Three years ago, labour shortages dominated discussions across the warehousing sector, with recruitment issues causing widespread concern. But the landscape has shifted. Today, the primary challenge is retaining employees. Constant churn not only incurs the expense of recruitment and induction but also strains managerial resources, jeopardises customer relationships due to service disruptions, and tarnishes the employer’s reputation in the local community, threatening future recruitment efforts.
While attraction bonuses were a fleeting trend, typical in 2021, current strategies are more sophisticated. Employers create advantage by offering training, apprenticeships, and opportunities for career advancement. The working environment is clean, well-lit and pleasant, shift-patterns are flexible, uniforms are smart and comfortable. Simple gestures of appreciation, such as implementing colleague recognition programmes and conducting engagement surveys, have become commonplace. By actively listening to their workforce, companies can unlock the potential of initiatives that might otherwise be dismissed as gimmicks. Canteens and washroom facilities are improving. Some modern warehouses even feature amenities like prayer rooms, gyms and creches, reinforcing the message that employees are valued. In isolation, these changes may seem small, but in aggregate they allow companies to foster a distinctive workplace culture that sets them apart from neighbouring employers.
Pay is vital too, and it must be both equitable and accurate. In the three-year period from 2018 to 2021, the national living wage increased by 14%; and in the three years from 2021 to 2024 it has gone up by a further 28%. The rate of growth has doubled, reflecting our economy’s cost of living crisis and the relationship between prices and pay. Although the general public might once have believed in magical supply chains that operate for free, our keyworker status during the pandemic was a wake-up call. Now, society is growing to recognise that excellent service levels and speed of delivery can only be achieved sustainably if people are fairly paid.
Third party logistics providers may attempt to pass rising labour costs on to their customers, but in a competitive market, characterised by increased availability of warehouse space, there is a competitive advantage to be gained by making our existing workforces more cost effective instead. Continuous improvement of processes, leveraging data analytics, and embracing automation can all create efficiency gains, ensuring we get the best ‘bang for buck’ out of the people we employ. And given the hidden cost of staff turnover, retention emerges as a pivotal factor.
ACS Staffing Solutions recently invited me to moderate a panel discussion with a handful of industry experts. For more on this topic, look out for the webcast of our conversation. Even as robots advance relentlessly into the world of warehousing, we concluded that our sector’s reliance on humans is here to stay.
Clare Bottle
UKWA, CEO
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