because TikTok would've been that commerce channel.[00:05:50] So who's to know. [00:05:52] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah, I think there's still plenty of startups coming up too, that I, I see focusing on, on live streaming. So if I was gonna add something, it would be how things turn out between the big social media platforms versus these dedicated livestream platforms that are mostly driven by startups and how retailers are gonna adopt one versus the other.[00:06:09] And, and maybe we'll seem do both because it just kind of makes sense to have one off your own website and not totally rely on, you know, a Facebook channel.[00:06:16] Liza Amlani: Oh, for sure. When we were at the retail innovation show, there were, I think core site had partnered with a live streaming platform, which was super interesting, but I feel like they weren't retailers. So it'd be interesting to see when retailers actually merge with live streamers and partner together to, to have the best CU customer experience[00:06:35] Casey personal shopping. I love this one.[00:06:38] Casey Golden: I'm obviously I'm biased. [00:06:40] So, brownie points here, customer expectations. I mean, I thought that they were high during the pandemic. [00:06:47] They're almost unachievable at the moment. Shoppers are no longer content with that simple transactional purchase outside of like commodity goods. And we, we saw a lot of innovation with the associate led shopping and it went big.[00:07:03] but I think that there's like a lot of rebuilds when it comes down to the tech on actually operationalizing. And really bringing that in-store experience online and working with customers remotely. We've seen a lot of team, a lot of brands building out specific dedicated frontline staff teams, but putting them online and building virtual teams to really have, you know Trusted product expert or that sales associate being able to, to help them shop and, and build that relationship.[00:07:33] I'm gonna still betting in that we're gonna see a lot more of it. [00:07:36] Liza Amlani: I think [00:07:36] so, too. [00:07:37] Casey Golden: with like, yeah, I mean, we, have to alleviate all of the mundane tasks that these sales associates have to deal with in order to manage these customers. And make sure that they don't lose their jobs. The sheer volume of online traffic and then trying to provide a personal shopping experience. I think everybody said that it was, this personal shopping shop with the stylist's going into client telling, and that's gonna be new platforms. It's working so. I think it's, it's really exciting to see the brands put this talent at the forefront of the narrative and start giving them software.[00:08:15] Liza Amlani: I love that you brought up client telling because I started on the shop floor and I definitely had a book that I used to, you know, bring to, to Harrods. That's where I worked in one of my, one of my store roles. And that book went everywhere with me. And that was my client telling software was manual pen and paper and technology would've definitely changed the game.[00:08:37] Ricardo, let's talk about the shopper experience.[00:08:40] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah, I think, you know, it technology and in-store experience. I mean, they're continuing down that March to converge. . And bring in more and more things into the store. We've got this year more examples of computer, vision and AI. You know, just look at Amazon's new style store and what they're doing there.[00:08:55] Some people like it, some not so much, but I think the, the point is we're seeing more and more experiments and more and more attempts to try things out. I think I mentioned when we first talked about this, we talked a little more about where we're AR and VR platform is gonna play in store.[00:09:09] I don't think we've seen as much with that. Although, I mean, I think there's more AR things happening. I'm I'm. More and more things happening around trying to improve fit in apparel. . It's always a challenge there. But to me, this is all about finding more and more technology in the store, but not in the way of the shopping experience, which makes it so much of a better experience and that we have people wanting to do more shopping in store.[00:09:32] Right now we've gotten past this idea that online was just gonna totally shut down physical experiences. And, and we're seeing that we're back to back to the norm there. For the most part, I think we'll just see more and more cashierless checkout, more shelf scanning types of. Technologies, whether it's robots or IOT sensors, we're gonna see more and more scan and go.[00:09:51] So I think this one's moving along, maybe not as fast as I, I would've expected at the beginning of the year when we talked about it. But that to me has more to do with retail is wanting to be cautious about some of these investments versus desire to do them at all. So I think it's all still happening.[00:10:05] Liza Amlani: Casey by now pay later.[00:10:07] Casey Golden: Oh, it gets hotter, then the bubble bursts. I'm a big believer and don't spend more than you have, but you know, Regulators are there they're coming. I read all my regulators. All I hear is Warren G [00:10:20] Liza Amlani: I love it. Now I have Warren G in my head. Good song.[00:10:24] Casey Golden: I know, right. We should all [00:10:25] have [00:10:26] Liza Amlani: I know[00:10:27] Casey Golden: God, good times. Good times. I think one day we'll look back at, buy now, pay later and say good times. It's, it's been a, they've been getting a lot of traction making, purchases, lack consumer protections and and they can really make hassle free returns 30% APR with just crazy, crazy APR rates.[00:10:50] There's easier ways to, block out these payments and they've been productive for all the brands. I mean, I don't know if you can even find a website that doesn't offer by now pay later. But I also think it's a very American thing. We are like, we invented the credit card, right? So whether or not it's consumer. So whether or not it's good for the consumer, it's been really good for businesses. But I think that there's gonna be a little bit more regulation and consumer protections on it to really make sure that, when you make a purchase for, $300, it's not gonna cost you three grand. cuz there's been some. Some, some more predatory behavior in this space, but Klarna has really stepped up their game and providing really interesting product discovery in their app rewards programs. And, you know, they recently just bought hero which was a personal shopping app. So they're offering, you know, just looking at the customer journey from start to finish and, you know, trying to set the.[00:11:50] Up to be more than just a payment system or at least feel like it. Right. So I think the competition's gonna get tougher and they're gonna have to be more interesting to branch out from the regulation, I think, [00:12:04] Ricardo Belmar: acquired or merge or combining something's gonna happen.[00:12:07] I don't think it's gonna keep on this growth path. [00:12:10] Casey Golden: ricardo, I'm really interested on your, thoughts on that too. [00:12:13] Ricardo Belmar: Oh, I mean you on, on buy now pay later. You pretty much had me at regulators.[00:12:19] Casey Golden: and I've used it once as an experiment. It's just like, well,[00:12:22] Ricardo Belmar: yeah. yeah. I, I, I mean, I, I think the very first thing we said back in, in that episode, on that one, right? The, the, it gets hotter and then the bubble burst, I think we're, we're just about, at that point, in my opinion, and there was more and more folks looking. Just what you said, right? The predatory terms, the insane APRs, and it's on a path to have an impact, right.[00:12:46] To put people into more and more depth when they don't need to be. So I, I don't know. I, I just, I think it's interesting that we see. The BPL companies trying to add more services to their offering that's not part of the core idea right. Of buy now pay later so that their business isn't totally dependent on it.[00:13:03] And I dunno, in some ways, this is one of these things where it was a huge bubble, but at the end of the day, I mean, How hard is it to replicate by now pay later functionality for a payments company. So where's the differentiator for all these guys to stay in business? I think , the bubble , has to burst.[00:13:17] Liza Amlani: And when we think about Ricardo, this is one for you, the analytics. AI and machine learning and sustainability and traceability and merchandising returns and predictive analytics, all this stuff that I love to talk about from a merchant perspective. Let's talk about your prediction around this.[00:13:33] Ricardo Belmar: . So in, in that one I saw that we're just gonna, so, so much more automation. A lot of this technology being used to remove all the mundane and tedious tasks that store employees have to deal with. And, and there are so many new tools coming out with that. I I've been working with a number of different companies now who have new technologies, just for that to make the life easier for those frontline teams.[00:13:55] And then just looking at returns, returns is becoming an even bigger problem, I think now than it was at the beginning of the year. And I see more technology being thrown at how to solve returns, not in terms of what do you do when somebody wants to return something, but what can you do preventively to make it so that people don't need to buy three versions of the same thing to see which one's gonna be the right one and return the other two. Now there's ways that AI machine learning can help with that analysis. And I think we're seeing solutions that do that. I've seen more retailers implement those and they're seeing tangible changes, where we're seeing reductions of returns in double digit percentages, which is, is obviously going to be meaningful to their sales numbers. You know, think sustainability has just continued down a march , I think more and more news coming out where people start to question some brands as to, are they really engaging in those sustainability practices they've been talking about? Or is there, are they doing one thing in with their right hand, but the left hand's doing something else.[00:14:50] It kind of works against that sustainability. So to me that says that people are paying more attention to sustainability is starting to matter more which I see as a positive and, and again, I think this is one where , without technology, none of the brands are gonna be able to solve this in a, in a meaningful enough way that's gonna accomplish, the dual purpose goal, which is to demonstrate to their customers that they are engaging in sustainable practices, but at the same time, not do it in a manner that's gonna make their cost skyrocket and make them unprofitable.[00:15:17] So I think that that's still happening. So I think that's on a good, good March. Predictive analytics. I mean, I, I'm always still surprised when you see retailers show you that, oh, they're still doing their forecasting on a spreadsheet in Excel versus using something more, you know, more appropriately let's say size for, for their business that allows them to, to leverage AI in a better way.[00:15:36] And I mean, yes, during the pandemic, all these systems tended to, to create more problems and solutions because nobody let's face it, could have the right model that was gonna predict what was gonna be a shortage and, and factor in the supply chain challenges and all that. But now, now those models are starting to get worked in and now[00:15:53] some of the companies I've been working with are finding that the real reason those solutions led them down the wrong path is because the people that were reading the results were taking different actions than they probably should have been. So it was less the technology as it was the human intervention, that didn't wanna accept what the technology was saying.[00:16:08] Because they felt that, you know, that was gonna be a different result. So I, I think that's all working itself out. In some ways I think this is one of the , most exciting technology areas in retail because it has the potential to have so much change, even if it's more behind the scenes and most consumers don't see this, it's not obvious to you if you walk into a retailer store.[00:16:26] But there's so much of this behind the scenes, it has to happen to make the business work. I, just think it's nowhere to go, but up.[00:16:32] Casey Golden: Yeah, I'm gonna just add a point on there just to kind of leave our listeners with something to think about. We've been measuring the wholesale business for like a hundred years. This is really the very beginning of taking direct to consumer analytics. As we grow these business models out on selling direct to the consumer, there is so much data, so more data than we've ever had.[00:16:58] And so we're gonna be able to get so an amount of knowledge from this over the next, like three years. That we've never seen or understood about our brand or sales. And I think it's, I, I agree, Ricardo, it's super exciting. I mean, you can just geek out on this[00:17:16] Ricardo Belmar: Oh, oh yeah. There's we're gonna, we're already keeping those data scientists employed for a long time.[00:17:23] Liza Amlani: I, I definitely geek out. Yes. I definitely geek out on all that. You know, coming from that merchants and product creation space, the challenge I find is that, we have all this data and we always have so had so much data from loyalty programs and even client telling, but are we really using it to drive? You know, product decisions, assortment decisions. So it will be very interesting to see, you know, in the next three years, I think we should come back to this one in three years and let's see where we are. Let's talk [00:17:52] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah, I think, I [00:17:52] Casey Golden: We got a [00:17:53] Ricardo Belmar: safely put this one on every top 10 list.[00:17:55] Liza Amlani: Oh yeah. [00:17:57] Casey Golden: Yeah, no, we've [00:17:59] Liza Amlani: exactly. Well, let's, let's talk about rapid [00:18:02] delivery. [00:18:03] Casey Golden: Yeah, rapid delivery. [00:18:05] Goodness gracious. Does access delivery from any company you're Canada. So[00:18:14] Liza Amlani: I know I do. I know. Come on. No, no, no, no, no. Getting here. Maybe not two hours, but definitely we're getting[00:18:26] Casey Golden: I feel yeah, I mean, Rapid delivery gets a rapid shakeout. I mean, too many popped up during the pandemic. It was an incredible opportunity to force, like for force adoption, for consumers to shop buying things online that they, they never even thought was possible. The amount of grocery online. I mean, without the pandemic, would you ever think like rural areas are getting.[00:18:51] We're getting, you know, two to same day delivery. But we asked in the beginning of the year, is this really sustainable? And I think the, the market has decided that it's not cost effective. And we'll continue to see a lot of acquisitions and consolidation M and a potential here with like micro fulfillment and last mile delivery.[00:19:10] Very hot space. A major's gonna win. , but there's been a lot of adjustments here, especially this year with even Uber eats. They're not, incredible how long it takes. Amazon canceled their two hour delivery and metropolitan areas. And a lot of them grocery delivery services have ceased to exist in a lot of you know, non-chain grocery stores that was, that were leveraging it.[00:19:32] I think, we're gonna have to figure out how you can afford to have[00:19:35] last mile. I'm very curious on how consumers feel about having this amazing service and then it going away and how that affects brand loyalty. So I think there's still a lot to watch here. There's a big opportunity. But it's gonna take a lot of money.[00:19:48] Liza Amlani: Yeah. And it's almost like we haven't really seen who pays for this. Who's P and L is this really impacting[00:19:56] right. [00:19:56] Ricardo Belmar: I don't know that anybody has the model down yet, to make money off of it because it's kind of this thing where, you know, the. The faster you want to deliver it automatically means the closer you have to stage it to the customer to have a chance, of getting it there. I mean like two hours, we had like the quick commerce brands in 15 minute delivery in cities.[00:20:14] I mean, if you're gonna do that, then you have to have so many different staging locations and fulfillment centers and you've gotta have the best predictive analytics to know exactly what are the items everybody's likely to order that they want in 15 minutes. And, and then you end up. All the, the providers say, well, we hope to make this work with larger basket sizes, but okay.[00:20:33] You don't really want a big order because then if you're trying to deliver it in 15 minutes, it takes you too many minutes to pick and pack the order to get what I wanted to get it to someone. . If it's more than a handful of items. So that means, okay, if you can't get your volume based on basket size, you've gotta have it on number of orders.[00:20:48] Okay. But then you mean more labor, right? Or, or more automation. And either one of those has a cost implication. So you still need to. Work that out. So I don't know. It just doesn't seem like it's sustainable. And then at the end of the day, I think Casey, you asked the right question. What do consumers really need to have delivered in less than two hours?[00:21:05] Casey Golden: my[00:21:06] Ricardo Belmar: often enough to make a business out of it.[00:21:09] Casey Golden: Yeah. I mean, I'm, I'm, I'm telling I'm, I'm probably oversharing here, but like the amount of times I ordered a chocolate donut from dunk and dunking donuts around like 11 to 1:00 AM in the morning from Uber eats during the pandemic is ridiculous. but it cost me literally nothing. Now, if I wanted to order that same donut for just to hit a craving at like midnight. It would cost me like $32. Like there are so many fees attached to that now that I'm like, yeah, I don't need,[00:21:39] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah. Yeah. Do you really need it delivered right now? Is it really worth it?[00:21:43] Casey Golden: yeah. So, I mean, it's those impulses versus primary way of going grocery shopping. So I think that there's, the volume has, has definitely adjusted the purpose of what people are buying the basket size. And then people are out and about, and they, you it's much easier to swing by the grocery store on your way home. [00:22:01] Liza Amlani: Exactly. [00:22:02] Casey Golden: that just takes your volume away from your pricing.[00:22:04] Liza Amlani: Yeah. And speaking of pricing and volume , I'm not sure if this is a segue, but Ricardo we're, we're almost done. We're at number nine, low code revolution. Tell us more.[00:22:15] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah. So I, I kind of hang my hat on this one as , the hidden secret that let's retailers figure out how to do things that used to take them six months and do it in six weeks because you can't wait for an army of your in-house developers to come up with a brand new system for you for any task, like you used to pre pandemic. Now you need things done right away and you wanna build into the schedule, how often you're gonna iterate on that solution to make it better and better. And if there's any technology that makes that doable, it it's everything around low code technologies where you're visually building applications, creating reports and dashboards to keep everybody informed.[00:22:49] If I just go by, what I hear from my Microsoft colleagues who are doing these deployments with customers, it's like every single opportunity they have involves some kind of low code technology aspect. And most of the partners that I work with all have some sort of an implementation in their solution that lets a retailer customize something via a visual kind of development platform.[00:23:10] So I'm beginning to feel like there isn't any technology that's gonna be put in front of a retailer that doesn't have a low-code design component to it just to make life easier for the retailer and to gain adoption.[00:23:19] Liza Amlani: Casey number 10. This is our last one. Everyone web three metaverse crypto NFTs. I don't think you know anything about this space, right? Casey. You actually teach me a lot. I'll [00:23:31] Casey Golden: Does anybody like really does anybody? I mean, I think I I've, every conversation I've ever been on is like, well, I'm not an expert. I'm like, come on. None of us are like, we're all learning together. Prepare for some whiplash. It's getting interesting and web three's here to stay. It's not, it's not just one thing.[00:23:47] We've got an incredibly passionate creator community and consumers are, curious, and we're getting a pretty rapid adoption rate. And, and adding a lot of payment opportunities for commerce and making this bridge. Commerce is going to drive this space to turn it into something that's here to last the biggest challenges are gonna be around data interoperability.[00:24:14] Retail is famous for silos and web three developers are, are staying aligned with that methodology. So hopefully hopefully we can all break that down. And a lot of companies, thousands of companies have come together to create standards for web three From file sizes to ethics. So I think that that's really exciting.[00:24:34] I've never seen companies come together quite like this. So fast in a market to say, we want this to stay. We need to work together. Let's not compete. So that's pretty interesting and brands are experimenting. Brands that typically do not experiment, period, are experimenting and they are supporting very large global initiatives to accept crypto at their stores, to launch NFTs and collaborate with content creators, or artists that are not in house, which is another really great, opportunity. That's just rare. So I wanna see a lot more brands build community and really see what they can turn this space into. It's not going anywhere. I can say that. It's definitely not going anywhere. I think it could make all of our predictions in some way. There's probably some piece that could be innovated by using some piece of web three and make our lives a little bit easier and a little bit more, enjoyable, you know, from the consumer to the brand, there's an opportunity here. But we're, the brands are gonna have to experiment to figure out what piece is gonna be the way that they roll it out. So I'm excited about this space. Take it slow.[00:25:47] Liza Amlani: I'm excited too. I was actually in the the Soho Faragamo store a couple weeks ago, and I saw the the NFT station, I guess. And as a consumer, I was definitely fascinated. So I'm excited to, to see. More of what happens in that space. [00:26:05] well, I'm sure that everyone listening is wondering how the score turned out.[00:26:08] So now as a, an impartial judge and to friends, to you both, you know, I will say that I would say you guys are both pretty spot on. Do you think that there's there's anything that you should have predicted that, should have been on this list? I think that's a, that's an interesting question to ask you both.[00:26:26] Ricardo Belmar: that's a tough one. And if I were to pick anything, I would say the one thing we didn't, we came close to it, right in Casey's brick and mortar expansion. I don't know that we really talked about whether it was gonna be sort of this pendulum swing, between online commerce growth versus physical stores and just how much people were gonna rush back to stores this year and, and want to enjoy that physical shopping experience. And, and what that implication was towards, the trends the last two years where our e-commerce was just gonna take over everything. Which isn't to say that it's still, you know, moving ahead, it's not like it's gonna contract, it's gonna keep growing just that the pace is back to normal.[00:26:58] So maybe that's one that we didn't talk about that we, we could have gone a step further maybe in, in that one prediction, but that's the one that comes to my mind. [00:27:05] Casey Golden: Yeah. I mean, coming out, we spoke about it maybe a couple times throughout this entire season, knowing that when that pendulum swings, it's gonna come with a recession. And we didn't really dive in. I think we could have used an entire episode just to talk about. The timing, the impacts of all of this with some type of recession coming into play, because it was obvious the timing wasn't.[00:27:28] And so it aligning up our holiday season or the kickoff of the new year. You know, there's a lot of companies are expecting to hit their numbers this year because of holiday. So I think we could have definitely dived into a little bit more of the consumer behavior coming out of the [00:27:45] pandemic[00:27:45] Ricardo Belmar: yeah. [00:27:46] Casey Golden: say which one of these things is gonna be what a retailer is gonna need to make it through that recession [00:27:51] Ricardo Belmar: yeah, and closely relating to that, we didn't predict the, wonky supply chain problems that were been continuous right throughout this year still. Right. I don't think we would've back at the, be when we recorded that episode, would've predicted that oh yeah.[00:28:04] Target and Walmart , are not gonna figure out how to get their inventory turned straightened out and they're gonna end up stuck with too much product. Right. We would never [00:28:10] Casey Golden: is what we do, right? Like, why are we still having, why are we still having issues?[00:28:14] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah, exactly. [00:28:15] Casey Golden: yeah, I agree.[00:28:16] Season 1 Highlights[00:28:16] Liza Amlani: Well, you know, I'll say that it's definitely a merchandising strategy issue, but you know, nobody asked me let's, let's talk about some highlights from season one. So Ricardo, , which was your favorite clubhouse discussion? I love these by the[00:28:31] Ricardo Belmar: Ah, oh yeah. Oh yeah. We, we really enjoy these too. I, I have to say, I think my favorite one was the one we did with Andy Laudato COO of the vitamin shop from his book, fostering innovation and, and how to build that culture of innovation in your IT shop. I think that one was my favorite one, just because it was such a wide variety of topics that we cover.[00:28:50] I mean, we asked Andy about his project management style. We talked about, how that impacts the corporate culture. There was some pretty clever tidbits in there that he talked about in terms of, how to consider how you hire people to align to that culture of innovation.[00:29:05] He talked about his hierarchy of IT needs and how you can get to earn the privilege to innovate, which I think was really clever. And then, one of my favorite, if I'm gonna pick catch phrases to come out of the season, that one had one of my favorites, which was be a diode that Andy had.[00:29:19] If you remember that one where he said, as the team manager, you're a diode, you take all the negative things that come to the team, those stop with you as the team leader. And you don't pass those on, but when you get all the good comments, you don't keep those, you pass those on to your team so they can all benefit from the, from the praise.[00:29:34] That one should, there should be a t-shirt for that one.[00:29:35] Liza Amlani: I love it [00:29:36] Casey Golden: Yeah. I actually took a lot of quotes from Andy. I love his perspective of project management and how to get tech in and actually deployed rather than running so many projects simultaneously. Almost nothing gets done in three years. I really haven't quoted anybody as much as I've quoted Andy from these podcasts, he is a gem. So everybody rewind, go back to that episode and [00:30:02] take a listen. It was really good.[00:30:06] Liza Amlani: I love that episode too. Casey, I have a question for you. Who was your most memorable guest speaker and who surprised you the most? It's a double whammy question.[00:30:16] Casey Golden: Ron Thurston and it's for both of them. There's probably no coincidence. He's been, he's been in. More than more, no, less than three, three of our episodes. We kicked off with Ron. And, and once you hear Ron advocate for the frontline store teams, you just can't help, but gain a better understanding of the people working in those roles and also feel motivated to wanna improve the work environment for , these associates.[00:30:42] I knew of him. I had met him on zoom. But that conversation, that podcast, I just completely fell in love with him. And I had no idea he had so much passion for these people until we started talking and like, we didn't stop talking. It was season one, episode one season one, episode two. It was just continued to bring in Ron that, he has this platform, like his voice needed to be out there and share his stories.[00:31:10] He's an amazing human, so definitely made it to my most memorable[00:31:16] Liza Amlani: I love Ron too. I love watching where he's gonna be next on his Airstream tour. That is it's super cool. And now I want an Airstream. Obviously. I know that. Yes, we all want it. . [00:31:26] Ricardo Belmar: Exactly.[00:31:27] Casey Golden: I hope it turns into documentary.[00:31:31] Liza Amlani: I love it. What about you, Ricardo? , which guest would you say? Did you learn the most from.[00:31:35] Ricardo Belmar: So, I have sort of an interesting way to think of, of that one. So as far as where I learned the most from , I think it was on the episode that we call the sea of academia. We actually had a couple guests there and, and big big shocker. Ron was one of those guests on that episode, too.[00:31:49] But we also had Gotham Vadakkepatt. Who's the, director of the center for retail transformation at George Mason university. And I, I think that was the one where I learned the most from, because it had a very different view that. I think all of us that talk about retail all the time, we don't often talk about the educational aspect of it and how that plays a role in creating the next generation of retail leaders.[00:32:09] And I think in that episode, I learned a lot about different perspectives on how to look at that. You know, the thing that sticks in my mind and that one is when Gotham said at the beginning of one of his classes in the semester, he asked his students, how many of you work in retail right now?[00:32:22] It was something like a big percentage of his class raised their hand and said, yeah, they work in retail and then he asked them, well, how many of you think you want to pursue a career in retail and all the hands went down.[00:32:31] None of them wanted to. But then by the end of his class, when he brought in a series of guest speakers to talk about different career journeys in retail, in different areas that you can work in in the industry. When he asked the question again at the end, at least half those hands came back up.[00:32:44] People finally realized, oh, there really is something interesting. It's not just what they thought was a harsh experience, I guess, working in those stores. And, and to me, it kind of ties together what Casey was just saying about the episodes we did with Ron. And advocating for those frontline store teams and this kind of gives a different spin to it.[00:33:01] So I, I came away learning a lot from that one and how there's an opportunity to influence, those future generation of retail leaders through those educational programs and through those university programs that they're going through to get them to come up with a, different new perspective on the industry, which I think oftentimes people in retail get stuck in their ways. And they're just used to doing things a certain way and you need that , new, new set of ideas to, to change things up.[00:33:26] Casey Golden: Yeah. I mean, one in six people on the planet, work in retail in some capacity. And for there not to be a way for you to go to school or go to college or university or specialize. In retail or commerce. I mean, that's kind of mind blowing the amount of education that, and curriculums that are popping up now at major universities to focus on digital transformation and retail , is so hopeful.[00:33:52] I feel that this is actually going to be. I, I feel like it's really about being respected as a career and getting those good salaries, being able to attract top tier talent. We have big problems to solve, and it's nice to see the universities turn this into an actual specialty.[00:34:11] Liza Amlani: I totally agree. And it's interesting cuz I also, I went to fashion school and got my degree in fashion. And it's so interesting to see how the programs have evolved to include, you know, things like data scientists or material scientists or textile innovation. So I love that episode two. Now tell us, do you have any special plans for season two?[00:34:31] What can we look forward to?[00:34:33] Ricardo Belmar: We'll have some surprises. We've been talking to some folks about a couple of unique segments we may try and do in season two. I'll try not to give away too much, but there'll be some people who might be familiar to listeners from season one who may come back and some who, who will be new to come and gives kinda like a, I'll call it a data angle to our conversations where we'll have one of these guests come in on a segment and it'll be related to the topic.[00:34:56] They might have an interesting data point or a research statistic that has come up and we'll spend a couple minutes talking about how that has an impact on the topic that week. So I think that that'll kind of mix things up a bit. It's almost kind, if you think of an ask me anything type of scenario, except it'll focus around a specific data theme.[00:35:15] So that should be a, a clever one and we'll have a new theme. You know, we, some folks maybe didn't realize we had a theme to the episodes that we set for season one. There was a structure to it. We were focusing in on digital transformation and innovation and, and people.[00:35:30] Which I think was the unique spin that we brought to those other two areas. So we'll have a new theme which we're not gonna spoil for season two, but we'll we'll definitely have a trailer coming out soon to give everybody an idea of what we're thinking for season two and what to expect.[00:35:43] Liza Amlani: Casey, any last thoughts? [00:35:45] Casey Golden: Yeah, our training wheels are off. You know, this started as a, I miss talking to everybody and we all kind of jumped in a room in clubhouse when it was super cool. I don't think anybody's logged into clubhouse for several months. So pretty exciting that, you know, this is season two's gonna be fresh you know, fully planned on purpose in real time, and it's gonna be interesting to see how we started to really like where we are now. And bringing some incredible guests that didn't have a clubhouse invitation and[00:36:21] Liza Amlani: I know[00:36:22] Ricardo Belmar: there is that [00:36:23] Yeah. Yeah. [00:36:24] Liza Amlani: they were, they were [00:36:25] hard to come. [00:36:26] Casey Golden: They were hard to [00:36:27] Ricardo Belmar: yeah, For a while, right? yeah. [00:36:28] yeah. [00:36:29] Casey Golden: we had some really great guests that [00:36:31] Ricardo Belmar: yeah.[00:36:31] Casey Golden: two.[00:36:37] Ricardo Belmar: yeah, right. It took a while for them. Yeah.[00:36:41] Liza Amlani: Yeah.[00:36:42] Ricardo Belmar: So listeners can expect more of those like the retail transformers series that we kicked off with April Sabral we'll do more of those in season two with some unique guests.[00:36:50] Liza Amlani: That's awesome. Well, thank you both for having [00:36:53] Casey Golden: And flip the script on you. [00:36:56] Liza Amlani: oh yeah, you should. [00:36:57] Casey Golden: in.[00:36:58] Liza Amlani: I'd love that, but thank you so much for having me and allowing me to put, put you guys in the hot seat, cuz you know, I love that. And I can't wait to do this again [00:37:08] I will. I will talk about all things merchandising and the retail silos. We need to break those down.[00:37:15] Casey Golden: they're gonna crash.[00:37:20] Ricardo Belmar: with us, Liza. Oh yeah. [00:37:21] Casey Golden: it will happen.[00:37:22] Ricardo Belmar: That's right. That's right. [00:37:23] so, Casey, I think that means we're ready to wrap this one[00:37:26] Casey Golden: It's a full wrap goodbye to season one[00:37:29] Ricardo Belmar: and season two awaits. [00:37:30] Show Close[00:37:30] Casey Golden: if you enjoy our show, please consider giving us that special five star rating and review on apple podcasts. Smash that subscribe button in your favorite podcast player so you don't miss a minute. Want to know more about what we talked about today? Take a look at the show notes for handy links and more deets.[00:37:49] I'm your cohost Casey Golden.[00:37:51] Ricardo Belmar: And if you'd like to learn more about us, follow us on Twitter at casey c golden and ricardo underscore belmar, or find us on LinkedIn. Be sure and follow the show on LinkedIn and on Twitter at retail razor, and on our YouTube channel for videos of each episode and some bonus content. I'm your host, Ricardo Belmar.[00:38:06] Casey Golden: Thanks for joining us. [00:38:07] Ricardo Belmar: And remember there's never been a better time to be in retail. If you cut through the clutter.[00:38:14] Until next time, this is the retail razor show.
Retail is the heartbeat of a thriving economy and community, and our guest's mission is to inspire a new era of leadership, one that teaches leaders to value their most precious asset, their people.In this episode, host CMA's David Ciullo discusses with April Sabral, author of her new book The Positive Effect: A Retail Leaders Guide to Changing the World.April shares her personal journey, lessons learned, and how to lead with a positive attitude against all the odds.
S1E9 – Retail Transformers – April Sabral Welcome to Season 1, Episode 9 of The Retail Razor Show! With this episode we introduce a new series– Retail Transformers! Who are the people in retail changing how we look at the business, how we're operating, redefining and reimaging what retail is? These individuals are transformers in every sense – they truly are more than meets the eye! In this episode we meet April Sabral, CEO of RetailU, online training for the next generation of retail leaders, and author of the book, The Positive Effect, A Retail Leader's Guide To Changing The World. April shares with us her retail journey, what she has learned about leadership along the way, and how she applies that to train the next generation of retail leaders. If you're working with aspiring retail leaders, want to better understand what makes a great retail leader, or just want to learn how to grow your retail career to the net level – this episode is for you! Have you heard! Our podcast is staying strong on the Feedspot Top 60 Retail podcasts list! We're currently at #22, so please give us a 5-star review in Apple Podcasts if you like the show! With your help, we'll be on our way to a Top 20 spot! https://blog.feedspot.com/retail_podcasts/ Meet your hosts:I'm Ricardo Belmar, a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Influencer for 2022 & 2021, RIS News Top Movers and Shakers in Retail for 2021, a Top 12 ecommerce influencer, advisory council member at George Mason University's Center for Retail Transformation, and lead partner marketing advisor for retail & consumer goods at Microsoft. And I'm Casey Golden, CEO of Luxlock. Obsessed with the customer relationship between the brand and the consumer. I've spent my career on the fashion and supply chain technology side of the business. Now I slay franken-stacks! Together, we're your guides on the retail transformation journey. Whether you're thinking digital and online, mobile, or brick & mortar stores, we'll help you cut through the clutter! The Retail Razor ShowFollow us on Twitter: https://bit.ly/TwRRazorConnect with us on LinkedIn: https://bit.ly/LI-RRazorJoin our club on Clubhouse: http://bit.ly/RRazorClubListen to us on Callin: https://bit.ly/RRCallinSubscribe on YouTube: https://bit.ly/RRShowYouTubeSubscribe on Apple Podcasts: https://bit.ly/RetailRazorShowRetail Razor Show Episode Page: https://bit.ly/RRShowPod Host → Ricardo Belmar,Follow on Twitter - https://bit.ly/twRBelmarConnect on LinkedIn - https://bit.ly/LIRBelmarRead my comments on RetailWire - https://bit.ly/RWRBelmar Co-host → Casey Golden,Follow on Twitter - https://bit.ly/twCaseyConnect on LinkedIn - https://bit.ly/LICaseyRead my comments on RetailWire - https://bit.ly/RWCasey TRANSCRIPTS1E9 Retail Transformers - April Sabral[00:00:00][00:00:20] Introduction[00:00:20] Ricardo Belmar: Hello! Good morning. Good afternoon. And good evening, whatever time of day you're listening. Welcome. Welcome to season one episode nine of the retail razor show. I'm your host, Ricardo Belmar a RETHINK Retail top retail influencer and lead partner marketing advisor for retail and consumer goods at Microsoft.[00:00:35] Casey Golden: And I'm your co-host Casey Golden CEO of Luxlock Obsessed with the customer relationship between the brand and the consumer. I've spent my career on the fashion and supply chain technology side of the business. Now I slay Frank and stacks.[00:00:49] Ricardo Belmar: So Casey, this is a truly momentous episode for us. We finally are launching our Retail Transformers series.[00:00:56] Casey Golden: Yeah. I'm actually quite thrilled. We've been talking about how there are so many people in retail right now that are really changing how we look at the business, how we're operating and what we need to do next and so much more. This is such an exciting time for this industry and they are true transformers In every sense.[00:01:18] Ricardo Belmar: In fact one might say they are truly more than meets the eye.[00:01:22] Casey Golden: that was smooth.[00:01:23] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah, I'm pretty skilled at that, actually. So you can give me, give me any small moment to work in a cool eighties, pop culture reference. I am all in on that.[00:01:29] Casey Golden: I'm sure the appreciation will make it into the comments. Anyway, let's talk about our amazing first interviewee. April Sabral[00:01:37] Ricardo Belmar: April is absolutely amazing. As listeners will find out in this episode, she's really transforming how retail leadership is evolving. April's got such a wonderful perspective on how retail teams should be managed, how people should be treated and so much to say about what leadership looks like for a modern retailer.[00:01:55] Casey Golden: A hundred percent. I mean, I really can't think of a more important conversation to be having right now. So let's cut through the clutter and get right to the interview. So kickback or keep your eyes on the road and listen to our session with April Sabral, founder and CEO of Retail U online leadership training for retail managers and author of the book, the positive effect, retail leaders guide to changing the world.[00:02:19][00:02:19] April Sabral Interview[00:02:19] Ricardo Belmar: Welcome to the show April. It's great to have you here. We've been planning for this for some time and so glad to finally make it happen![00:02:29] April Sabral: Thanks. Yeah, I'm excited to be here.[00:02:31] Casey Golden: April, absolute pleasure. Just to get started, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and what you're focused on now? What brought you to this, this moment? And how do you see your role transforming leadership in retail?[00:02:44] April Sabral: Yeah. So I'm the founder and CEO of retail U which is an online leadership learning platform for field operators. After having a 30 year career in retail, working through the stores, all the different ranks, all the way up to vice president just really found an opportunity to build affordable leadership development.[00:03:03] And what I'm focused on now is really helping leaders transform their leadership in this new era of empathy and compassion and connecting with people. And so I've been focused on you know, getting retail U out there , along with the book that I just wrote introducing a new leadership methodology that I've used over my 30 year career.[00:03:23] And so I'm coaching and teaching that hour and doing a lot of leadership development coaching right now.[00:03:28] Casey Golden: That's great. I actually ordered it. I haven't read it yet. But we brought it over to like our head of talent and really super excited to, to read.[00:03:38] April Sabral: Oh, amazing. Thank you.[00:03:41] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah, I've been in the midst of reading it myself and I've been thoroughly enjoying it. I'm finding a lot of really interesting nuggets on I'm going to be popping a few of those in, as we, as we go to get more details from you because you've had such a really interesting journey.[00:03:55] I find just from reading the experience you've described in the book from all the various retail roles that you've had you know, like you said, just starting from, front lines in the store all the way to being VP and heading up stores. You mentioned a number of really valuable lessons that you learned along the way and particularly around managing people in retail. So I'd really love for you to kind of tell us a little bit about some of those , and maybe think of what kind of advice would you give to other retail employees on, on how to build their retail career and really growing into one of those retail management roles.[00:04:26] April Sabral: well, I think that, you know, along the way certainly when I started off in retail, I didn't think of it as a career choice. Right. I share a lot about that in the book. It was like a part-time job that I got when I[00:04:37] Ricardo Belmar: Right.[00:04:38] April Sabral: moving out of home. And it just, you know, Started providing me a way to, to pay for my bills and look after myself when I was younger.[00:04:46] And so, however, you know, I think that I was very fortunate because I worked for a huge brands back in the day at pivotal times for them when they were entering new markets. For example, like when Starbucks came to the UK and when the gap came to the UK, I happened to be there. And I was a part. That expunction and then moving to the U S with Starbucks and then to Canada with Banana Republic.[00:05:08] So I do think I had great opportunities along the way. The one thing I would say about retail, or if you're a manager or if you're not a manager and you're just a part-time sales person to really see it as an opportunity to build your people skills because your people skills are life skills, Right.[00:05:24] And retail, we teach people life skills, like how to problem solve, how to have confidence in speaking to people how to sell something even like, you know, in life, you've got to sell yourself every single day, whether you're in an, a job or whether you're an entrepreneur. So I think that there's just so many skills that you learn. And my journey along the way, I was fortunate, like I said, I worked for those mega brands back in the day and they had really good leadership development programs back then, they were really invested in their people.[00:05:50] This was before e-comm came about. So it was a really big focus on talent. And so, what, I've learned along the way is that if you continue to grow, develop your skills and invest in yourself, then you will have a great career and you can move up the ranks and get compensated for it. You know, frontline employees always see it as a job as like, it's not a great career choice because I think they're underpaid.[00:06:11] But once you start moving into manager multi-site and moving up, everything changes. So that's why I think it's a great career choice. And I also think that it's a huge career because you can move around the world with it. You know, it employs, millions of people. So I think we need to start looking at it a little bit differently.[00:06:28] And so I would say, work hard sign up for things. If there's different projects that you can get on or transformation happening within your organization, say, yes, I did that a lot. Like I moved around a lot. I was willing to take risks and move to different countries even, or different districts to just take on projects and get myself known.[00:06:49] And I was always really good with people. And so that just really helped me. I was one of the easiest people to manage, I would say, and the easiest, really easy person to get along with. And just, and that helped me deliver the results that they were asking of me. And so every time I moved up and took on more responsibility, the results would just keep growing.[00:07:07] So yeah, you have to deliver results, but you have to do that through a team of people.[00:07:12] Casey Golden: traditionally, it's pretty hard to make the jump from being on the floor and read. Into corporate, any advice there on how to make that.[00:07:24] April Sabral: Yeah.[00:07:24] There's not a lot of us that have done that, me and Ron, talk about that all the time and, and how we can help that in our industry continue to build that because there's so many great people in the field. I think it's about building those relationships in advance. Like in the book, I talk about an experience when I first got promoted from a district supervisor into a director role.[00:07:45] So that was that first experience of going from like field leadership, into working with corporate partners. And I had a lot of feedback given to me that wasn't super positive at the time. I had. Sells re results for the awards for the, you know, the four years leading up to that. So people saw me as very highly competitive and the team that I was going to assume didn't really want to work for me.[00:08:08] So I had to take some humble pie, take that feedback on and then realize that the relationships that I had, weren't just about the relationships with the people that report into me, but really the relationships that I worked alongside with. And so if you want to get promoted and you want to be successful and work with your corporate partners, you need to have those relationships in advance so that you can influence the things you need to influence.[00:08:33] And you have the backing because now it's not just about your team in the field, you have this huge team of support in the office. But if you don't know how to build those relationships, guess what? They're not going to help you. They don't know what your job is. So I think just building those relationships and networking with them, just like you would on LinkedIn, right?[00:08:51] Like network with your corporate partners and think about collaboration and, and don't think like, what are they doing and why are they rolling out this out to us and complain about them? Instead see yourself as a conduit to kind of help them help you and I think that's something that we really need to teach and build that bridge between the field and the head office.[00:09:10] Ricardo Belmar: of the things I noticed you, you mentioned quite a bit in the book that maybe gets lost sometimes in this industry is that a lot of the roles are defined as sort of a sales leadership role, but you point out many times in the book that you really need to see yourself as a people leader, not just a sales.[00:09:27] And I guess just based on what you just said, right? A lot of it has to do with how you interact with the people you're leading and the teams that are in the field. And as well as everyone around you, not just focusing on those sales performance numbers.[00:09:41] April Sabral: Yeah, a hundred percent. It's like, you know, we build relationships with our customers, right? Why do we do that? Because we want to get money out of them. And we want to have them coming back to us and feel good about the experience. And so it is sales is a relationship driven business. So if you want to sell your employees and get them to do something for you for the organization, well guess what, then you need to have a really strong relationship with them because every employee wants to feel three things from their boss that they're cared for, that they can trust them and that they they're going to help them do the job better. And that only comes from a relationship. So, I'm a very results driven leader. And so I had to learn to cook. You know, yes, the results really matter, but the results is an outcome of how you're leading your team. at the end of the day, people get up and come to work every day, wanting to do a good job and for the person that they work for. And if they don't like the person, they work for good luck getting results out of them. It's just not going to happen. You think about that in your own life, right?[00:10:41] Every time you've had a boss and you've loved them, you're like, oh, I love going to work. I want to do a good job. And when you have somebody that's just a pain. It just can control your life. So it really is about positive relationships. I can't say that enough.[00:10:55] Casey Golden: I always think of do I want this person to win? Right? Because we all work together so much. And it's so much of a back and forth and it's just like, you know, I want them to want me to win. But then at the same time, you want to work with people who you believe in and you want to win and you genuinely will build that relationship and be like, how can I help you?[00:11:13] April Sabral: Yeah. And it's funny, right? Because like, when we talk about retail to other people, the let's say I'm in a dinner party or I'm somewhere, and there's not a lot of retail folks. They'd be like, well, you know, you just sell clothes, right. And I'm like, no, no, no, no. We drive millions of dollars and like lead thousands of people and make an impact on their life every day.[00:11:33] Right. So I think there's a misperception about what we do. And if you ask anybody in the field. Nine times out of 10, why they love what they do in retail, especially at a leadership level. They always say it's the development of people because coaching really exists in the field teams because we're always coaching for performance.[00:11:53] Just like, a basketball coach, who's coaching his team on the, on the court. It's the same idea. So I think. We're very fortunate in the fact that coaching really does exist and people already passionate about, and that's why I say it's not just a sales business, right? It's a people business.[00:12:09] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah. I was probably one of the most hidden things I think in retail, right? It's this aspect of coaching in the field, that has always been there. I just. Talk about it enough because we always focus so much on the selling,[00:12:21] April Sabral: a hundred percent. But if you think about sales floor leadership, most companies have flow leadership, cell phone leadership programs, and it's all about coaching[00:12:30] Ricardo Belmar: That's right.[00:12:31] April Sabral: in the moment.[00:12:31] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah,[00:12:36] Casey Golden: obviously a lot of the focus in this book is really about positivity. Both how you see your career goals and how you. Others in your organization, you talk about how leaders are in a position to foster creativity and imagination to develop new ideas, but you also kind of remind leaders that they don't have to act on every idea that their team presents.[00:12:58] But they need to be acknowledged. This is an interesting point because I know that there are so many leaders that believe the opposite of this. And they, they don't have to embrace every idea. In order to recognize the contribution of those team members, how do you coach leaders to embrace this approach?[00:13:14] Because store teams can be quite large and there can be a lot of ideas. And it's not a very formal process of write down all of your ideas from all of these stores. And then I'm going to put it in a, put it in a pivot. I mean, it is so much of just taking in all of this information. And where do you, where do you feel like some, some great recommendations for a manager today that is looking for those contributions? How would you recommend that they kind of extract that?[00:13:50] April Sabral: I mean that's Yeah. That's, there's so many ways now, like when I was at David's tea, we had an app called nudge. Right. And so that was a way for field employees to kind of write everything down and give feedback. And at the office we could say, Like, like real time, because we would ask questions about things and they would provide their feedback.[00:14:10] So I think there's lots of technology that can help with that. I think the number one thing is, like you said, that people think that they have to embrace every idea and act on every idea to make people feel acknowledged. I don't agree with that because the thing is, there'll be really great ideas floating around out there.[00:14:27] And some of them know. That's just, you know, that just can't do that. Maybe it's like the budget's not there or you just don't have the time to do it because you can't focus on 25 things and do it well. Right? Like you can only focus on a few things and do it well. And so, I think this idea of acknowledging what people are contributing in their ideas is very important because in the book I talk about making every person feel valued on your team. And so to make somebody feel valued, they have to be seen and heard. It doesn't mean to say that you have to execute their strategy or their idea. That's not what most people are looking for.[00:15:03] Most people are looking for just to feel like I said, seen and heard. So just acknowledging that and saying, "That's a really great idea and thank you so much, but maybe we'll park it and we'll bring it back out and we'll use it next time." And I think most people want transparency.[00:15:20] The worst thing you can do is ask for a whole load of ideas, not use them and never acknowledged that they were given. Right. So I think that leaders just need to have managerial courage. I think it's just being transparent with your team and not feeling pressured, but one of the biggest things that I coach on is leaders having that managerial courage to be able to be transparent with their team.[00:15:43] Nobody likes conflict and nobody likes going into a conversation where conflict could occur. But it's not it's, it's just human nature. We just don't like that. We kind of shy away from it. So they don't know how to deal with difficult conversations. Right. If you think about people and performance management, it's the same kind of idea, but it really isn't about that.[00:16:02] It's just, just acknowledge it. Like, thank you so much for that idea and acknowledging everybody's idea, but yeah, you get 150 ideas. There's no way you're going to be able to act on them. You're going to have to pick a few that are going to work with that strategy at that time. Right.[00:16:17] Ricardo Belmar: and you know, that reminds me of, you mentioned in the book, you, you, your formulas, so to speak for, for this successful process, you call it your act model or accept, create and teach. Right. And you also talk about leading with awareness, which I think was a really critical point and how you accomplish that can kind of walk us through that model and tell us more about, you know, the importance of leading with awareness.[00:16:40] April Sabral: Yeah. I mean, I'm a self-development junkie, right? My whole life, I have been focused on just self development and reading self-help books and what that has done for me has made me a very self-aware person. Like I know when I've messed up. You know, every boss I've ever had, they're like, we don't need to tell you what you've not done.[00:17:00] Right. Because you actually know before somebody else tells you because I'm very self-reflective. And so I think going back to leading people and building relationships, the more self-aware you are about how you contribute to that relationship and your communication tone connection the better result you're going to get out of people because you're going to be paying attention, being mindful, being present. . And that just comes again from my years of self-development. And so when I lead that self-awareness is really important and I filter it into this model because this is the way that I've led for over 25 years and incorporates yes, my professional coaching training, if you like.[00:17:43] But it also incorporates that mindful piece of being present through my self development journey. So the first step. "Accept" it's about being supportive and having no judgment and assumptions on people. This is one of the hardest things for leaders to do because we all judge people, right? There's so much training out there on bias now and inclusion and our natural ways that we do make assumptions and judgements on people.[00:18:10] And it's simple things like the way somebody looks, the way somebody dressed The way our sister treated us yesterday, like so many things that we judge people on, but when you lead a team it's really, really important that you help them feel supported and encouraged to be themselves. And all the stores that I ever visited every time I would ask a leader what makes them feel successful? It was always around when they felt they were showing up to work, being their whole self and that their boss could see them and hear them. So that's what that pillar is all around. It really teaches leaders to , look at that judgment, stop making assumptions, managing the moment and being present, and really accepting people for who they are.[00:18:51] And then "create" Is all around being responsible and responsible with your thinking and your envisioning, because I'm a big believer in the law of cause and effect ,[00:19:02] and manifesting things. Like I know that sounds like a little bit of a spiritual idea and a bit hokey pokey, but honestly it's like nothing is created until you think about it first, you think about a business. anything you think about this business and you have to like mindfully envision it and then you put the plan in work. Right? So create is all about how you create this into your business and thinking mindfully.[00:19:25] I mean, I used to sit there on Monday mornings and kind of envision what I wanted my week to look like my conversations to look like. I just watched actually. The Serena Williams story over the weekend on a plane. And I was watching her father and I was like, he was totally demonstrating, create in action.[00:19:42] Cause he was like, there was no way my kids are going to fail. They're going to be the best tennis players. And it was the way that he showed up every day. He just created that. So that's what that pillar teaches leaders. And I really think that that needs to be talked about more in business. I think entrepreneurs get it a lot.[00:19:58] And then "teach" is really about being selfless and being a mentor and a coach. So if you take a coach approach to leadership, you'll always be passing on knowledge and you'll always be teaching people and it will make you less frustrated because. So many leaders I work with, like I told that person that and why aren't they doing it?[00:20:16] And I'm thinking, well, did you actually coach them on their performance? And did you actually help them understand and train them? And so those are the three pillars wrapped up. And so I kind of looked at it as like, it's a way of being, that's why I say it's leading with awareness because if you can have more awareness of what your contribution is, you'll have a very highly engaged team.[00:20:37] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah, I think that's really spot on . I'm sure we've all been in large corporate organizations where it seemed like the upper tiers of management felt that the obligation was to reward their best performers by just deciding to turn them into managers and leaders in the organization, but never actually giving them the tools , or the methodology on how to actually lead a team.[00:20:57] I think they kind of assume that, well, if they could manage a project, they could manage a group of people. And that's not always the case, but it's not an automatic thing. If you don't take into account all the different points you just mentioned April, I think that's a really great way to frame that[00:21:11] April Sabral: Yeah. And like you normally in retail, it's like usually the best sales person on the sales floor that gets promoted. Right, And then all of a sudden they have like five, 10 people and it's not going so well. And then your top performer, it's not your top performer anymore[00:21:24] Ricardo Belmar: more, Yeah. Yeah. Cause it's just the, see in the management changes to assume assumes that because they hit the numbers so well that they can automatically lead everyone else in doing the same thing.[00:21:34] Casey Golden: Well, where are you guys working? You would get top sales and like, well, we can't take you off the floor. I'm like, let me create 20 of my me. But can't take you off the floor. You do too much in sales. No, I mean, I think that's great. I mean, we have all had great managers and we've all had learning experiences from not so great managers, but I think, I think there there's something to be said that retail is so many people's first job. And this is really like that building block of you're essentially installing work ethic and process for the first time.[00:22:12] April Sabral: Yeah. Yeah. And also you're giving somebody, and this is another thing, right? I have a 24 year old, 24 year old daughter, and she was sharing a story with me and Ron about her first retail job and how terrible it was. Experience because of her boss. Right.[00:22:26] And me and him were like cringing at lunch. Cause we were like, oh, this is so many people's story.[00:22:32] And the thing is, we're trying to fuel retail with newer leaders because we need them cause bricks and mortar are not going away. And one of the big gaps now is that middle management. And so it starts off with your first job. I was. 17 when I got my first job in retail and I had a great boss. And so it sets the tone.[00:22:52] Right. And so that, you know, it's so important, like you said, it's the first time somebody's having a first experience of having a boss and a work environment. And, we need to really take responsibility for that and help our managers for say, managers that are like 20, 21, you know, managing an 18 year old.[00:23:09] How are they doing that? You know, like we really need to help them with that.[00:23:13] Casey Golden: Yeah, I agree. And if that manager feels like that there is communication and there is way to move up in the company. They're less likely to push down to keep from taking, you know, cause they, they don't feel like they have. So it really gives you that position of leadership to, to inspire team. I loved like my team, like being a manager to like I had 17 year old, 16, 17 year olds.[00:23:35] And it's just one of my favorite retail experiences, because I got to be their first boss. I still talk to these people most like 18 years later. And they're "Casey, like you inspired me to get in the fashion industry." I'm like, they're like an SVP that Nike now. And I'm like, I'm sorry. It does. It opens up that whole world of like, whatever they're doing and wherever they go, you get to be that moment in somebody's mind of their first work experience. And you get to be that first amazing boss that I've ever had, or you get to be that pain point that changes their perspective of leadership, even moving forward for years, potentially.[00:24:22] That is your first moment.[00:24:24] Ricardo Belmar: And it really sets that that first impression is so strong, especially when you think about the age groups we're talking about. And we had this come up in one of our previous episodes where we talked with I think Ron was in that discussion. And in fact, what a Gotham from the George Mason university retail center, and he even pointed out, or when he first asked students in one of his classes, you know, who here has a retail job.[00:24:48] Lots of students raised their hands. Yeah, they had, they were in a retail job. And then he, when he asked them, how many of you plan on pursuing a retail career and all the hands went down because they all had a bad, first impression and most likely because of, what their experience was. And if we don't do something to change that experience, and what's going to motivate people to pursue a career in this industry[00:25:07] Casey Golden: Yeah. So, I mean, this kind of brings us back to, you know, you might say it's the reason we're having this conversation today and why the show exists and you know, some, a lot of the motivation behind your book, we're experiencing a movement in retail around changing how frontline staff is treated both by the customer but more importantly by retailer, management teams and where they sit into an organization. I mean, we've had these conversations with Ron Thurston who we're, we've all had I mean, everybody adores him B because it does, we all have that shared experience right. Of having that first retail job that we're able to build a lot of these things off of when retailers think and talk about wanting to change these behaviors the initial why right? That, that initial why? And because my initial, why for my company was the people who I worked with on the floor. I saw that they were hurting and. I wanted to help them. And that was, that was back in 2007 and it's kept me motivated to continue trying to build this solution to make sure that retail staff has a thriving career.[00:26:13] And I'm not even on the floor anymore. Right? I mean, we go through all of these different. Do you agree that like, maybe by seeing that transformation of how frontline workers are treated on their jobs, do you agree with, this, this whole conversation and this movement, like just really realigning that focus on making sure that that experience is a positive one.[00:26:38] April Sabral: Oh, Yeah.[00:26:39] a hundred percent. It should have always been a positive one. I just think that the investment in people got shifted to e-com in the last seven years. , cause that's where all the money went into, building your e-comm your channels, trying to figure out that whole customer journey.[00:26:53] And so leave like development of teams. But it's put in polls. Like there's a lot of companies that don't have proper onboarding programs for managers right now. And so I think that has to come back around. Pay is a big thing, you know, advocating for pay and like different incentive programs because comp sales, the traditional way of looking at comp doesn't incentivize people anymore because the sales have shifted the mix of the channels where it's coming from.[00:27:18] So I just think there's many different components that go into it. But one of the easiest things to do is just give your team training and development. So everybody wants you read any exit interview and the top two reasons why people leave is I'm not growing in my career and the person I work for, isn't helping me.[00:27:35] So it's just like, that's just something that can change an environment. And the clients at retail, U that have implemented the online leadership programs are seeing that in the surveys from the staff, like from just having that coaching and leadership development, full people, it gives them something additional that is not very expensive, but it's a very easy thing to do to shake that environment.[00:27:57] Casey Golden: So let's say if we were thinking about what are, what are a handful of things that we might be seeing on the transformation of this culture change? Because it's a huge culture change in the organization from like a corporate. Corporate side, from my perspective, we're looking at different compensation, strategies training and development.[00:28:19] Do you foresee anything else like that stands out that you feel is going to adjust over the next? Let's say two to five years when it comes to how the retail staff and how that really works.[00:28:32] April Sabral: I mean, I think they need to retell needs to embrace bringing on more coaches. I'm a leadership development coach, right? I'm a Forbes leadership development coach now. And I think that because we assume that way, such a high coaching, high touch environment in the stores, which we are, but at that middle level from district supervisor to director, That's where the gap is right now.[00:28:52] And I think that a lot of organizations bring on coaches, retailers don't really bring in people from the outside as coaches. So what I'm doing now is working with that middle level and to help make a difference and kind of succession planning people up. So I do think that we need to embrace that more and realize that you may have a leader like a VP or a director, but maybe they do need a leadership development coach to help them actually develop their team and succession plan and help that leadership. And I hope that that's embraced more because it's not something I was ever provided. I had to go and seek that myself outside of the organization that I worked for.[00:29:30] So I'm really hoping that that gets embraced more because what I'm excited about the future is new leadership coming into those senior spots. Like a lot of us now some of us have, we we've done it and we've been through it, but how do we get the next level up into these seats? Because they're going to be the leaders of the organizations in the next 10 years, and that's going to really shape it. ,[00:29:51] Casey Golden: I really want them to be the leaders over the next 10 years, you know? It's such being somebody who spent, you know, a, a good portion of my initial career on the floor. There's so much that you've learned that you want to take and do good with at corporate and being able to just even know that you can have a future, that it doesn't have to end with that, that store. I think it's just really, really important.[00:30:16] Ricardo Belmar: There really should be able to say that, you know, today's frontline workers are tomorrow's retail leaders because they have all the built-in to build. Right.[00:30:25] Casey Golden: Yeah, you can indirectly, right.[00:30:27] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah. So April along those lines, and if you look out, you know, in case they ask you about the next two to five years, I'm going to be a little closer to near term, like over the next year. What, what are you most excited about when it comes to retail leadership? What do you think is most likely to change for the better.[00:30:42] April Sabral: Ooh, what am I most excited about that more people get retail U programs because people seem to be finding it now and embracing it. And I think it's a really good way to develop teams. And I just think, like I said, like more middle like that, more of that field leadership moving into. The additional roles, there's a lot of head of store roles posted right now, by the way, the most I've ever seen a lot of director roles.[00:31:06] So I think we've come through a massive shift in the last couple of years. A lot of people left those roles in those Chris because of what was going on and, and opted to do something else. So I think there's a big opportunity now for that management to move up and really take those seats. So that's what I'm really excited about.[00:31:21] Just seeing new leadership and new ideas and the new generation coming into that talent pool.[00:31:26] Casey Golden: How would you suggest someone wanting to go ahead and start taking the first step? Do you see that first step at corporate? Do you see it at that district level?[00:31:36] April Sabral: Yeah, , one of the things I'm working on right now with a few leaders is just development, planning sessions. So what does that actually look like? Because back in the day, when I was at Starbucks and I was at gap right before in e-comm and all of that came about, we had individual development planning sessions.[00:31:53] With competency base and we had it on paper and we had these two things that we have to focus on and I think that's really disappeared. So I think if you were going to stop wanting to grow in your career, you need to start tapping on your bosses shoulder and being like, okay, I need a plan, not an action plan to drive your sales.[00:32:11] But a personal development plan. And if you don't have one, there is so many tools out there. You could go and get one, because if you, somebody said to me a long time ago, if you leave your career in the hands of somebody else, you're going to be waiting for somebody else to promote you. So, you know, I took it upon myself like that whole self development journey.[00:32:29] Right to read books about leadership, to watch Ted talks, to put a plan on paper for my own personal development, my competencies that would help me drive my business. And FYI is an amazing book that I use with a lot of leaders, but I just think a development planning session. What are the two things that April's going to work on this to become better at my job, that's going to impact the results?[00:32:51] Is it my communication? Is it my managerial courage? Is it how to have performance conversations? What is it? And if you don't have that on paper right now, and you're in a, in a leadership role and you want to grow. You need to make sure that you have that. And unfortunately, that lacks skill in a lot of organizations.[00:33:09] So I find myself doing that with leaders and once they've left it, they're like, and I'm doing it with their boss and them. So usually it's like a district manager with a director and I'm sitting with them and we're assessing what they need to do to do the job. And, and they walk away going, man, I have a plan and six months later, people get promoted like all the time.[00:33:28] So I'm really good at promoting people in succession planning. It's because I focus on their development of skill, not just not just the action plan that needs to drive the results of the operational things, let's say, you know, it needs to be the people's side as well.[00:33:44] Casey Golden: Well, and then we'll also start with reading your book, right? Start the conversation. It'd be passive aggressive, drop it on some of these guys.[00:33:57] April Sabral: Well, and that's why I launched the second book. The lift purposely lead positively workbook because so many people read that book and they were like, but how do I actually turn this into a developed plan? I'm like, let me give you one. Now. Now there's a workbook with 15 activities that you can do to develop those skills.[00:34:15] Right.[00:34:15] Casey Golden: Oh, that's great. I I'm, I'm a fan of work books.[00:34:18] Ricardo Belmar: Well, April , thank you so much for joining us today. It's been such a pleasure hearing about your retail experience or your journey, everything that you're doing now with retail U. We probably haven't said it enough that our listeners should all run out and get a copy of your book if they haven't already, because there's so much fantastic advice and ideas on how to just improve your own retail career, as well as how you lead others.[00:34:42] So how can listeners reach out to you April? You know, learn more about retail u or just follow your work?[00:34:47] April Sabral: Yeah. So retail U like university.ca that's the website. So you can go on, check out everything that's going on there. And then I have my own, which is April Sabral.com, but you can find that through retail U or just connect with me on LinkedIn. And I always usually respond to people pretty fast.[00:35:04] So that's where you can find me.[00:35:05] Ricardo Belmar: Fantastic.[00:35:06] Well, I want to thank you again for joining us.[00:35:08] Casey Golden: I am excited. Everybody's going to be reading your book[00:35:10] Thank you so much for joining us.[00:35:14] Recap[00:35:14] Casey Golden: Welcome back everyone.[00:35:20] Ricardo Belmar: Well, Casey,, I would be surprised if this doesn't end up being one of our most popular episodes so far. I mean, April's background and experience has so much to offer retail leaders just to make themselves better, you know, better at running their business. And most importantly, better at leading their teams.[00:35:33] Casey Golden: Hundred percent.[00:35:34] We can't recommend enough that if you're leading retail teams.[00:35:38] you need to get a copy of April's book and really absorb what she's saying. You'll see the difference.[00:35:44] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah. You know, Casey you've led retail teams before. And you mentioned in the session kind of how your philosophy around managing those teams aligns with April's. So what, what would your top tip be for retail leaders? Is it pretty much the same as what April said?[00:35:58] Casey Golden: Yeah, I could've stolen April for the entire show. There is a lot of overlap but I think a skill that, that lacks in management is learning how to be an advocate for change we have a lot of incredible talent on regional levels, but find a disconnect at corporate. April provides some great tools to be a good steward, not just from management and going downstream to their teams, but being able to develop those managers to be a good steward of getting that information and managing upstream. It's always been a gap. Even professionally moving from the field to corporate. The information flow and continuity is no different. So managing up, I think is a huge opportunity for a lot of different like HQ corporate to benefit from talent that they've been developing for years[00:36:49] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah, that's a great point. April definitely had a lot to say about that. I can see what you mean about that gap. I think we've all, if we've worked with retailers have seen the differences between what's happening in the field with store teams versus what corporate's point of view is on that and necessarily, is it the same point of view?[00:37:04] So there's definitely an opportunity there in that upstream direction to get the information flow right, to really manage that part of the process so that everyone is getting the right learnings from those field teams. And I think April does a really good job too, of highlighting that in the book and in her retail U program on how to really set up those leaders for success, to really understand who it is they're leading[00:37:25] Casey Golden: I remember many times where it was a weekly conference call, but we didn't have the ability to talk. We just listened[00:37:34] every single person's phoning in to listen,[00:37:37] you know, so I think there's a huge opportunity here that April highlights[00:37:41] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah and I think you mentioned this too in April talks about it. You know, I just remember being in those store teams and when you'd hear that message would come through, oh, there's going to be a call with corporate has to review something or one of these other higher up regional managers is doing a store visit and everybody kind of panics that that's coming and you really shouldn't have to do that.[00:37:59] Right. That shouldn't happen. It should not be such a massively stressful thing. When somebody from corporate or one of the regional. Or like a VP or somebody comes through the, to the story team, you know, it should just be a normal mode of operation, right. Because if everything is going well, then you shouldn't have to worry about it.[00:38:13] And I think, the way April kind of positions this as a, as a leadership tool, it makes a difference here. There's that level of understanding that has to be there..[00:38:23] Casey Golden: I agree. I think we have such an opportunity over the last couple of years that the frontline workers have been highlighted and what these jobs feel like. And how they're being led. And then we have this great resignation as well. , and I, this is a hard job, but it's filled with a lot of passionate people that are highly skilled.[00:38:42] And, and I have to say most of them are overeducated. I know a lot of people with master's degrees that are on selling Salesforce at, in retail brands, they have master's degrees, they're fully qualified to have a voice.[00:38:56] they need the opportunity and some refreshers on some tools on getting that management, you know, up management, upstream management, to have those voices heard.[00:39:06] There's a lot of benefits.[00:39:07] Ricardo Belmar: Yeah, definitely. Definitely. I mean, I really hope this episode helps listeners in those retail management positions, especially those that are managing store teams. Right. Understand how important they are, not just to the role they're filling, but to that overall employee experience. Hopefully they'll take away some useful lessons from what we talked about with April.[00:39:24] And, as you say, Casey, you gotta go out and get a copy of April's book. I think everyone. Yeah, in this industry can stand to learn quite a bit from it.[00:39:32] Casey Golden: Yeah. Sometimes you have to step back from the tech and realize we're all only human and recognize how you lead, how we're managing people is just as important to the business as anything else we do operationally or with technology.[00:39:48] Ricardo Belmar: A hundred percent agree with that. And on that note, Casey, I think it is time to wrap up this episode. Once again, we'll want to give a big, thank you out to April Sabral for spending some time with us and sharing her experience and knowledge. Thanks again, April, we look forward to having you back on the show.[00:40:03] Casey Golden: and that's a wrap!.[00:40:04][00:40:04] Show Close[00:40:04] Casey Golden: If you enjoy our show, please consider giving us that special five-star rating and review on apple podcasts. Remember to smash that subscribe button in your favorite podcast player. So you don't miss a minute. Want to know more about what we talked about today? Take a look at the show notes for handy links and more deets. I'm your cohost, Casey Golden.[00:40:25] Ricardo Belmar: And if you'd like to learn more about us, follow us on Twitter at casey-c golden and Ricardo underscore Belmar, or find us on LinkedIn. Be sure and follow the show on LinkedIn, on Twitter at retail razor and on our YouTube channel for videos of each episode and the occasional bonus content. I'm your host, Ricardo Belmar.[00:40:41] Casey Golden: Thanks for joining us.[00:40:42] Ricardo Belmar: And remember there's never been a better time to be in retail. If you cut through the clutter.[00:40:49] Until next time, this is the retail razor show.[00:40:52]
In my last interview highlighting Authors, I end with a phenomenal guest, April Sabral, the CEO of RetailU and author of "The Positive Effect". April started her career as a part-time sales associate, having moved out of her home at 16. She worked her way through the ranks with over 30 years in the retail industry. Working for brands such as; Starbucks, Gap, Apple, Holt Renfrew, Paul Smith, culminating as a Vice President of a national retail chain in North America of 250 stores. She took that knowledge and created one of the most cutting edge training platforms for retail teams in the Retail U platform. This episode covers so many incredible topics and I was bummed when I realized that we had already been talking for an hour! Don't miss it...
Leadership coach, author, and entrepreneur, April Sabral, joins Tech Done Different to teach us why leaders need to become more aware in order to create better connections.You'll learn:why these three pillars of leadership success matter: Accept, Create, and Teachwhy to measure performance but not judge the performerwhy emotions matter in leadership and how to think about themhow to ask better questions, and use questions to lead betterwhy leaders must have a positive effect________________________________GuestApril SabralCEO & Founder retailu | Coach to Executives | Author of The Positive Effect | Leadership ExpertOn Linkedin | https://linkedin.com/in/aprilsabralOn Twitter | https://twitter.com/aprilsabral________________________________HostTed HarringtonOn ITSPmagazine
Leadership coach, author, and entrepreneur, April Sabral, joins Tech Done Different to teach us why leaders need to become more aware in order to create better connections.You'll learn:why these three pillars of leadership success matter: Accept, Create, and Teachwhy to measure performance but not judge the performerwhy emotions matter in leadership and how to think about themhow to ask better questions, and use questions to lead betterwhy leaders must have a positive effect________________________________GuestApril SabralCEO & Founder retailu | Coach to Executives | Author of The Positive Effect | Leadership ExpertOn Linkedin | https://linkedin.com/in/aprilsabralOn Twitter | https://twitter.com/aprilsabral________________________________HostTed HarringtonOn ITSPmagazine
Retail is a fast paced diverse, and exciting industry—and managing complexity and ambiguity has been the theme of the past two years. In this episode, host April Sabral dives into the topic of positive leadership with guest Emma Taylor, vice president of North American stores for REISS, a modern, global fashion brand offering stylish women's and menswear. Prior to joining REISS, Emma spent nearly 14 years growing her career at TOPSHOP TOPMAN where she most recently served as the brand's US regional manager. If you enjoyed this episode, please let us know by subscribing to our channel and giving us a 5 star rating us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. - - - - - - Hosted by April Sabral Produced by Gabriella Bock Edited by Trenton Waller
Guest: April Sabral, CEO & Founder of retailu and author of The Positive Effect: A Retail Leader's Guide to Changing the World Description: April Sabral, author of The Positive Effect: A Retail Leader's Guide to Changing the World joins me to discuss the importance of leading with a positive attitude, the critical differences between management skills and leadership skills, and the importance of “in the trenches” experience when it comes to leading others. The retail industry is her specialty, but the principles she uses to build effective field leaders can be applied in any industry. Here's what you'll learn about in this episode: The ways in which the climate and responsibility of leadership is changing. The 3 ways by which every employee evaluates their boss. The importance of feedback from your team members and your peers. You can learn more about April here: April Sabral Leadership: www.aprilsabral.com You can learn more about retailu here: https://retailu.ca/ --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/humanlypossible/support --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/humanlypossible/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/humanlypossible/support
A SEAT at THE TABLE: Leadership, Innovation & Vision for a New Era
One of the key differentiators between good and great companies is leadership.For most companies the focus tends to be on financial results, product development - and recently on juggling supply chain crises.That leaves little time to think about leadership - let alone getting involved in professional development.However as many of have learned, the value of having capable leaders at the top and middle level of your organization can be a game-changer - and often times a lifesaver!Being a great leader sounds like a lofty concept, but it can be distilled down into a series of simple, actionable skills and tactics that once learned anyone can apply.That's exactly what April Sabral, founder of RetailU has done. She's taken everything she's learned during two decades of managing diverse retail teams around the world and codified her best tactics in a way that leaders - in retail or virtually any other industry - can use.Today she'll share what's she's learned, what worked best - and how a million dollar chocolate bar drove her team to achieving sales results beyond their wildest expectations.Before we get started, if you're looking to develop knitwear collections that will be social media superstars, then SPINEXPO is the place to go. It's the primary exhibition for yarns and knitwear.The fair is a rich resource featuring well-edited, high quality collections, as well as cutting edge technical innovation. Not to mention outstanding trend information that can not be found anywhere else. You can learn more at www.spinexpo.com. There's also a link in the show notes.Also checkout our website. You can find all of the previous episodes of a Seat at The Table, the show notes, news about our upcoming workshops and lots of other useful information. You can find it at www.seat.fm.USEFUL LINKSLearn more about SPINEXPO: www.spinexpo.comConnect with April Sabral: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aprilsabral/Find out more about RetailU: retailu.caA Seat at The Table website: seat.fmLearn more about The Current Situation in Sourcing: bit.ly/current_situtation
Next up on #3UNIQUES - - Wait until you learn more about April Sabral, executive coach, entrepreneur and author. April has a long career with prominent retail organizations like David's Tea, Banana Republic, Holt Renfrew, Starbucks, Apple and many more. Over the last few years she started Retail U, an online retail management training program that walks you through all of the fundamentals in leading and managing a retail business. And in 2020, she published her first book, The Positive Effect. You'll soon learn as you listen to her interview that positivity is one of her #3UNIQUES. YouTube link is in my bio. Please check out more about April Sabral here: Retail U: https://www.retailu.ca/ You can find April's book the Positive Effect on Amazon or any major bookstore. Learn more about #3UNIQUES.
April started her career as a part-time sales associate, having moved out of home at 16. She worked her way through the ranks with over 25 years in the retail industry. Working for brands such as; Starbucks, Gap, Apple, Holt Renfrew, Paul Smith, culminating as a Vice President of a national retail chain in North America of 250 stores. In 2019, April founded retailu.ca an online retail leadership education company. In 2020, she also wrote a book called “The Positive Effect” where she shares how to lead with awareness in her three step leadership method, A.C.T. April believes that leaders can make or break any business, and the positive effect of leadership can not and should not underestimated. Connect with the retailu platform. Buy April's Book- The Positive Effect.
6:30 Vikaya Powell - Cleveland Browns Intern 7:00 - April Sabral
Despite the encroachment of Ecommerce and tech-driven experiences, people will play an important role in powering retail forward, yet traditional leadership and employee incentive models will no longer work as the industry transforms.April Sabral is the author of The Positive Effect, a companion book to her training and coaching platform, RetailU. The book is an inspiring story of overcoming and empowerment that pulls together April's years of experience leading store teams for global brands like Apple, Banana Republic, and Starbucks. In this interview episode, April and Carol discuss the new-world realities that will transform retail leadership and how retailers can maximize the opportunity to empower associates and engage shoppers.In this interview, you'll learn:The three pillars of leading with awarenessWhy new models and metrics are required to motivate retail teamsWhy filling the retail leadership pipeline has never been more criticalHow to make career leaps with confidence
This podcast is intended for listeners 18+Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I'm your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada and with the support of omNovos Canada's digital customer engagement company. ‘Tis the season for giving and omNovos can help you give your customers the gift of a personalized experience in 2021. Find out how you can Get Personal and Grow Sales with omNovos at www.realcustomerengagement.comIn this episode I welcome back to the podcast retail leader April Sabral on the launch of her new book, "The Positive Effect"! April talks about her personal and professional journey and how the lessons learned along the way created formative lessons in retail leadership.Next, JP Adamo takes a lifetime of hospitality and customer experience lessons and leverages them into Canada's newest retail cannabis concept store, Dimes Cannabis.But first, let's hear from Scott from April********Thanks to April and JP for being my guests, plus omNovos for their support on this episode. If you liked this podcast please subscribe on Apple, Spotify or your favourite podcast platform, rate and review, and be sure and recommend to a friend or colleague in the retail industry. I'm Michael LeBlanc, Founder and President of M.E. LeBlanc and Company Inc. and you can learn more about me on www.meleblanc.co or of course on LinkedInUntil next time, have a safe week!
Welcome to The Voice of Retail, I'm your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of CanadaFirst up in this episode Tanbir Grover joins me for the first of a two part interview, reflecting on his twelve years at the forefront of digital retail and eCommerce in Canada, working for retail brands including Sears Canada, Hudson's Bay and Lowe's Canada. We talk corporate culture, the history of Canadian eCommerce and the state of online retail today and how we got here from there and where we're going next.Next, April Sabral joins me to kick off the new retail year sharing her incredible experience on the front lines of retail for twenty five years - from Starbucks, to Apple to David's Tea. April talks about what retailers should be thinking of in terms of their associates, how your willingness to recommend scores need to encompass employee satisfaction, the recipe for success for retailers and driving in-store conversion through training and development and fills us in on her new venture, RetailU.caBut first, let's jump into part one of my interview with Tanbir Grover******Thanks to Tanbir and April for being my guests on this special episode - now let's hit the highlights of the retail news in Canada and around the world with Retail This Week….That's a wrap on this edition of The Voice of Retail. If you liked this podcast you can subscribe on Apple iTunes or your favourite podcast platform, please rate and review, and be sure and recommend to a friend or colleague in the retail industry.I'm Michael LeBlanc, Founder and President of M.E. LeBlanc and Company Inc. and you can learn more about me on www.meleblanc.co or of course on LinkedInUntil next time, have a great week!
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