The Hindu Business Line : Retailers hunt for right talent to man stores

Hyderabad April 19 It is raining malls all over. Be it lifestyle or food and groceries segments, organised retailing has become a buzzword, with several companies, both big and small, throwing in their hats to have a pie of the largely untapped market.

As they expand across the country, organised retailers face a huge problem — finding the right kind of people to man the stores.

With the demand-supply curve becoming sharply unfavourable with more and more stores coming up, retail majors have begun to explore ways to recruit people for their expansion plans.

`No talent available'

Going by the growth plans of major companies, Hyderabad needs about 10,000 people for various categories in the next three months.

"There is absolutely no talent available in the market. We alone need 2,000 people this quarter," Mr S. Jagdish, Vice-President of Heritage Foods (Retail Division), told Business Line.

"We are going to form associations with training institutes and colleges to get people. We are talking to some 30 colleges," he said.

Anticipating the shortage, Subhiksha, which has a network of 75 stores in Andhra Pradesh, runs its own schools to train people.

"Every month we enrol tenth class dropouts and intermediate students, give them a two-week training in various aspects of retailing and certify them," Mr Vinod, Vice-President (AP), said.

About 60 per cent of the 2,200 Subhiksha employees are groomed in house.

"We do this exercise at several cities nationwide," he said.

For higher-level posts such as shop floor managers, the company conducts separate training programmes. They would have hands-on experience for one year.

"Currently, we are in the second batch," he said.

Different model

Magna, the supermarket chain run by the former promoters of Trinethra, has a different model in recruitment. "We enrol the youth from tier-II and tier-III towns and give them training before absorbing them in our stores," Mr Sriram Kakkera, Chief Executive Officer, said.

The company, which runs 35 stores including 10 hypermarkets, also takes the help of societies in finding human resources.

"We tell them what we need. Besides giving product knowledge, we teach them to serve customers," he said.

For higher-level posts, Magna believes in elevating the home-grown staff, he said.

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