Cisco has again brought to the fore the need for all cross sections of Nigerian employees to be equipped with basic network system skills.
The American networking hardware company made this call on the heel of this year’s Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
Cyber Monday is a marketing term for the Monday after the Thanksgiving holiday in the United States. The term “Cyber Monday” was created by marketing companies to persuade people to shop online. Black Friday is also an online and offline sales campaign.
According to Alfie Hamid, Regional Manager for Corporate Affairs for Cisco Africa, ‘Many retailers have missed empowering their own workforces with, for example, digital collaboration tools, real-time customer insights, and virtual assistance. A workforce that is armed with relevant knowledge and insights is essential and a key differentiator over bricks-and-mortar.
According to research from Cisco, employee productivity technologies can deliver the greatest value for increasing efficiency, optimising the checkout process and improving worker collaboration. Investments in these areas also contribute to improved shopper experiences and increased loyalty.
Just 6% of retailers’ 2016 investment priorities were focused on employee productivity use cases, despite research indicating that use cases deliver the greatest return on investment for retailers; in other words, digitization is a $187 billion (roughly R2,6 trillion) opportunity, according to Cisco.
“The key initiatives that improve employee productivity all rely on a network that understands how people interact, can be customised easily and can control access irrespective of the device that the employee is using – all things that today’s retail employees demand,” Hamid says.
In retail, investments in workforce digitisation deliver value to operations, the labour equation, and talent retention. Since all of these support new and compelling customer experiences, digitising the workforce enables a value chain that is critical to retail success.
“A focus on technology investments that empower employees takes on a whole new meaning in Nigeria, which already struggles to overcome education and training challenges,” Hamid says. “With digitisation, companies have an opportunity to improve skills across the board in the retail industry, which will contribute hugely to the growth of the country’s economy, whether on Black Friday or throughout the year.”
