Can’t Get No Satisfaction

July 31, 2007  by in UnCategorized   

By Home Furnishings Business in on August 2007 Despite headlines to the contrary, employees/managers/owners in the home furnishings industry are generally quite satisfied with their jobs. Based on a Home Furnishings Business survey conducted in May, three-quarters of the respondents reported that they were somewhat or very satisfied with their jobs. This compares quite well with a 2006 University of Chicago survey that reported furniture/home furnishings salespersons were ranked among the bottom of U.S. occupations when it came to job satisfaction.

Happiest were owners/CEOs/COOs, with 38 percent saying they were very satisfied. Twenty-nine percent of sales reps were equally satisfied, followed by sales personnel (27 percent) and trailing the pack were store managers/operations personnel with a “very satisfied” rating of just 19 percent.

Just 3 percent of all those surveyed reported that they were not satisfied at all with their jobs. Breaking the response down by job category, the least satisfied were sales personnel, with 5 percent falling into the “not satisfied at all” grouping with owners/CEOs/COOs just behind with 3 percent. No store managers/operations personnel or sales reps reported that level of dismay with their jobs.

Virtually all of those surveyed reported they were full-time employees.

Over half of all respondents had been in their current position for more than 10 years, with the newbies (12 or fewer months on the job) representing a meager 5 percent of the particpants. Nineteen percent had job experience of five to 10 years, with the balance split between those with two to three years of service and four to five years of job history.

Two-thirds of the top brass (owners/CEOs/COOs) had been on the job for more than 10 years, and the same number of sales reps had served an equally long time in the trenches. Not far behind, three-fifths of sales personnel, including sales managers, had at least a decade of job experience. Just under half of store managers/operations employees reported that length of service, but they’re catching up fast—30 percent of their number have between five and 10 years of service, substantially more than any other job category.



Who’s Selling, Who’s Not

Just 10 percent of those surveyed said that none of their time was taken up by non-selling tasks. Skewing the overall response are the sales reps, 56 percent of whom reported that all of their time was spent on their selling efforts.

Excluding sales reps, respondents reported across the board that non-selling tasks took up more than 25 percent of their time. Overall, 53 percent stated that more than one-quarter of their work time was spent doing something other than selling, with 60 percent of both owners/CEOs/COOs and store managers/operations personnel hitting the one-quarter mark-plus. Just under half of salespeople saw at least one out of every four hours devoted to something other than selling.

Overall, 80 percent of respondents said that more than 10 percent of their time was spent on non-sales tasks, with 90 percent of owners/CEOs/COOs, 88 percent of store managers/operations employees and 80 percent of sales employees agreeing.

Holding out are the sales reps. 88 percent of them reported spending 5 percent or less of their time on non-selling tasks.



Dealing with Customer Gripes

Most survey respondents felt that they were a strong part of the selling process when it came to resolving customer complaints post-sale. There are very few things more frustrating than having an unhappy customer vent and to not be able to do anything to resolve her complaint.

Collectively, just 13 percent of survey participants said that they had no authority to resolve customer complaints after the sale was concluded because that was not part of their jobs. Nearly two-thirds reported that they had a great deal of authority to resolve complaints, with 16 percent stating they had some authority, with the balance admitting they had little authority to fix things.

Not surprisingly, 87 percent of owners/CEOs/COOs were top tier when it came to handling and resolving complaints, with only 4 percent saying they had no authority to resolve post-sale gripes. More than half of store manager/operations employees, sales personnel and sales reps stated they had a great deal of authority to handle complaints. Most participants said they had some or a great deal of authority to resolve post-sale complaints: 90 percent of owner/CEOs/COOs, 84 percent of store managers/operations personnel, 78 percent of sales personnel and 88 percent of sales reps.

Only sales reps reported that resolving complaints wasn’t part of their jobs.



The Best Part of the Job is ...

The good news to the home furnishings industry is, after excluding salary and benefits, the best-liked part of industry jobs is working with customers. About half of all respondents reported customers were their favorite job duty, with 66 percent of sales reps agreeing. One-third of store managers/operations personnel said so, with 62 percent of sales personnel joining in.

Number two on the most-favored part of the job was the variety of tasks respondents faced. Two-fifths of respondents liked the change of duties inherent in their jobs, with half of all store managers/operations employees choosing this option over working with customers. Also receiving favorable scores were the available product and product options.

Training fell to the bottom of the list for most respondents, with the lone exception being sales reps, with 22 percent reporting that this was a favored part of the job. This makes a lot of sense, since reps are often responsible for demonstrating product features and options to store salespeople. Just 4 percent of all respondents reported training as a favorite part of their job, with no store managers/operations personnel agreeing, once again perhaps due to a limited role in this area.

Overall, survey respondents indicated a lot of satisfaction in the parts of their jobs that required one-on-one contact with others, particularly customers. This also included their co-workers and management, although co-workers outscored management by four percentage points! Only a collective 6 percent said a resolving customer service issues was one of the things they liked to do best. Job location and hours both received double-digit responses, 15 percent and 13 percent, respectively.



And the Worst Part is ...

Ouch! The least-liked part of the job for the participants (excluding salary and benefits) was dealing with customer service issues. Despite having a great deal of authority (63 percent of respondents) to resolve problems, two-fifths of all respondents disliked this task. Over half of owners/CEOs/COOs chose this as their number one beef, with 42 percent of store managers/operations personnel agreeing. About one-third of sales personnel and sales reps voted this way, too.

The number one complaint of sales reps were their hours, with nearly three-quarters placing this at the top of their least-liked part of the job, with paperwork taking second place, with 38 percent of sales reps choosing it.

Hours involved in the job was also a top tier gripe for owners/CEOs/COOs, store managers/operations employees and salespeople. About two-fifths of each group stated their hours were among their least-like parts of their jobs. Similarly, paperwork was disliked across the board.

Don’t ask about product problems—one third of all the participants cited this as a major irritant of their job. 39 percent of owners/CEOs/COOs and an equal number of store managers/operations personnel agreed. Only one-fifth of sales employees joined in, with just under one-third of sales reps voting this as a least-liked characteristic.

While no delivery personnel responded to the survey, they get pretty high marks from their co-workers. Just about one-quarter of all respondents said delivery problems were among the least-liked attributes of their jobs, with those on the front lines—store managers/operations employees—booting that response up to 32 percent. Just 18 percent of sales reps choose delivery problems as one of their least-liked parts of the job.

Managers everywhere can heave a sigh of relief—overall, fewer than 5 percent of respondents didn’t like their co-workers. Product and product options, along with job location, scored the same response. All three of these topics scored well in the “liked best” part of the survey, with overall responses of 21 percent, 32 percent and 15 percent for co-workers, product and product options and job location, respectively.