Retail exits hit wholesale mode

NEW DELHI/ MUMBAI: The retail sector which led a massive churn in India Inc with its appetite for talent last year, is bemoaning the same fate. As a result of hyper growth plans and rushed hiring, most retail ventures are struggling to keep their flock together even before they roll out nationally.

Last week saw several high profile exits in the retail sector which included the likes of Ved Prakash Arya who quit as Pantaloon COO to consider a private equity fund, and Vijay Kashyap AVB Retail HR head who is said to be relocating to Australia. According to sources, Kashyap was in the process of hiring expats to fill key positions in the AV Birla retail foray.

In another development, retail behemoth Wal-Mart’s Indian entry saw a churn even before it could come to fruition. Two of its top executives, cash-and-carry operations head, Randy Guttery and another key executive, Lance Retig, moved out. Earlier, Abhijit Sanyal, a senior VP with Subhiksha left to join Reliance Retail, as did V Nagaprasad who was heading Subhiksha’s Karnataka operations.

A few months back, Rajeev Karwal quit Reliance Retail in less than a year of joining the retail venture. Similarly, Lifestyle International CEO, G Shankar exited the company late last year. In fact market has been abuzz lately, about a few key executives on the verge of putting in their papers in two big retail ventures although there has not been any formal announcements.

Analysts say much of the rush to retail that happened last year is now taking its toll. “Being a hot sector offering tempting salaries retail carried a high glamour quotient and many professionals got carried away,” says K Sudrashan, MD, EMA Partners International. “But now with reality hitting hard in this highly demanding operations job, they are having a second thoughts.” Industry watchers expect more exits at senior levels in almost all retail ventures.

HR experts point out that while retail is extremely operation-oriented, a lot of the top honchos are not used to the daily rigours of operations considering they have moved upwards to blue sky strategising. Meanwhile, most of the talent for retail was poached from FMCG or expats were brought in, so while other sectors are skewed 60-40 in favour of strategy, retail is 70-30 tilted towards operations.

“There is an absolute dearth of middle management talent in retail which means that the top people can’t delegate much and have to get operationally active. In addition there is a lot of ambiguity and lack of process orientation,” says Vidya Prakash, principal consultant, Stanton Chase, an executive search firm.

For the retail companies, it was trial and error situation last year. And there was no way the retailers could have waited and got the right fit for their operations. “Startups and scale ups have their own challenges which established players may not be ready for,” says Gauri Padmanabhan, partner, Heidrick & Struggles, retail. As a result, many are facing the churn now.