For most retail businesses, the holiday season is the key to increasing their annual sales. Sometimes, this season can even be responsible for more than 30% of total sales, which is definitely a big deal if you just think about it for a second. If you are running a business that depends on the holiday season quite a lot, then you will also have to spend a lot of time getting properly prepared for it. Do you, however, have any idea what kinds of preparations I am talking about?

Well, to cut right to the chase and prevent you from taking some wrong guesses, the preparations consist mostly of a successful staffing holiday process. To be more precise, when the holidays are around the corner, you need to make sure that you have enough employees that can deliver great services to your customers and thus increase your sales even more. So, if you are worried about not having enough staff when the holiday season is approaching, here is what you should do.

Think carefully about the actual needs of your company and then form the right staffing strategy that will help you get equipped with enough workers. Now, if you are not sure that you know how to successfully do this, i.e. how to succeed in staffing during the holiday season, the best thing would be for you to first get some tips on that and then start looking for people that could be a good addition to your team. You are most likely willing to hear at least some of those tips because you want to be sure that you’ll be doing everything the right way, which is why I have decided to share some tips with you below and thus help you succeed in this particular endeavour. Let’s begin.

1. Don’t Waste Time

Most businesses make one crucial mistake when holiday staffing is in question. They decide to wait because they “still have a lot of time to do this”. At one point, though, they realize that they really don’t have enough time and that they should have begun the process much, much earlier. That’s how they end up being short-staffed, which can certainly take a toll on their entire business and lead them towards failing to achieve their sales goals.

You absolutely don’t want anything like that to happen to you, am I right? After all, who would wish for their business to fail at something? Well, if you really don’t want to face such consequences, you will have to stop wasting your time and start thinking about the holiday season early on. In short, you should start looking for help at least a month before the actual holiday season begins, because that gives you the highest chances to be successful at the staffing process.

You can find some more useful tips here: https://www.allbusiness.com/holiday-staffing-101-how-to-ensure-a-smooth-holiday-season-102073-1.html

2. Be Clear About Your Expectations

Whenever you are interviewing people for these seasonal positions, you might find yourself thinking that they might not need to know practically everything, especially if you are not planning to welcome someone on board full-time when the holidays end. This, however, is the wrong way to go about it, since the new people might misread your expectations, which can lead to them not being as effective as you would want them to be. That’s why it is important for you to be clear and upfront with your general and specific expectations.

It is also important to talk about these expectations early on, i.e. even before it starts getting crowded with customers. That way, you can give your new employees some time to get the hang of it all and actually get properly trained for the positions that they will be filling. Talk about the length of the shifts, the uniform expectations, locations and all the other things that you think are important for your business during the holiday season, or in general for that matter.

3. Give Out Rewards For Top Performers

Some employers are using a reward program as a sort of incentive, so as to make sure that all the workers will do their best work and be extremely efficient. You should perhaps do the same, and not only because this will definitely lead to success, but also because having happy and motivated staff means a lot, both to your business and to your customers. When you make your workers feel valued, they are highly likely to do a good job, which is why offering, say, a monetary incentive to your top performers could go a long way in helping you have a successful holiday season. Go here to learn more about how to prepare for the holidays as a retailer.

4. Think About Offering Post-Season Positions If Possible

While having those monetary incentives and rewards can definitely be a great motivation for your workers, there is one thing that most of them will love even more. Basically, I am talking about the idea of offering post-season positions to some of the top performers if that is something that you feel you could do without hurting your business. So, if you feel that you could offer at least one full-time position to someone after the holidays have ended, make sure to mention that to your seasonal staff once you bring them on board. Of course, you should never lie about this and trick the people, because everyone deserves to know clearly what to expect from certain job offers and positions.