A For the bookshop to achieve agile nimbleness does Collective Wisdom of employees (for example Best Buy experiments) and customers (for example Nordstrom Flash Mob) offer more than the expertise of managers? (1,200 words)
B What benefits does crowdsourcing with competitions/prizes (for example TopCoder and Threadless) offer the Bookshop? (1,200 words)
C Compared to the current monopsony, bureaucracy, and hierarchy what would be the advantages in the company adopting self-management? ( for example Morning Star, WL Gore, Cheeseboard Collective, Shared Space and Upside Down Management) (1,200 words)
D What inspiration can the Bookshop take from research on consumer choice (for example Iyengar) and how would this knowledge impact the future offerings of the Bookshop? (1,200 words)
E With the rapid growth in Millennial consumers and their preference for experiences what could the Bookshop do to offer powerful experiences to millennial consumers? ( (1,200 words)
F How can the Bookshop encourage employees to be more creative? (for example Seelig/Birkinshaw) (1,200 words)
G Take either culture OR performance management and explain their importance in supporting your vision for the future of the bookshop (1,200 words)
H Explain the importance of teams in supporting your vision of the future for the Bookshop (1,200 words)
Many in the bookshop trade feel they are looking oblivion in the eye. This pessimism is given support by the numbers: the Booksellers Association found that the number of independent bookshops in the UK has dropped from 1,894 in 1995 to 967 in 2021 (and the Booksellers Association Annual Review 2022 added a further 50 new independent bookshops- total 1,027). As e-commerce grew during the 2000s independent bookshops have shut in the UK and Ireland (according to the Booksellers Association). An article in The Bookseller also mentioned other pressures including rising rent and business rates, and gave the example of the recent closure of The Theatre Bookshop in central London which had seen its rates rise 200%) and the rising popularity of other forms of entertainment such as Netflix and gaming. At the Booksellers Association Annual Conference the President stated that the need to change the bookselling model is “present and immediate”- “we have to demonstrate that we add value to the customer’s experience”. That bookshops to survive and prosper need to re-invent and re-invigorate themselves.
For 40 years “The London Bookshop” (not real name so don’t bother Googling it) an independent bookshop in London has been owned by Richard Ollard. Richard is now in his 80s and he worries about the future of the bookshop: for the first 30 years the shop prospered but has struggled over the last decade for the same reasons as given in the first paragraph. Richard has asked you to give advice on how the shop can survive and prosper through being more agile . Richard knows he is in the final years of his life and more than anything he wants the shop to continue as his legacy. “The London Bookshop” is based in Charing Cross -road in the heart of London and was opened in the 1930’s, Richard bought it in 1975. It is a good size- 30,000 square feet over two floors and is filled (crammed might be the best word) with books and a small café but little else. The bookstore specialises in the Arts (Charing Cross Road is in the heart of theatreland and close to the National Gallery, National Portrait Gallery, Courtauld Institute of Art, Sothebys the auctioneers, The Royal Opera House and many cinemas and restaurants) and has 5 departments: 1) Theatre, Drama, TV, and Film 2) Art, Fashion, and Photography 3) Architecture and Design 4) Music and Dance 5) Food and Drink.
In line with the rest of the bookshop industry sales at The London Bookshop have been declining due to the competition from online retailers (especially Amazon), supermarkets and e-books. Richard has avoided bankruptcy but each year there are fewer sales and pencil thin profit. Given the financial problems “The London Bookshop” faces and Richard’s desire in late life for the shop to continue as his legacy Richard has asked you to give advice on turning the fortunes of the company around, making the chain a success with a view to getting the format right so it attracts more customers who buy more per visit and visit more frequently with the goal of boosting revenues/profit. In particular Richards is aware that in the UK a quarter of the population are millennials and that they are set to soon become the biggest consumer demographic. He wants to make the Bookshop to be attractive and compelling to millennials but is unsure how to go about this.
As Richard looks back on 40 years he is disappointed with himself. “The London Bookshop”. Late in life he realises his approach to managing employees has been too controlling and authoritarian. He asked you to visit the shop and report back on your customer experience: this is what you reported back: first, you pointed-out that the shop had “the presentational sophistication of TESCO” and a complete lack of excitement or originality. Each of the departments in the store was seen by you as “drab, predictable, and anodyne”. Richard looked uncomfortable when you said “Why would anyone visit these bookshops when they can get the same books from Amazon cheaper?” Secondly, while you found the employees were very helpful the look and feel and experience of the visit was bland, a word you used was “frumpy”. Like most bookshops “The London Bookshop” has tried what it regards as “new things”- and like other bookshops it has made room for a café, but as you pointed-out to Richard – how does this make “The London Bookshop” different when cafes in bookshops are commonplace (Waterstones the biggest bookshop chain in the UK has cafes in many of its shops).
You also observed on their visit that many people in the cafe spent a long time reading a book, nursing a coffee for an hour or more, but seldom bought the book they had just read. You reminded Richard that industry giant Borders in 2003 had 1,249 stores worldwide, in 2004 opened cafes in its shops, 2006 made its last profit and 2011 was declared bankrupt. Opening a café in a bookshop is stylistic but not necessarily a creative and successful solution.
The London Bookshop has a very basic website with opening times and contact details and a few pictures but no sales are made on-line. The shop currently makes no use of social media. The General Manager sees himself as an “old-school” physical retailer and there are no IT specialists in the company.
Your undercover visit to the shop only confirmed what Richard already knew- there must be a better way to run the shop. Richard is both owner and General Manager in overall charge of the store and he has in place a conventional hierarchical set-up for bookstores with himself at the top of the pyramid beneath a manager for each of the departments. All decisions about which books to stock , and how to display are decided by the Richard in consultation with the 5 department managers. Richard holds weekly meetings each Friday afternoon with his 5 managers and this weekly meeting is known to everyone as “The Group of 6”. Goals from “The Group of 6” meetings are always short-term: what they need to achieve next week. Richard has been in the bookshop business for 50 years (40 as owner of the shop) and he believes that his wealth of experience gives him great insight into what customers want , “intuition” he calls it– so in “The Group of 6 “ meetings while he listens to the 5 managers he always has the final say and sees himself as both General Manager and “Chief Book Buyer”. He is a firm believer in “pile them high”- offer shelves full of books for the five specialist departments. Any decisions made by the Group of 6 are then cascaded by each departmental manager to their employees the following Monday morning. But there is always an absence of sales figures- the General Manager sees sales figures as “confidential management information”.
In addition to a department manager each department is staffed with a 6-8 employees (retail assistants). Nearly all of these employees are both millennials and passionate about books in their specialist department- and several have real subject expertise (for example graduates and post-graduates expert on art, architecture, theatre and so on). For 40 years Richard has made it clear that the job of employees is to follow to follow instructions- everything decided by management to be implemented to the letter. The Group of 6 decide what will be and each store manager then implements those decisions together with their assistant manager through clear instructions to the employees (the retail assistants). Everything is prescribed: from stacking the shelves, keeping everything tidy and how to make contact with customers. So prescribed that Richard has written a document “The Way We Work” – a 60 page document that prescribes in granular detail how to work in “The London Bookshop”. Over the last 40 years he has never asked for ideas from the staff but instead insists that each department stick rigidly to the instructions for stocking and displaying books ( a visual “planogram” is produced by each department manager) issued by the Group of 6.
Richard makes frequent daily unannounced visits to each department, and while always outwardly friendly to employees he is infamous for making mental notes of what is wrong and then before leaving will communicate this to the department manager who is then expected to ensure employees do things correctly. On return to his office Richard will then write-up the list of problems, email them to the department manager reminding the manager of the conversation and the deadline to remedy the problems. The department manager then has to confirm remedial action in an Action Plan for the following week’s “Group of 6” meeting. All Action Plans are filed away by the General Manager.
As owner of the shop Richard for 40 years believed in his right to be controlling and dictate orders as it “his neck is on the line” and so everyone must do things “his way”- thus the planogram and “The Way We Work”. A self-styled “Old School” bookseller Richard had no interest in new fangled ideas about managing employees until now.
As he nears the end of his life he wants to retire from the business and he wants more than anything to leave a legacy- for the shop to survive and prosper (ideally forever) and to provide work for the employees. So for the first time he held a series of focus groups with the retail assistants. He found these young, educated retail assistants to be friendly and knowledgeable and they all think the pay is pretty good compared to other bookshops- but they felt alienated from the store and management and Richard. They felt unvalued- one employees called the feeling “We go to work and leave our brains on the coat hanger”- and all the employees agreed that no –one in management listens to their suggestions or encourages them to contribute beyond stacking shelves and being helpful to customers. There is also an absence problem- the absence rate running at 10% and when employees were asked about this absence problem, many agreed it was mostly due to people feeling stressed and treated like robots rather than thinking humans.
Richard realises that the way he has managed people is no longer fit for purpose and he is open to radical ideas. Most radical of all as Richard has no family he has decided to give the bookshop to the employees.
