Retail Executive Leadership Program (RELP)

Contact the Institute to schedule a program at your store.

The RELP is a custom tailored classroom program for groups interested in management and executive training. This class offers the knowledge from renowned experts, in-depth workshops, and a collaborative environment. You and your colleagues will openly explore critical issues that directly impact your business.

The program duration and topics can be tailored to meet your organization needs. Popular topics include leadership, strategy, people development, family business, quality service and merchandising. Topics from the International Supermarket Management such as loss prevention, supermarket finance, store positioning, among others, can also be included.

We can bring the program to your facilities or to another venue of your choosing.
Contact the Institute to tailor a program for your organization.

Who Should Attend and Why?

This class is designed for owners, key family members, executives, district managers and team leaders responsible for determining their business's direction, strategic planning and people development and those who are being prepared to assume those roles.

Sharpen your leadership skills: Return to your store with a renewed sense of confidence in your leadership abilities.
Family business leadership: Learn about leadership succession in family businesses, including the characteristics of successful next generation leaders and proven ways to help them develop their full potential.
New ideas: Find out what is working for other leading organizations. Learn through in-depth experience and by asking questions of experts and peers. Sessions will inspire you to achieve at a higher level, think in new ways and overcome new challenges.
Network with your peers: A limited class size, casual social encounters and a range of breakout sessions give you the opportunity to engage with a wider community of peers and executives.
Access to online courses: The Institute offers 90+ online courses designed to further expand your learning. The Institute also offers a social network, where participants can share materials and experiences beyond the classroom event.

Program in Detail

Leadership and Self-awareness
Self-awareness is the foundation of great leadership and the first step toward change. Though everyone has something to learn about themselves, the process cannot simply be taught. To support the development of a more accurate perception of self, this session will rely on a pre-class assessment tool that is based on more than 20 years of research with working adults and leaders. By utilizing this assessment, the session aims to help participants be more strategic about their career development and become more self-aware individuals

Faculty: Paulo Goelzer, Ph.D. President & CEO, IGA Coca-Cola Institute

Leading Teams
Teams have more talent and experience, more diverse resources, and greater operating flexibility than individual performers. So why do so many teams either struggle unpleasantly to an unsatisfactory conclusion, or worse, crash and burn shortly after launch? Richard Hackman, one of the world's leading experts on group and organizational dynamics, argues that the answer to this puzzle is rooted in flawed thinking about team leadership. It is not a leader's personality or management style that determine how well a team performs, but how well a leader designs and supports a team so that members can manage themselves.

Faculty: J. Richard Hackman, Ph.D. Professor, Harvard University

Distinction in Retail - Strategy 2015
In an evolving market, retailers must find ways to create a competitive advantage and distinguish their stores. In this workshop, the founder of the RNG demonstrates leading transformational strategies to revolutionize an organization. Learn about future scenarios for the next 5-10 years and the key strategies that will get you there intact. Examine the changes that are currently shaping the retail market, and discover how "bringing the future to the present" places your business in line for success.

Managing a Family Business
This session sheds light on the complex aspects of family-owned business. Examine the reality of living and working with ambiguities that are present in all family businesses. Through polarity mapping, this session will demonstrate how family business members can meet these challenges and use polarity maps to develop an action plan. Understand the process of working through the issues encountered by growing multi-generational family firms.

Identify the opportunities and challenges presented by family businesses and how to address them, with a focus on predictable paradoxes that arise across the generations.
Explore the demands of leadership succession in family businesses, including characteristics of successful next generation leaders, and proven ways to help them develop their full potential.
Learn the different demands and dynamics that occur in the Founder (G1) to Siblings (G2) generation, compared and contrasted to the Cousin (G3) transition, and beyond.
Understand the planning, policies and procedures that families and businesses can put in place to promote successful continuity, especially for siblings and cousins.
Explore personal and family values among owners, and discuss how they can build an organization culture and strengthen business.
Provide practical opportunities to apply these concepts to your own situation.

Faculty: Amy M. Schuman Consultant, Family Business Consulting Group ®
Paulo Goelzer, Ph.D. President & CEO, IGA Coca-Cola Institute

MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE

Marketing today looks very different from how it did a couple years ago. Traditional paid media (print, TV, radio) still plays an important role, but progressive retailers now take advantage of many alternative forms of media as well. Mobile technology, Wi-Fi and Broadband Web access are now driving growth worldwide. This session will fully explore the alternative digital media that supermarkets are adopting to reach consumers in a timely, relevant, personal and cost-effective way.

Faculty: Robert Hemphill, President, Webstop.com, Inc.

ENTREPRENEURSHIP

Learn the rules and intricacies of creating a business within a business—taking the entrepreneurial experience one step further. For anyone who works at an organization and believes progress relies on innovation, for those who want to grow but do not know how, Steven Pulver's experience—both as a corporate teacher and in his real life—will provide invaluable knowledge.

Faculty: Steven Pulver, Professor at The Schulich School of Business