The last few years have certainly been filled with significant change for all of us in the retail industry, and especially for those in loss prevention. Retail America has been forced to react and respond to an over-stored, understaffed and poor-performing retail environment in the United States, and the economic pressures facing all of us continue to mount. The final three months of 2007 may prove to be the worst fourth quarter since the early 1990s and, with only a handful of retailers doing well, the industry as a whole will be forced to react even more aggressively in 2008. A number of the darlings of the ’80s and ’90s appear to be faltering and the feverish merger activity of the last 10 years will remain heated.

These pressures have created an environment in which the phrase “doing more with less” has become a mandate for nearly every retailer. With 64 percent of all capital budgets being spent on technology, the hunger and need for Retail America to evolve its information management to increase speed and performance will be never-ending, and the human impact will be the continued shrinking of the middle-management ranks.

Increase in responsibility
Over the last two years alone we’ve seen a significant increase – in some cases a doubling – of store-count responsibilities for field LP executives.

At first blush, this increase in store counts would seem to have a negative impact on shrink; in most cases, however, it has been successful for a number of reasons:

Technology, which allows us to manage, audit and respond to information and people faster and on a larger scale.

The streamlining of LP job functions. Having them focus on the core deliverables of safety, theft and fraud and eliminating operational responsibilities simplifies the function, speeds up delivery and allows LP personnel to handle more stores.

Technology (again) is reducing opportunities for employee error, thereby reducing the need for the training and auditing once provided by the LP executive.

The trend toward increased store-count responsibility has been paralleled by a general transition of the majority of corporate LP reporting structures from the financial side to the operational side of the house. This change has been significant and has evolved as a result of technology and the absolute need to increase speed of delivery.

Information is flowing faster, so reaction and decision-making need to move at the same speed: Reporting to the operator eliminates the middleman and allows the LP executive to have a greater, more immediate impact at the store level.

Defining standards
Over the last 10 years we’ve seen a significant increase in the number of retailers requiring four-year degrees, which eliminates 80 percent of the industry and has led to a number of senior LP positions being filled by non-LP executives.

And while the current effort to professionalize our industry with a certification process has value and will have a positive impact, it’s ultimately up to the c-level executives to define the standards and requirements for their LP executives.

The question then becomes: “Will this certification process be accepted as a standard by the c-level executives over time, and what value does it truly add to an individual retailer or executive?”

Retail America will be facing some significant challenges over the next few years, but the ongoing changes have been, and will continue to be, good for the LP segment of the industry: they have refocused and streamlined us and brought us back to basics so that we can increase our performance in an age where speed of delivery is what determines who survives.