Measuring productivity is an excellent tool for determining the amount of business needed when increasing staffing levels and for shaping schedules during peak and non-peak hours.
Measuring store sales performance is ascertained by using the following formula:
Net Sales / Number of Transactions = Dollars per Transaction (DPT)
If Sally Salesperson sells $500 worth of merchandise during the course of twelve transactions, 500/12= $42 making Sally’s average dollars per transaction 42.
It is also helpful to know Units per Transaction (UPT) which uses the following formula:
Total Units Sold / Number of Transactions = Units per Transaction
If Sally sells 37 units during the course of 12 transactions, 37/12= 3 making Sally’s average units per transaction 3.
Knowing Dollars per Transaction (DPT) and Units per Transaction (UPT) of the store will be useful in establishing goals for individual sales associates.
Once a store average has been established you may want to find out how each sales associate measures up to the standard by calculating UPT and DPT at the associate level.
Using the same formula at the daily and hourly level will indicate your peak selling hours and days which is valuable information for scheduling purposes. In other words you will want to schedule your top performers during peak hours to maximize sales and your slower performers during non-peak hours to perform refilling and maintenance of the sales floor.
Many of my colleagues will argue scheduling for productivity is next to impossible since many scheduling decisions are based on availability. I agree scheduling according to productivity is challenging but you can still take advantage of DPT/UPT results and use them for reviews, or contests.
