Company Profile
Industry Firsts and Second Chances
TJX Europe Provides Second-Chance Opportunities for Ex-Offenders and Relaunches LP Graduate Programmes for Rising Stars
A “poacher-turned-gamekeeper” is an old business idiom that succinctly describes an individual who has not only turned their backs on a life of crime but is actively putting their previous talents to good use in the pursuit of their former selves.
Retail businesses such as shoe-repairer Timpson have made a virtue of the fact that they employ ex-offenders straight from prison in their branches, and the loss prevention speaker circuit has welcomed many previous shoplifters, fraudsters, and cyber-hackers to tell their stories as examples of their epiphanous journey back to legitimacy by describing how they managed to easily overcome the technology, processes, and procedures that were designed to keep them at bay.
But in the post-COVID world of recruitment challenges into LP, it is rare to see former offenders being given an opportunity to directly redeem themselves in a role with such risk responsibility.
To that point, the worlds of asset and profit protection still lack the pathways for all levels of recruitment as diversity in LP remains low, and high-level roles are still dominated by the “pale, male, and stale” stereotype of former jobbing Police and security officers.
To this end, one retail business that is heavily invested in global diversity has set in motion schemes that tackle both of these challenges head on, through ex-offender and graduate apprenticeship schemes designed to attract the poachers-turned-gamekeepers and those leaving higher education institutions with exciting and engaging career paths and progression in LP, both in the UK and across Europe.
As the leading “off-price” retailer of apparel and home fashion in Europe through its TK Maxx and Homesense brands, TJX Europe bases its success on the selling of brand name and designer items to consumers at prices up to 60 per cent less than the recommended retail price (RRP) and at a significant discount to the prices in a department store or on the high street. By so doing, it has effectively democratised the high street, allowing lower income consumers to access higher value fashion and homeware.
Now with tens of thousands of colleagues employed in 700 stores and as part of an e-commerce site, tkmaxx. com, TJX Europe is introducing a best practice model into its recruitment and retention programmes as part of its search to employ as diverse a range of risk professionals as possible.
Commitment to Diversity
TJX Europe’s approach is articulated on its website as a key point of distinction and differentiation:
“Associates bring our business to life, and we aim to support them by making TJX a terrific place to work. It’s very important for us to attract talented individuals, teach them our off-price model, and support their careers. We are also very proud of our culture and are committed to our core values of honesty, integrity, and treating each other with dignity and respect. In fact, developing talent and championing our culture have been global business priorities year in and year out. We believe this encourages many Associates to join us not just to find a job, but to build a career. Inclusion and diversity have long been a priority at TJX, and we are continuing our work to do more. The diversity of our Associates makes us a stronger company and better able to serve our broad and diverse base of customers around the world. We strive for an inclusive workplace where our Associates feel welcome when they walk in the door; valued for their diversity of thought, background, and experience.”
The LP Recruitment Journey
The company has adopted and adapted this diversity model throughout its LP teams to ensure that new recruits into the security and LP functions are not only the right calibre of candidate but also represent the diverse lived experiences of society as a whole. This was not exclusively through a multi-cultural and multi-lingual approach, but inclusive of all comers, including those who may have previously made wrong choices but were now ready for a second opportunity.
TJX Europe has a long history of giving back to the communities in which it lives and works, and with the assistance of The Prince’s Trust, a charity it had worked with for more than a decade, it developed an initiative designed to retrain ex-offenders in retail security.
The company already has a ten-year relationship with The Prince’s Trust through its “Get Into Retail” programme that has been really successful—it has helped 1,500 young people with 78 per cent going on to secure jobs with TJX Europe with the business wanting to go further to build on the relationship and create a similar programme for ex-offenders by getting them into retail security.
The programme provides a taste of employment for ex-offenders looking to turn their lives around and gives them the opportunity to understand what the job is all about.
Despite initial slow progress with smaller cohorts of candidates and disruption during COVID lockdowns when non-essential stores were closed, TJX Europe succeeded in creating a “Get Into LP” programme and an entry-level LP officer role that focussed on greeting customers on entry, which was predominantly tested in London stores.
Now thirteen former offenders are going through the programme, with the goal of being offered a full-time role at the end if all goes to plan.
Managing the Programme
Chris, a regional LP manager with TJX Europe, manages the relationship between the business and the Prince’s Trust and supports the candidates going through the ex-offender programme along with Dani, another LP manager who has so far delivered the biggest cohort of ex-offenders compared to previous years.
“These are people who may lack confidence and have certainly not had a great deal of opportunity through the pandemic where they have missed social interaction, they may also be neuro-divergent,” said Dani.
Chris added, “We take them through a whole series of skills and over that time see their confidence grow. One of our first candidates, Peter, has flourished as a result of moving from the entry level to now being an LP investigator working with a wider team.”
Peter’s Story of Transformation
Peter is by his own admission an articulate, confident individual who had held down sales jobs and even started his own business pre-pandemic, but, according to his own account, “got mixed up in the wrong crowd” and ended up with a custodial sentence. He did not think that retail was for him.
“I knew when I got out that I wanted to rebuild my life on a firm foundation but did not think there would be many jobs out there for people with a criminal record.
“I saw the advert in the job centre and although I really did not want to work in retail, I decided to give it a punt. To be honest I struggled with the first week of it but with the help of the business and Charlotte from The Prince’s Trust, they guided me, and I ended up enjoying it.
“I have been able to talk about what I want because progression was always important to me. As a result of this approach, I was able to gain promotion well within one year and I am loving it. It is challenging but I need to be motivated and engaged and this has given me something to really get my teeth into.
“Within that first twelve months, everyone was encouraging me to move up from the LP officer (LPO) role to LP advisor (LPA). I managed this progress within nine months because the business values good people and your past does not matter to them—it does not define me.”
Now an LPA in a busy London store, Peter added, “I now work with a bigger team covering everything from the door to helping to keep people in the store safe and protecting the assets of the building. I also have responsibility to help manage crime and operational shrink. Every day is different, and I am valued because my opinion is sought. It goes to show that there are opportunities out there for people like me who did not find life easy.
“I enjoy engaging with people and working in an inclusive and diverse business where I hear twenty different languages every day. We all learn differently, but at the end of the day we are all singing off the same hymn sheet.”
Where People Feel Welcome, Valued, and Engaged
Dani said, “We have now had thirteen people go through the programme and they are spread across our London stores. It has been really positive. Our 2021 Kickstart LP programme, which had developed from our Get Into LP initiative in 2019, has now been embedded with our culture as a bespoke programme with built-in progression—it’s taken it to another level.”
She added, “We can teach people to be good LP officers, but the important thing is they learn to be the decision makers when it comes to helping to keep people safe, supporting and managing crime reduction, and signposting shrink reduction. It builds confidence in talking to people as well as influencing and coaching to bring the LPOs through.”
Peter agrees. “My manager was really supportive,” he said. “I knew what was expected of me, and I was in no way micro-managed at any time. They gave me the freedom to explore the role and make my own decisions even if I make a mistake. It is an autonomous role, and you are trained to be the decision maker.”
The programme is at the start of its journey, building stronger bonds with The Prince’s Trust and its links to the Department for Work and Pensions, and the numbers look good for the next cohort intake with up to twenty opting for a place.
Dani added, “You hear a lot of cheese about fresh starts, but this really does translate into reality where people feel welcome, valued, and engaged.”
Graduate Programme Gains Traction
Another industry first is that of the LP Graduate Scheme, which again was stalled because of COVID, but is gathering new momentum providing expanded career paths. As well as welcoming graduates to learn new skills, it also widens their journey by offering specific placements around Europe.
Sarah. A retail analytics manager for TJX Europe, Sarah began her retail journey as a merchandiser for shoes, but now the boot is on the other foot as she has become a specialist investigations manager based in DÜsseldorf.
“I was one of the first guinea pigs. After a year and a half studying shoes, I wanted another challenge, and the graduate intake allowed me to look at alternative careers. I swapped looking at shoes for a living to a role where I am studying people and crime.
“The culture is really good, and I am now in the position where I am thinking that I may stay in Germany,” said Sarah, who has been with the business for six years.
Manu. Emanuele, or “Manu,” TJX Europe’s threat assessment and technical support specialist, was one of four graduates to undertake the programme in 2017 after taking his master’s degree in intelligence and international security.
Originally graduating in international relations from Exeter University, Manu undertook the two-year graduate scheme and has moulded the learnings from it to his current role as one of the key decision makers at TJX’s European Security Operations Centre (SOC), where he has proactive “eyes on” real-time incident management across the TJX Europe estate.
“I had never really thought of retail as a career, but I loved TK Maxx as a customer. I soon realised that the role was all about learning about business, security, and crime. I thought, ‘I’ll see how this goes,’ but I soon realised that it was very structured and allowed me to understand all aspects of the business, from stores to warehousing and distribution and then head office LP.
“I have been able to tweak it to go where I wanted, and I have literally been able to soak all that knowledge up like a sponge,” Manu explained. “In year two I was able to specialise in the LP role in the field, which was my first experience of what managing threats was like. I also now look at the technical side of the role in terms of alarm systems. It has all been really rewarding looking at all the different cultural factors, and you certainly learn the importance of valuing the individuals around you—the business helps you to thrive.”
He added, “You may make mistakes along the way, but you learn from them. In the SOC, we have built a team of ten that looks at the European store estate but also manages operational procedures and travel safety.
“The business has been flexible with me and that has kept me interested throughout. You are very much the driver of this, and you are encouraged to set your own development path.”
Zoe. Investigations analyst Zoe started her TJX journey as a fitting room specialist and front-line associate in 2014. After finding out about the programme, the Lancashire University graduate in policing and criminal investigations joined the scheme in 2018.
“When I was working in-store in the early days, I was enjoying it, but I would not have stayed beyond university as I was thinking of joining the Police. The graduate scheme is well paid, and it puts you in a really strong position to work on your progression.
“The analyst role is the area I really wanted to go into, and it has already opened up so many doors for me to help fulfil my career aspirations,” she said.
Already, Zoe, at age twenty-five, has been asked to step up into a more senior role deputising for her manager while she was away on secondment.
“I would recommend the graduate programme to anyone,” said Zoe. “We need to let people know about all the travel that is possible with the role. We’ve been to Poland, Germany, and Ireland, although that was curtailed during the pandemic.”
Elizabeth. Joining TJX Europe as a Christmas temp at the Leicester city centre store in 2014, Elizabeth, now an e-commerce LP specialist, did not necessarily see the business as a gift that continued to give. However, the criminology graduate who joined the programme was drawn to the LP role after becoming interested in the issue of till and refund fraud that she witnessed.
“I then looked at the two-year graduate programme in 2017 and was delighted to be moved about to see every aspect of the role. Everyone knows who you are and are all willing to help you,” said the Winchester University graduate who has been working with the third-party distribution centres investigating everything from parcel loss to fraudulent claims.
“We work with DHL as our third party, and it is really rewarding to be able to see the warehouse and have influence over the processes and how they should work.”
Elizabeth said the programme encouraged free thinking and collaboration rather than relying on what others thought.
“E-commerce is a growing area for us, and it was a brand-new role for me. I have learned so much already. I can see the graduate programme only going from strength to strength as it relies upon the feedback from those involved, and you feel listened to.”
Joshua. At the end of the day, it is not only diversity that drives the graduates forward, but variety, according to LP Manager Joshua, a criminology graduate from the University of Lancaster who joined the business in 2017.
“I thoroughly enjoyed the graduate scheme, where there isn’t really a ‘typical’ day at TJX,” he said. “A working day could be filled with routine tasks; diverse project work; meetings within loss prevention or with other functions; visits to suppliers, stores, or processing centres around Europe; shadowing specialists; taking courses or attending workshops; not to mention networking and maintaining healthy relationships with business partners. No two days are the same. For me, that’s what keeps work fresh and exciting,” he added.
Practicing What It Preaches
From poachers-turned-gamekeepers to graduate intakes, TJX Europe practices what it preaches in terms of associate development and diversity through providing industry-first development, when it comes to LP learning and personal associate growth as well as its ex-offender programme that is designed to provide second-chance opportunities to first-time law breakers in need of a different kind of break. Together, they represent aspirational design for life and the progressive career opportunities not usually associated with the world of retail. But this is TJX Europe and, rather like their stores, a careful look through the rails never fails to deliver the perfect look.
