180: Building Slack Into Your Operating Model

Building spare capacity into a business is a difficult decision as the investment is not immediately needed. But in the retail industry, with major spikes around peak trading times and with squeezed margins. So it’s becoming increasingly important to carefully manage the slack in your operating model. To help explain how to do this, Jeff Roberts joins Oliver Banks to explore why and how you can build the right amount of slack into your operating model.

Listen to this podcast episode to discover:

• What slack is and examples of where it exists in the retail industry.
• 3 tips to make the most effective and productive use of slack in your operating model and organisation.
• How to plan for extreme peak periods that we see in retail, for example, Black Friday or Christmas.
• Why a good approach to building slack can help you innovate and find novel solutions.

 

Introducing Jeffrey Roberts

Jeffrey Roberts – or Jeff – is Partner and Head of Futures at jump! Innovation, where he helps clients to decode alternative futures and design bushiness models to win them.

Previously, Jeff was a Director and Chief Growth Officer at Alchemmy where he led the Retail & Consumer and Growth Advisory practices.

He’s a specialist in operating model design. He works with companies to bring new services and products to market, design organisations for growth into new categories, and help businesses to protect and expand their market positions.

Connect with Jeff Roberts on LinkedIn.

Additional episodes of the Retail Transformation Show to listen to

If you enjoyed this episode, then also check out episode 142: The Modern Retail Operating Model. This episode was recorded on the virtual stage of Oliver’s event, Retail Transformation Live. And Jeff Roberts joins in to share his perspective.

Next, listen to the solo show, episode 174: What To Do When There Is No Right Answer. And in this one, you’ll hear tips and tactics to help make decisions in a volatile and uncertain scenario where there are many unknowns.

Oliver Banks spoke to Quorso’s Julian Mills in episode 118: The Agile Stores Manifesto where they discussed how to build flexibility and agility into your store operations.

The importance of following your strategy was also another big takeaway from the conversation with Jeff Roberts. So listen to episode 71: 10 Biggest Strategy Mistakes To Avoid and discover how to make sure your strategy doesn’t evaporate into thin air.