RetailCraft · 2026-01-31 · 34 min
This episode is for retail operators who believe that the store estate is an asset, and that the people running it are the brand. Ian Jindal chat with Shannon Osman, Head of Retail at Footasylum, who has built her career from shop floor to leadership and brings a practitioner's clarity to questions that often get buried in strategy decks: how do you actually recruit, retain and develop a predominantly Gen Z workforce at scale? The conversation covers Footasylum's distinctive hiring model, its social-first content machine, the Locked In franchise, and a franchise expansion into the Middle East - all through the lens of a retailer that has won Retail Employer of the Year while opening stores, not closing them. Key themes Rethinking recruitment from first principles: Footasylum scrapped the CV-led process and replaced it with group in-store interviews. No CV submission, just availability, knockout questions, and a live group exercise. The best candidate on the day gets the job, eliminating unconscious bias and filtering for exactly the communication skills the role demands.
RetailCraft 62: "Full Circle: - in conversation with Lucie McLeod of Hair Syrup68 / 100RetailCraft 60: "Win, Win, Win" - in conversation with Florian Clemens of Tesco MediaRetailCraft 59: "Spreading Positive Energy" - Shani Higgs of PerfectTedRetailCraft 58: "Share of stomach" - Timo Boldt of GoustoRetailCraft 57: "1300 entrepreneurs" - in conversation with Oskar Jacobsson, Director Customer Solutions, ICA Gruppen