Posted By CWCaz
Hello,

Can you give a wider inidication as to the nature of the interview and what angle is it your coming from?

CW

Posted By Carl Taylor-Walster
I work for a large high street retailer and would suggest your approach should include understanding risks within retail. our biggest issues are slips/trips/falls (customers) and manual handling (employees). ikea probably have the same issue by virtue of the product they sell. also worth mentioning is financial implications of maintaing a good positive h & s culture especially in terms of fines and civil claims. our civil claims for last year for slips/trips and fall for members of the public currently stands at 3 million pound which is taken from our profit.

Posted By Alexander Falconer
If you are already in a Senior Management position within a different industry sector, then the skills you have gained will be easily transferrable into the retail sector.

Being a Senior Manager is no different to being an Advisor, Manager, practitioner or whatever - good H&S knowledge is still essential.

However, it helps if you can demonstrate how you would emphasise & implement H&S at a strategic level ie, collating/reviewing accidents/incidents/sickness/absence trends, and plan/implement programmes to reduce long term to the benefits of the organisation.

This in itself is just a means to an end, consider all the aspects that would/could assist in the strategy:

training - who needs it, what type, who delivers, budgets, etc,

developing people - who (managers, supervisors, employees), what type of development in order to achieve ultimate aim?

implementing/planning systems - ISO standards requirements (ISO 9000, ISO 14000, OHSAS 18000, IiP)

Performance Measurement - KPi's, allocation of targets/improvements, continual improvement

etc, etc

The list goes on and on!

These are adaptable to any industry, and as long as you have a fair understanding, then you cannot go wrong.

In addition it is not necessary to have an indepth knowledge of the retail industry, but demonstrate that you have an understanding of these (from using your own existing experience and skills).

Not having worked in retail before, I would consider the risks/hazards relating to Manual Handling (handling products), goods storage (storage of good on display - remember many products are flat packed, stacked upon one another - what happens if one falls on top of a member of public whilst retrieving for their own purchase), warehousing (additional stock storage behind scenes), transportation (delivery of products from main depots to regional depots, unloading into warehouse, forklifts, etc), public risks (what dangers apply to public), violence (employees exposed to irate customers), ergonomics (operation of cash registers, collection of trolleys, office PC's, etc) Security (handling of money, transfer of money, etc), office safety, fire safety, first aid, emergency planning and so on, but I am sure you will understand the similarities with other industries.

Sorry if I sound a bit long winded

Hope this helps you out

Good luck with the interview