Retail Technology Show 2024: BRC addresses what leadership looks like as general election looms large

In a change to the published conference programme on the second day of Retail Technology Show (RTS) 2024 at London Olympia, after Clarks were unable to attend, Helen Dickinson, Chief Executive at British Retail Consortium (BRC), instead discussed leadership in the economy, with a UK election due soon, and in the workforce, encouraging diversity and so on.

There are many pressures on senior leaders in the retail industry at present navigating the move towards digital, physical, and blended approaches, while still being aware of internal and external demands for sustainability, ethics, diversity and so on.

These pressures have only been exacerbated by a recent downturn in the economy and tough times on the high street and online as cost-of-living pressures hit the world, alongside macroeconomic issues such as high interest rates and wars, which have adversely impacting supply chains.

Many retailers are still exhausted from the disruption they suffered from the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns.

“There is a lot to manage every day at present,” conceded Dickinson. “But the challenge is to meet them head on by realising that culture trumps strategy every time.” 

In other words, if you get your businesses’ culture right, emphasising collaboration, openness, hard work and so on, then everything else will fall into place anyway and challenges can be overcome.   

Diversity of race, gender and sexuality is also a benefit, not an obligation, argued Dickinson, while pointing out to the RTS audience in London that: “There are more non-white people in the UK than there were ten years ago, more identifying as LBG and so on, and catering for a changing customer base is how retailers win business.” 

Be authentic 

Authenticity is the key leadership skill, in Dickinson’s opinion, because it makes it OK to say ‘you know what I don’t know’. Let’s talk to the team and develop a solution to this challenge – whatever it is.

“If you are curious, open, with a diverse team comprising of many different skillsets and experiences then you can find answers,” she said.  

General election  

UK specific change is likely later this year when a Labour government is widely expected to come to power after 14 years of the ruling Conservative Party.

“Whoever it is that comes in we want a different relationship with a greater involvement for business in long-term planning,” said Dickinson, as she called for less short-termism moving forward, rather than chasing headlines.    

Diversity and recruitment

Another issue attended in the leadership debate in the Headline Theatre at RTS 2024, during the Q&A section, was how AI – much discussed at the show – could present a threat to diversity in recruitment, planning, customer service and so on.

“I do worry about AI bias,” said Dickinson, while arguing that good leadership could negate any negative impacts. “We’d be lying to ourselves if we said that there wasn’t bias already in recruitment processes, so the same leadership oversight qualities is required when deploying AI to find staff.”

“The key is the overlay and how the technology is used. You obviously cannot hand over all responsibility to a large language model (LLM) AI application.”    

The industry needs to do a better job in recruitment anyway, added Dickinson, as she worried that valuable data scientists may not see retail as the sector for them versus the attractions of a high paying bank, during the present tough economic times.

“Even though there are probably more data scientists in retail already than in any other sector in the UK,” she commented.

Diversity could again be a strength here in attracting sometimes ignored people that nonetheless have valuable skills to contribute.