River Island is entering the final stages of replacing its POS system across 200 stores comprising 1,000 POS terminals across the UK and Ireland. The project involves training over 2,500 staff

Almost from the beginning, training has been at the core of the strategy. One of River Island’s early objectives was to make the transition from the existing legacy system to the new POS system as seamless as possible.

River Island took the decision to review their strategy and approach to the communications and training that supported the IT change programme and engaged the services of retail training experts First Friday.

Steve Cassidy, Project Manager with River Island commented: “The size of the task was such that we wanted to ensure we were on the right track and taking the right approach to achieve our objectives.”

It was First Friday’s retailing expertise and innovative approach that convinced Steve that First Friday were the right organisation to carry out this review.

“Training at River Island is traditionally conducted in house and it is more an exception to the rule to outsource any element of that function with the exception of specific skills training”

“The use of a company such as First Friday was therefore something of a revolution for us, but the fact that their own management team have such a close working knowledge of the retail industry gave us the confidence that they could add value to our existing in-house training function.”

It was agreed that First Friday would carry out a review of the current training and communication approach. The objective of the review was to recommend an approach that meets the needs of the change programme and builds on the work already completed.

The principle activities to be completed in the review included:

• Review of the programme together with its objectives
• Review and visit the pilot stores
• Review current proposed rollout approach
• Review materials already developed
• Review high level training needs for the different job roles, both at implementation and ongoing

Two consultants were assigned to the project who were responsible for reviewing the training manual as well as spending time in the pilot stores in order to get the feel of the emotional impact of the implementation of the new system.

A Communication framework was developed relevant to function across all areas of the business including B&M, Stores, Logistics and Distribution in addition to other functions. The strategy also took into account River Island’s external communication to suppliers and was structured in such a way that it could easily integrate with all projects, current and future.

Steve Cassidy concluded: “The investment in the implementation of any new systems strategy in an organisation the size of River Island is a major task and it was for this reason that we have placed so much emphasis on training.

“The input of our own internal resource coupled with that of First Friday has been invaluable and will greatly contribute to the success of the roll out.”