Business Issue

One of the largest home improvement retailers in the United States embarked on creating a specialized retail model aimed at catering to professional customers, including contractors and remodelers and other trade professionals. The vision of this model was to provide specialized services to assist professionals in their business operations, requiring the retailer to build new capabilities and a workforce with different skills. The success of this new retail model depended on having the optimal workforce composition at the Corporate Center and across its 1,700 retail outlets. Operations and HR sought support to develop a dynamic and flexible strategic and operational workforce planning approach to outline the actions and investments required to close workforce gaps.

 

Approach

To address these issues, we undertook a comprehensive workforce planning initiative to align the client’s workforce capabilities with the demands of the new pro-services business line:

  1. Assessment and Integration: Conducted a detailed evaluation of existing business and workforce planning methodologies to identify synergies and opportunities for improvement.
  2. Designing the Framework: Developed a tailored strategic and operational workforce planning process, accompanied by a playbook and analytical modeling tool. These resources empowered decision-makers to make informed choices regarding workforce investments aligned with long-term strategic goals.
  3. Collaborative Strategy Execution: Worked closely with organizational leaders to translate strategic objectives into actionable work plans that catered to customer needs while achieving operational and financial targets.
  4. Segmentation Model: Created a robust segmentation model for work activities and roles, enabling prioritization of workforce investments based on talent strategy and cost-effectiveness.
  5. Long-term Planning: Formulated a five-year strategic workforce plan, ensuring alignment with business growth projections and evolving market demands. Additionally, provided training to the HR-Field team to foster ongoing capability in strategic and operational workforce planning.

 

Business Impact

The initiatives we implemented yielded substantial outcomes:

  • Enhanced Productivity: Improved people productivity by 25 basis points over 18 months, contributing significantly to achieving profitability targets for the new Pro-Services retail model, which is particularly sensitive to labor costs.
  • Business Success: The Pro-Services business line emerged as a highly profitable segment, bolstered by a workforce equipped to deliver specialized services and support to trade professionals.
  • Capability Building: Established enduring capabilities within the HR-Field organization to sustain effective strategic and operational workforce planning through comprehensive training, toolkits, and standardized playbooks.