That’s right, by arming you with pertinent information and the knowledge gained from years of experience, a Coach can help you prevent employee theft before it starts or before it eats away too much profit. For example: Did you know that the American Society of Employers estimates that 20% of the profit earned by a U.S. company is lost to employee theft? And did you know that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce estimates that 75% of employees steal from the workplace and that most do so repeatedly? And did you also know that the F.B.I. calls employee theft “the fastest growing crime in America!”?
If you’re new to business the chances are you didn’t know these stats. Well, now you do. So the next obvious thing you need to know is what to do about it, right?
Right…. well let me get you started with something you can look for. I call it the “Bad Bread Switcheroo.”
A few years ago I was getting frustrated over not being able to pin down the reason for a rise in the food cost at one of my stores. The inventory counts were accurate, the bread was even, the coupons matched and so on. Nothing seemed of out of place but the higher food cost. The mystery was driving me crazy!
One morning while visiting the store I noticed the manager hadn’t emptied the waste bin yet, so I picked up the bread and discovered it was rock hard, like it had been there so long it was petrified! While questioning the manager I learned that she had been allowing an employee on the closing shift to throw away bread in the waste bin every day. Apparently, the employee would get to work a few minutes early, empty the waste box, then say to the manager, “Hey, I threw away that x number of bread for you.” The manager thought the employee was being helpful and allowed this to become a daily occurrence.
But the employee was not helping the manager; the employee was helping himself! He would toss the wasted bread in the trash and, after the manager entered the credit and went home for the day, would pick it back out and return it to the waste bin. Then he would pull out fresh bread and make sandwiches to take home. Can you imagine? The manager was crediting the same bread over and over again for weeks!
Boy did that employee pull a fast one… but his free food fest didn’t last long thanks to close monitoring of the food cost and me picking up that rock hard piece of bread. The employee was fired and since that time my managers never let anyone “help” to throw out bad bread. Plus all wasted bread is broken into pieces before going in the trash.
You want to go check the bread in your waste bin now don’t you?
Strive to be More!
Coach Morse
(… got questions, comments or a theft story of your own? – leave a comment or contact me…)
I would be interested in understanding your point of view regarding employee theft reduction strategies. The fast food industry is high risk for internal theft.
Pat Murphy
President
LPT Security Consulting
Thanks for commenting Pat. In my experience the best strategies for reducing employee theft have been those aimed at deterrence. The best of these are the consistent use of internal controls, such as requiring employees to conduct cash and inventory counts at the beginning and end of their shift, use of the inventory spot check and daily inventory, combined with communication and follow up by the store manager or owner when a discrepancy is found. In the final analysis, creating an environment where shortages do not go unnoticed is the best defense against employee theft, in my view.