On the issue of motivating employees of the security service of hypermarkets.
In this article, I would like to touch upon the issue of motivating employees of the security service as a tool for improving the efficiency of their work, and, as a result, improving the efficiency of the hypermarket security service department as a whole.
I would like to immediately stipulate that the term «security officer», in the context of this article, refers to full-time employees of the hypermarket, who, by position in various networks, have the title of «sales floor administrator», «controller», and the like. In this case, I put into this term not a legal, but a factual meaning. Everyone understands that from a legal point of view, «security officers», «security officers», by virtue of the requirements of the Federal Law «OCHDOD», pr. 272, can only be called employees of a private security company. However, taking into account the specifics of the functional duties performed in hypermarkets by both private security company employees and full-time store employees (no matter what they are called), it seems appropriate to use the term «security officer» in its broader sense.
The issue of motivation of security service employees, as well as the motivation of any other categories of employees, can be considered in various aspects, which ultimately boil down to two main types of motivation — material and non-material. In this article, we will ignore the issues of non-material motivation, since there is quite enough professional practical information on this topic (although I suppose that the generalized experience of practice accumulated in various networks was also of interest on this issue). As for the material motivation of security service employees, its specificity is determined by the nature of the main activity of the service — prevention, suppression and compensation for material damage to a commercial enterprise.
From my personal accumulated experience, I would allow myself to highlight two main types of material motivation of security service employees:
— material motivation within the framework of calculating the monthly salary of a security service employee (simply, — salary);
— material motivation of security service employees in the form of additional monetary incentives for specific results of work on preventing, suppressing and compensating material damage.
Material motivation within the framework of monthly monetary allowance.
When talking about this type of motivation, it should be remembered that the work of the hypermarket security departments cannot always be adequately assessed in quantitative terms, since a significant part of it is taken up by the preventive component, which cannot be calculated in the number of prevented thefts or in the monetary equivalent of the prevented damage. One can only assume (and such experiments have been conducted in world practice) how much the losses of a retail enterprise can increase in the event of a complete refusal of the services of security departments.
In relation to security service employees (I repeat, — if, of course, we mean full-time employees of the hypermarket), various remuneration systems are used, the most common of which is the salary-bonus or salary-bonus system. In this system, the salary part is constant, which is often less than the bonus (variable) part. It is the size of the approaches to calculating the bonus part of the SS employees' salary that distinguishes this type of material motivation.
I think it is fair to assume that it is most appropriate, when determining the amount of the bonus part, to take into account the following objective circumstances concerning the work of a specific security service employee in the reporting period:
? Personal discipline and efficiency, — compliance with internal work regulations, no late arrivals, no violations of uniform standards, timely execution of management orders, compliance with internal facility regulations, etc.;
? Quality of customer service, — no comments on duty at posts, rules for handling customers, no conflict situations reflected in the book of complaints and suggestions, etc.;
? Hypermarket loss indicator based on the results of current inventories;
? Fulfillment of the hypermarket sales plan (there is a practice of applying this indicator to security service employees, although I consider this issue controversial);
? Fulfilment of the individual detection rate by the number of detected facts of damage. In this case, we may be talking about the number of detected facts, and not about the amount of prevented damage. I assume in advance that many may find this indicator unacceptable and misunderstood, so I would like to immediately make a reservation that the issue of planning the work of security units is a separate topic for discussion and I would not like to dwell on it in detail now.
At the same time, the calculation of the bonus portion of a security service employee must be transparent for the employee himself, therefore it is advisable to use a system for determining the performance of a specific employee based on «key performance indicators» (KPI), with the appropriate gradation. I will risk citing the following scheme for calculating the bonus portion as an example (all figures are, of course, conditional and cannot be used as basic ones):
The table is maintained in Excel format with the introduction of the appropriate formula, which automatically calculates the final amount of the bonus portion based on the actual performance of a particular indicator by the employee.
Calculating the bonus portion of the pay for security service employees based on KPI is a fairly effective system, but it will have an even more powerful stimulating motivational effect if it includes an increasing coefficient. That is, if the employee significantly exceeds the planned indicators, the bonus portion of his pay will exceed the maximum amount stipulated by the staffing schedule.
In this part, I would not like to dwell on the motivation of the Security Service employees in the form of changing the size of the salary or bonus part of the salary within the framework of changing the organizational and staffing schedule. I think this issue is not subject to discussion, and the grounds, size, procedure and frequency of making such changes are the prerogative of the relevant managers and there is no need to dwell on this
Material motivation for specific results in preventing and compensating for material damage.
It should be emphasized that this type of employee motivation can be applied not only to security service employees, but also to any employee of the hypermarket. This type of material incentives for security service employees is determined, as has already been said, by the specifics of the tasks facing the security service departments and the specifics of assessing the performance of specific employees. With the exception of preventive work to prevent damage to a retail enterprise, which can only be subjectively assessed based on the results of a full inventory of the hypermarket, security service employees carry out work, the results of which can be fully expressed in a specific monetary equivalent. This is work to identify, prevent, suppress and compensate for specific cases of material damage to the hypermarket — theft, personnel errors, damage to goods.
In order to motivate employees to be vigilant towards persons committing theft of hypermarket property or creating other threats to the company, and to increase loyalty to the interests of the team, a special type of monetary reward for employees may be introduced in the hypermarket (hypermarket chain). The reward may be paid for providing information about facts that create a threat to the economic security of the Company, about theft being prepared, committed or completed, and other offenses on the territory of the hypermarket.
In cases where the provision of information by an employee may result in threats to the employee himself, the fact of the communication is not made public at the request of the source of information, under the guarantee of the Company's management. In order to keep his awareness of the above-mentioned threats secret, the employee must not spread them to his colleagues, but promptly inform the director of the hypermarket or the head of the hypermarket security service.
The amount of monetary compensation is determined individually in each case, taking into account the significance of the information provided and the degree of danger of the prevented threat. In cases where the amount of prevented material damage is known, the employee is paid a monetary compensation in an amount not less than a certain percentage of the amount of prevented damage.
For example, this amount is defined as 30% of the amount of damage (Nominal amount, given for clarity). Let's assume that, according to the employee's information, a theft in a hypermarket in the amount of 10,000 rubles was prevented, in this case the employee is paid at least 3,000 rubles in bonuses. The frequency of such messages from one employee is not an obstacle to rewarding him for each episode, but is the basis for increasing the amount of remuneration for subsequent messages. The work done by an employee to compensate for damage caused by damage to goods is also encouraged in the amount of a certain percentage of the amount of damage compensated. For example, a buyer or an employee of a hypermarket, having damaged goods worth 1,000 rubles, tried to hide this fact or refuses to voluntarily compensate for the damage caused, but after the work done by the employee, pays for the damage. In this case, if the amount of incentive for compensating for damage to goods is defined, for example, at 20%, the employee is awarded a cash bonus of 200 rubles. The very fact of identifying the damage caused, when the guilty person voluntarily reports it and does not refuse compensation for the damage caused, is not a basis for rewarding the employee.
It is assumed that for providing information about theft committed by an employee of the Company, as well as for preventing material damage that could have been caused as a result of errors in the records of goods movement in the cargo area (errors of employees when accepting, returning, moving goods, dispensing goods by bank transfer — as errors that cause the most significant damage in the overall array of losses of hypermarkets), a more significant amount of incentive from the amount of prevented damage should be determined — up to 40-50%.
The permanent employees of the hypermarket security service, despite the fact that the detection and prevention of security threats is their direct responsibility, are rewarded for the prevention of material damage on an equal basis with other categories of employees. At the same time, the detection of thefts due to the activation of anti-theft equipment should not be taken into account as a personal result. In order to evaluate the results of the official activities of the security service employees, and reward employees for each episode of preventing material damage, the head of the security service should daily record the personal performance indicators of his subordinates, recording the amount of damage prevented.
The following procedure for assigning this type of monetary rewards is proposed:
The basis for assigning a monetary reward is a petition from the head of the Company's security service to the General (or Operational) Director of the Company. The directors of retail structural divisions (hypermarkets, supermarkets, shopping centers, etc.) shall first send petitions to the head of the Company's security service for employee incentives.
The petition for bonuses for employees is formed by the Director of the retail structural division (hypermarket) in the name of the Head of the Company's Security Service based on the data provided by the head of the hypermarket's security service. When including security service employees of all categories in the petition, the head of the security service must take into account the degree to which a specific employee has fulfilled the individual monthly quota for identifying facts of damage. If the quota for identifying facts is not met, the employee should not be included in the petition for incentives.
The petition for incentives includes only those employees whose total combined result allows them to apply for an incentive of at least 200 rubles (the amount is conditional and can be determined individually). The results of employees who were not included in the petition are recorded according to the accumulative system and carried over to the next reporting period.
In order to motivate individuals from the line staff (for example, cashiers), a petition for their incentives in an amount lower than 200 rubles is allowed.
With a cumulative system of identified facts, an employee must be rewarded at least once every three months. If the facts of preventing damage to the interests of the Company identified by the Security Service employee over three months do not allow him to apply for a reward even in the minimum amount, his results for this period are cancelled.
When forming all petitions, the text must have a single format for subsequent generalization of petitions received from retail structural divisions into a single petition. The following format is proposed as an example:
EXAMPLE:
«- Security officer of the hypermarket «………..» of the city of ……….. Petrov Petr Petrovich, for the period from «…»…….. 20… to «…»………20.. revealed 3 cases of theft by customers, in the amount of 450 rubles, 15 personnel errors in the amount of 550 rubles. In total, for a sum of 1,000 rubles. The amount of the incentive is 300 rubles. In addition, he revealed one theft by personnel in the amount of 300 rubles and 10 errors in the accounting of goods movement in the amount of 1,200 rubles. The amount of the incentive is 750 rubles.
Based on the above, I request incentives for the following employees:
Security officer of the hypermarket «………» Petrov Petr Petrovich, in the amount of 1,050 rubles.»
The petition on behalf of the Director of the retail structural division and from his e-mail is sent to the name of the Head of the Company's Security Service within a certain period. As a rule, the deadline for submitting the petition is determined by the deadlines for forming the relevant budget. It is recommended to copy the direct superiors of the head of the security service of the relevant hypermarket for control purposes. The further procedure for coordinating the general petition and paying cash rewards to employees is determined by the Head of the Company's Security Service in agreement with the General Director.
In conclusion, it should be noted that the practice of using this type of material incentives for employees, despite the apparent significance of the funds spent, has fully justified itself. However, its use requires constant monitoring by the heads of the security service, in order to avoid possible abuses and padding.
April 12, 2011
Belov Viktor.