Retailers know that hiring is only half the battle. Keeping great employees engaged and motivated is what truly drives success. In today’s session, we’ll explore smart, practical strategies for incentivizing your team beyond just a paycheck. Whether you run a boutique, a tack store, or a multi-location shop, you’ll walk away with ideas you can implement immediately. Listen in...

WESA Retail Roundup June 23, 2025

• Host: Glenn the Geek, Host of Horses in the Morning
• Facebook: Retail Roundup Facebook group
• Guest: Ilya Ilienko | Linked In |
• Presented By: Western English Sales Association

Time Stamps:

07:33 - Flexibility in Business Scheduling

10:18 - Innovative Perks for Small Businesses

18:55 - The Importance of Employee Responsibility

27:01 - Creating a Positive Workplace Environment

Takeaways:

• Incentivizing employees requires a multifaceted approach that extends beyond mere financial compensation.
• Engaging employees through cross-training not only enhances their skills but also fosters collaboration among team members.
• Flexibility in scheduling and responsibilities can significantly improve employee satisfaction and retention rates.
• Creating a supportive work environment by allowing pets and family involvement can enhance employee morale and loyalty.
• Acknowledging milestones and achievements in the workplace cultivates a sense of belonging and recognition among employees.
• Community involvement through volunteer opportunities can strengthen employee ties to the business and enhance brand loyalty.

Foreign.

You are listening to the Horse Radio Network, part of the Equine Network family.

Well, hi everybody.

Glenn the Geek, back with you.

Founder of the Horse Radio Network and host of Horses in the Morning, the daily podcast for the last 15 years.

Welcome to WESA Retail Roundup.

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Retailers know that hiring is only half the battle.

Keeping great employees engaged and motivated is what truly drives success.

In today's session, we explore smart, practical strategies for incentivizing your team beyond just a paycheck.

Whether you run a boutique, a tax store, or multi location shop, you'll walk away with ideas you can implement immediately.

And today we're joined by Ilya, who's a financial expert who uniquely blends corporate leadership with small business insight.

Ilya currently serves as CFO of a tech startup and advises clients with wealth management.

Ilya's 20 plus years of experience spans Fortune 500 companies and small businesses alike, making him a powerful voice for retailers looking to build motivated teams with limited resources.

Plus, he has a whole bunch of other acronyms that are scrolling down there.

Thank you, Elias.

Thanks for joining us.

Thank you very much for having me, Glenn.

It's a pleasure.

So where are you located?

Where are you at in the world?

I am in warm and sunny South Carolina.

Oh, wow, okay.

Yeah.

Been to Florida, not too far away from you.

And of course, how warm is it.

Going to be for you guys?

About 95 today.

So, you know, normal summer day.

Same as you probably.

Yeah, very similar.

And you're in horse country, a lot of horses up in your area.

We have a lot of listeners up your way.

So, yeah, most definitely.

I actually took some time and had an engagement at one of the largest Arabian horse farms on this side of the United States.

Oh, wow.

Okay.

Yeah, it's right nearby, very few towns over.

Very cool.

Yes.

So fairly familiar with your landscape.

Our little world over here.

Yeah.

And you know how crazy we are then.

We're, we're addicted to what we do.

You know, we're passionate about our hobby, that's for sure.

You're ambitious and driven.

Yes, exactly.

So why should retailers think beyond the paycheck?

You know what, you know we obviously pay our employees, but you know, you need to do a little bit more to make a dedicated employee.

So, you know, why should we think beyond that?

Well, Glenn, your employees are your boots on the ground.

So you can't track everything that happens in your business.

Your employees play a function, they see what is happening and they are the eyes and ears, not just to the ground, but they are your primary communication devices to your vendors, to your customers and all of the other relationships.

So as the business grows, the employees that have been at the business, they start, they get to know the business, they understand its inner workings.

And tenured employees can bring more of a benefit to the, you know, to the business.

And as such, as such, we want to not just hire and be able to hire well, but we want to be able to retain because as we retain talent, that talent grows and can give us back in terms of obviously business strategy and furthering our business.

So it's very important.

What kind of 9 financial incentives can you do for employees?

Or let me rephrase that, what kind of 9 financial incentives are effective for employees in a small business especially.

Sure, sure, I would say a category of non financial, non monetary benefits.

For example, cross training.

Cross training doesn't, doesn't just benefit the employee by keeping them more engaged and allowing them to broaden their skills, but it also allows your business to benefit from those employees cross training each other.

So in other words, one employee knows what the other one is doing and should one of them fall out of the game, then the other one knows the responsibilities of the other.

It's also a great way to break up the monotony.

For example, and this particularly applies to Gen Z and the Millennials and the younger generation.

Everything is so instant where those generations tend to favor a little bit more action and a little bit more movement and attention on themselves.

So cross training provides this attention and it also provides the energy and the robustness and the variety to the to work.

So cross training is one that in my experience has worked exceptionally well, not just for employees, but for the business itself as well.

For continuity.

If you want, I can provide a few more.

Yeah, sure.

Rotation and sharing schedules.

So for example, you know, businesses, as businesses get to know their employees, they, they see that employees can be trusted.

You can, especially at a smaller business.

You can take the reins off a little bit and provide freedom.

And employees like freedom.

You know, people who can be trusted.

They like when freedom is offered to them.

So with freedom you can offer sharing schedules and rotations.

So for example, you can tell Your small team, hey, figure out what works best for you and should you have a problem, you don't need to involve me, but go ahead and just communicate with your colleagues and work it out.

That's freedom and it also helps continuity and it also lessens the managerial burden.

From the business owner, I think, to.

The work life balance you're talking about with, with younger people today.

They're more in tune to that and I admire them for that.

I wish that I had been our generation.

It was tender.

You just go to work and you work all the time and you come home and you know, whatever time you have left is what you have left.

And I think that's changed a lot.

And I like that it's changed a lot.

I think it's a better experience for everybody.

For family, for you, for the employee, for everybody.

Yes, I, I agree, Glenn.

I remember the times when I would get on the subway in New York, go to work, take my half an hour lunch, get back on the subway and get back home now with zoom.

I mean look at us now doing, doing this from one state and another state.

Freedom and flexibility is definitely, is definitely a plus.

And with that being said, actually flexibility, flexibility in terms of your business needs.

This is a great intro into my next one that I was going to say flexibility into your business needs and scheduling.

So for example, you're talking about freedom.

If the business owner notices that you have down times or for example in the summer, some of your days are not as busy, you can offer flexibility in terms of scheduling and work attendance as you see fit.

And that also may play a role in, you know, tele attendance if you say, you know.

So anything else that comes to mind, other incentives?

Sure, yeah, absolutely.

I think for the, for an appropriate type of business and especially the industries in equine, bringing your kids and allowing employees to bring animals, their pets to work is a huge, can be a huge plus because it doesn't only integrate the employee as an employee, but it integrates that employee from the human perspective.

It lets the employee and their family, their four legged ones get to know the business as well and feel more comfortable.

I think that type of thing, non monetary is one of the best.

It's funny you mentioned that.

I consulted for a very, very large retailer in our world and they allowed their employees to bring dogs in.

And it was a cubicle farm, you know, and it was low cubicles and I had a Boston terrier that would stare at me all day long from the next cubicle.

He'd stand up on the Top of the cubicle, and he'd stare at me all day long.

I had that Boston terrier.

I could still picture him staring at me all day.

But that was.

It was a wonderful perk for that particular business because they did let their dogs come in and, you know, they had to be behaved and all that stuff.

But it worked out well there because, you know, we're in a.

We're in an animal business.

I mean, that's what we do.

Yeah.

Yes, absolutely.

For lots of businesses, these things work.

For some other ones they don't.

And for example, I have an animal, that one, and he's pretty quiet, so I could bring him to work.

It's just the size is a little bit.

What do you have?

What do you have there?

This is a Doberman.

Oh, you have a Doberman there?

Okay.

Yeah.

His name is Aries, just like my mom is an Aries.

There you go.

There you go.

So have you worked with a lot of different businesses?

Is there perks that you can offer that work?

Well, for a small business that doesn't necessarily break the bank?

Yes, Glenn, I think one of the best, and this directly applies to a lot of your listeners, one of the best perks I saw was when I worked for Palmetto Arabians, which is one of the largest Arabian horse farms on this side of the United States.

And being that it was a relatively large horse farm and a vet come in fairly frequently to the property.

And because the horse farm and the small business that's attached to it were providing the vet so much business, then they had a relationship and agreement that any one of their employees can bring their pets to use the vet for free, assuming that it's obviously not for leg breaks or things like that, but for your regular ongoing animal routine management.

And that was fantastic.

You don't only get to bring your animal to work, but you can also have your animal serviced.

Yeah, vaccines, all that stuff, checkups, you know, that kind of stuff all adds up, especially today when, you know, a small animal vet calls.

$300 to show up.

Absolutely.

The other big one in retail in our world, and it's.

It's become a joke, actually, is discounts.

So if you work for a tax shop, you get a discount on everything you buy.

And the joke is that you're going to spend more than you make anyway, so the retailer is really better off because we all do spend a lot of money when we get discounts at the.

The places we work.

But.

But it means a lot.

I mean, it means a lot because you're going to buy the stuff anyway.

And now I'm getting a discount because I work there.

Well, not, not only that, but that's a, that's a great, that's a great one that, that I did not think about.

And thank you for mentioning that, Glenn.

When I was doing public accounting, we had a division specifically focusing on small business.

And one of the things that we encourage small businesses to do is to explore their community.

So in other words, you know, you may have a corner gym, you may have a gym on the corner of the block.

And although your small business may not be large enough to get a corporate discount, you can speak to the gym and say, hey, can we get a family discount?

And that has worked not just across gyms or other health facilities, but also, you know, your regular grocery store.

If you say we are a member of this community, can we get a, you know, a 10 discount?

For example, groceries that my employees shop here, if they just mentioned that, you know, we're your business neighbor, or a dollar off of a cup of coffee or lunch or things like that.

Go out, go out, advertise your business, say that you're a part of the community and ask them if they can participate.

If you funnel, you know, some of the business to them, I think it's a great win.

Win.

Yeah, I think that's a great idea.

I never thought about that, you know, doing that for local businesses.

How about recognition, you know, employee of the month.

Do those kind of things work?

Yes, I think that, I think that we as people, we all like attention.

And, you know, particularly the younger generation, everything is instant, instantaneous.

It's at your fingertips.

So I think the need for attention is great and the need for us to be accepted.

So acknowledging anniversaries, you know, work anniversaries, acknowledging that your employee had a fantastic something happen in their life.

And likewise, you know, maybe someone passes away or there's a, you know, there's a bad thing that happens.

Giving them time off, taking them to lunch, all those things, they give attention and show gratitude to employees.

And that's one of the biggest things that small businesses can do.

They can't quite compete with the big box stores, but where they can't compete monetarily or for example, on your benefits, they can go ahead and compete on attention.

You're not a number in our, in our business, you will grow with us and we will acknowledge you and what is happening, you know, in your life, if that makes sense.

Yeah, no, I mean, birthdays were always a big thing at a lot of the companies I worked for, you know, they.

They have a cake or bring in, you know, something.

But again, it's just.

You're right, it's just, hey, you're being acknowledged that I'm here and I'm valuable.

You know, I think that's.

That is the key.

And I don't care what age you are, you always want that.

You want to be told you're doing a good job too.

As simple as.

You did great today with that one customer that came in with the boots, you know, for the boots.

You spent an hour trying boots on them and they ended up walking away with a pair of boots, you know, and, you know, just those little things really do make a.

Because you did just spend an hour and you were probably frustrated, right?

As an employee, you were frustrated because it, you know, it.

I've done that before in stores and tried on boots for an hour.

And the fact that they walked away with a pair of boots, you know, acknowledging that is important too.

As important as the other stuff, I think.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

But Glenn, that takes.

That goes back to one of the points I think I was saying, or was going to say, which is being tuned into your employees, especially tuned into those employees who appear to be tuned into your business.

So it's a, you know, give, give relationship.

You understand what your.

What matters to your employees.

So, for example, taking the gym, you see that most of your employees are very health conscious.

Health conscious.

And I've had a.

I've had this at one of my smaller clients where instead of a regular lunch, they would expand it to an hour and a half if you were visiting the health facility next door.

Oh, I see.

Okay.

So that's what, that's what matters to them.

That's what you give to them.

But at the same time, you know, though, you notice that those are.

Employees have your business's best interests at heart as well.

So are there things, other things they can do to compete with the.

The big box stores or whatever, with the full benefit packages and, you know, the whole thing.

Are there other things that they can throw in that you've seen work and are effective?

Yeah, absolutely.

Well, I think small businesses are, like I said, in a unique opportunity where they don't have to go through these rigid policies and procedures and have levels upon levels of approvals if they want to institute something.

Small businesses are much more nimble and quick to act.

So if you want to, for example, try out an overstock policy, say the small business, and I've had this happen.

A small business orders Inventory perishables, what have you on an ongoing basis.

So some of that inventory or overstock, if it cannot be returned, they share with the employees.

So there's a gourmet grocery business, which is.

Was a client of mine, and they would get eggs, milk and things like that for, you know, cooking.

And as new items come in, they would give the other obviously not expired items to their employees.

And given the prices of eggs.

Yeah, today.

Yeah, that's better than a paycheck.

Yeah, in a lot of cases, yes.

But flexibility, I think flexibility is a huge one.

Attention, being able to move and react.

You try the overstock, and if that doesn't work, you can try having your employee bring their dog or cat in.

If that doesn't work, switch to something else and keep track.

Big box stores will never be able to compete with that kind of thing.

All they can do is throw money.

One of the things, too, that I'm thinking about is responsibility.

What I mean by that is if your employee has a good idea for something that, that, you know, whatever, a special promotion or program, giving them the responsibility to take that and run with it inevitably gives them pride in what they've done and makes them feel like they're part of the team that's making this thing grow and work.

So, you know, I always thought in the employees I've had, I've always, you know, if they, if they have time and they have the wherewithal to take that responsibility and run with it, they learn a lot.

You see growth.

Hopefully it works.

If it doesn't work, that's fine too.

You know, we all try things that don't work, but giving them the responsibility helps them grow into future positions, too.

And also, you're testing them, right?

You're testing them for what they can handle and what they can do.

And you might find a.

A new area or an area that.

A vertical that you could put them in that you weren't thinking about for that particular employee because you found something that they were really good at.

So responsive.

Don't be afraid to give them responsibilities.

What I'm saying.

I agree.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

What can we.

What can we.

What can we add to this?

You can provide autonomy.

You know, you see someone has a sharp, bright mind, you know, be forthcoming.

Express to them that you want to hear their opinions.

They see.

They may see more customers than you do, so they may have other ideas that will be beneficial to the business.

Big box stores are not going to be able to do that.

But you can leave your comment box open all the Time for employees and to what you're saying, expand the set of responsibilities.

It gets employees, it gets your business to be sticky.

So they are growing with your business just like to what you were saying.

And they feel like they are a part of this business.

So that's.

It makes it sticky and it makes it harder for.

It makes it less likely for employees to leave because they're now part of this family.

Yeah, they feel like some sense of ownership there, right?

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, I totally agree with that.

We talk about ROI all the time in relation to everything.

I think some of this, you know, and you being a cfo, this is something you deal with all the time.

But I think there's some of this you're doing for your employees that you can't track ROI on it and maybe shouldn't track.

It's not ROI able.

It's more creating that lifelong employee, which I guess is ROI when you think about it over a long period of time.

Right, sure.

Am I looking at it wrong?

I don't think so.

I think ROIs can be whatever.

Well, I mean, they.

Probably not.

I don't want to put my foot in my mouth, but ROIs, you can calculate ROIs in a number of ways.

You know, it could be in your head and that's the way that you're keeping track of ROIs.

Or you could be looking, looking at absences, absenteeism over time.

Or you could be looking and seeing Google reviews and how Google reviews mention some of your employees, maybe one or two particular employees, you know, or maybe it's feedback from customers directly that, wow, this employee of yours went above and beyond.

So that's a way to track them.

And obviously ROIs are tracked up and down in your huge corporations.

We don't necessarily need to get into that kind of paradigm, but we can keep track of employee performance just by utilizing the basic metrics that make sense to us.

Is the customer happy?

Is the business moving?

Is the inventory all there is the employee.

Are the employees performing their duties well, basically.

Right.

So, and this is something we have never talked about on this show is surveys.

Do you recommend surveys even for small businesses?

And that ties back because one of the questions obviously can involve employees, but do you.

How do you feel about surveys, customer surveys, customer surveys?

Well, we've had business, in my experience, we've had businesses use customer surveys, vendor surveys, all sorts of surveys.

As unfortunately, as we've probably all seen on Amazon, people that leave reviews typically.

Are the negative people.

Yes.

So they want to, they want to air out their displeasures.

So if you can filter or somehow get around that and take all of the negative reviews, for example, given that, you know, 90 of your review levers will be leaving a negative review.

If you can take that with a grain of salt and learn from it, I think it could be a very, very positive tool if used appropriately and at the right place.

Obviously, you know, some, some small businesses are not going to be review accommodating or whatever it is.

You know, you have mass, mass clients or customers coming in, getting one time small transactions, buying potato chips or what have you.

That's not the kind of probably environment that's going to be that tool conducive.

But if you have ongoing relationships that are very material to your business, the feedback can be absolutely beneficial.

Like if you have a club program or something like that, they're your target for surveys.

I think two surveys.

There are so many.

Now.

Anytime you buy anything, anytime you sneeze anywhere, somebody wants you to do a survey.

And I think, I know I don't do as many as I used to because I get so many.

It's like I don't, I just don't care to do it right.

I think they've kind of lost a little bit of their effectiveness because of the quantity you receive now.

Survey paralysis.

Yeah, just like information paralysis.

We.

It's true.

I mean, it is true.

So any final piece of advice, one piece of advice that you could give a retailer, trying to motivate a team, trying to develop that loyalty and that sense of ownership, what would you say to them?

What do you want to leave them with?

Well, I think that you need to, you need to market your, your business, you need to create a voice for your business.

So, so for example, volunteering, paid time off, it's not, it's not as attractive, you know, when you say it.

But if you position your business to go to the community and approach nonprofits and say, hey, we want to be, we want to be active and we have a few employees that we're going to dedicate their time that allows you to market your business free of charge and doing this face to face with much more impact as opposed to if you are putting it on your business, on LinkedIn or something that's so less.

Personal, that could be done easily in the horse world with therapeutic riding organizations.

Every community has them, you know, also rescues, horse rescues, things like that too.

And it ties directly into your business and, and they then obviously feel some loyalty to you and they also buy their stuff from you.

So it's Kind of a.

Absolutely kind of a win win that way.

You know, there's so much to, to unpack here.

But employees are the hardest thing we do and the most beneficial thing we do.

At the same time, you know, it's, it's hard to create that environment and also, you know, to deal with what we have to deal with with employees today.

It's not all sunshine and roses.

Right.

But you get the good ones and they make it easy.

So.

But it's the app.

I always said it always comes down to the manager.

It comes down to you as the manager, what the atmosphere is going to be in your store.

That's it's going to.

And we've all been in restaurants that have, even fast food places have terrific managers.

And you walk away saying, those employees all seem very happy and I was glad to be there.

Or you walk into the ones that are not.

Right and you can tell that the manager's in the back, he's yelling and screaming or whatever.

It does come back to us setting that atmosphere and creating that workplace that people want to work at.

Yes.

I think, Glenn, if I can.

What you just said made me think about the.

What is it?

Emotional Quotient.

Eq, but Emotional quotient.

And there's a book which something emotional quotient 2.0 or something like that, and I've read it and I have it on audiobook.

I would highly suggest managers and business owners look into that because understanding your employees, making that human connection, you're not going to understand or have your perks be valuable if you don't know what is or is not valuable to your employees.

So it comes down to the human element getting to know them, letting the employees get to know your business.

And with that you can isolate the high performers and potentially give them more freedom, more flexibility and grow together.

I think that's a perfect place to leave it today.

Thank you for joining us.

We really appreciate it.

There's no LinkedIn best place to find you.

Absolutely.

Okay.

Yeah.

My name is unique enough where you can put in Ilya Ilienko and I'm the only result.

Yeah, you were the only one.

You're rare in that space, that's for sure.

Well, you know, Ilya is a derivative of Elijah just in Eastern Europe.

So to your listeners, thank you for listening from Elijah.

Oh, very good.

Well, thank you all for being here on Wes's retail roundup.

To watch retail roundups, check out the WESA trade show YouTube channel.

You also find the episodes on Wisdom by Wes, a podcast feedback.

And on the WESA website@wesatradeshow.com Retail roundups are published every week.

I did want to make a note too.

I haven't even told Sophia this yet, but Jennifer and I both will be going to WESA in August.

We're only we're less than two months away now for the next trade show in August in Dallas.

So we're going to look forward to meeting as many of you as we can in Dallas and you can stay up to date with all of the information and all of the helpful stuff that we put out.

Retailroundup on Facebook.

You want to join that for sure.

And you can find Wisdom by Wesa, the podcast for Wesa on any podcast player, Spotify or any one of the thousand other podcast players.

Just search for Wisdom by Wesa.

They have a brand new host that started last episode, so you want to check that out too.

My wife Jennifer is one of those who also was in retail for a very long time in the horse world, so she knows a little bit about what she's talking about and a buyer.

So check out the new Wisdom by Wesa.

Last episode I think was the first one that they put out.

So check that out on your podcast player.

Ilya.

Have a great one.

Health and prosperity to your listeners.

Thank you very much.