【双语】由于冠状病毒对零售业造成冲击，零售业员工受到裁员的冲击，因而被迫承担新的工作职责

Retail workers slammed by job cuts, pushed into new roles as coronavirus shakes their industry

由于冠状病毒对零售业造成冲击，零售业员工受到裁员的冲击，因而被迫承担新的工作职责

PUBLISHED WED, JUL 22 20203:19 PM EDTUPDATED WED,JUL 22 2020 3:35 PM EDT

发表于美国东部时间2020年7月22日周三下午3:35

KEY POINTS

要点

Retailers and their employees are staring down challenges that could determine their longer-term fate — such as the spread of the coronavirus across the sunbelt and the risk of a second Covid-19 wave in the fall.

零售行业的员工正在面临可能会决定他们长期命运的挑战，比如新冠疫情在阳光地带（美国南部地区）的传播，以及秋季第二波疫情爆发的风险。

The retail workforce has gotten smaller, but employees are also taking on new roles like fulfilling e-commerce orders or focusing on safety.

零售业的员工人数有所减少，但员工们也需要承担包括完成电子商务账单还有关注安全等新的责任。

But uncertainty remains for workers as retailerstry to predict sales patterns and adjust their staffing budgets accordingly.

但对于员工而言，不确定的因素依然存在。零售行业们试图预测消费模式，并相应地调整员工预算。

An empty parking lot is shownat a closed JC Penney store in Roseville, Mich., May 8, 2020.

2020年5月8日，密歇根州罗斯维尔市(Roseville)的JC Penney商店里，空荡荡的停车场。

Ross Allen-McCabe worked for sixyears at J.C. Penney. Now, he’s out of a job after the department store filed for bankruptcy and has so far let go hundreds at its headquarters in Plano,Texas.

罗斯·艾伦-麦凯布在J.C. Penney公司工作了六年。现在，在百货公司申请破产后，他失业了。到目前为止，J.C. Penney公司已经解雇了德克萨斯州普莱诺总部的数百名员工。

It is not the first time the 36-year-old has worked for a troubled retailer. Prior to his years at Penney, he was at Toys R Us, which also went through bankruptcyin 2017, after drowning in debt from its private-equity backers.

36岁的他已经不是第一次因为从事零售工作而陷入如此困境了。在彭尼任职之前，他在玩具反斗城(Toys RUs)工作，该公司在无力偿还私募股权投资者的债务后，也于2017年破产。

Allen-McCabe said he’s still optimistic about his prospects — even as the pandemic shakes up his industry, shifts employees’ roles and leads to demands for new skills. Yet, he said he will approach his job search in retail differently now.

艾伦-麦凯布表示他始终对于自身的行业前景持乐观态度——尽管疫情让他的行业受到了冲击，让他没有了员工的身份，如今需要学习新的技能。他表示将在未来用不同于以往的方式在零售行业寻找新的工作。

“This hasn’t left a bad taste in my mouth,” he said. “However, I am now much more mindful of which retailers are pandemic-proof....Before, it was never a conversation: ’If the world shut down, what would that look like?”

“这并没有给我留下不好的印象，”他说。“然而，我现在更加关注哪些零售商售卖关于疫情防控的产品……此前，这一切从来就不只是停留在口头上：“如果整个世界面临封锁，那将会是怎样的景象？”

Even before the pandemic, retailers could quickly teeter toward profit or losses based on customers’ appetite for shopping, their search for adeal or their fashion preferences because of the industry’s thin margins. Customers were demanding expanded online offerings, delivered to their door or picked up in stores, that added costs. Some mall-based brands and department stores entered the global health crisis already hobbled, as they struggled to stay relevant.

即使没有疫情，零售商们也可能会因为行业利润本身的微薄，而根据消费者的购物欲望，对交易方式和对时尚的偏好而被迅速决定会盈利还是会亏损。客户会要求扩大在线服务，送货上门或是在商店提货，这大大增加了成本。一些商场品牌和百货公司本身就已经在面临经营危机，它们在很艰难的保持现有的影响力。

When Covid-19 struck the U.S., it sharply heightened that unpredictability. Customers stripped shelves at essential retailers, suchasWalmartandKroger. But nonessential stores and shopping malls were shuttered for weeks during shelter-in-place orders.

当疫情在美国爆发时，这大大增加了这一切的不可预测性。沃尔玛(Walmart)和克罗格(Kroger)等重要商店那里，顾客会将货架上的商品抢购一空。不过，非必需品商店和购物中心在订单“就地避难”期间关闭了数周。

Now, retailers are staring down new challenges that could determine their longer-term fate — such as the spread of the coronavirus across the sunbelt, the risk of a second Covid-19 wave in the fall, and uncertainty around the back-to-school and holiday shopping seasons. That’s shaking up the future for workers, too.

如今，零售行业正在面临可能决定其长期命运的新的挑战——比如疫情在美国南部地区的扩散，秋季面临第二波疫情爆发的风险，以及开学季和假日购物季的不确定性。这也对工人的未来增加了不确定性。

“The problem with this environment is that you don’t know what’scoming,” said Mark Mathews, vice president of research development and industry analysis at the trade group National Retail Federation. “The peak or trough in demand can be so immediate that it’s difficult to plan for that and to have inventory in stock and to get people in the store to help you deliver some of that stuff to the consumer.”

全美零售联合会(National Retail Federation)负责研究开发和行业分析的副总裁马克·马修斯(Mark Mathews)表示:“这种环境的问题在于，你不知道接下来会发生什么。”“需求的高峰或低谷可能会转变的很快，以至于很难进行计划，很难有库存，也很难让商店里的人及时帮你把商品送到消费者手中。”

Retailers face tough decisions: If they staff up too much, they could have to pay idle employees. Yet, if they hire too few, they could fall behind in filling orders and meeting customer demand.

零售商们正面临艰难的抉择：若他们过多的增加员工，将不得不需要支付很多闲置员工的工资。同样的，如果他们的员工太少，就无法完成订单，满足客户的要求。

“It very quickly goes from a profitable business to an unprofitable business, if you’re not careful,” Mathews said.

马修斯说：“如果你不小心，很快盈利就能变成亏损。”

Growing, shrinking headcounts

增长，减少及总人数

Retail workers felt a near immediate impact as companies adjusted their staffing.

公司的人员编制面临调整，首先受到冲击的就是零售业的员工们。

Some, such as Walmart, Kroger andCVS Health, added to their workforce — but with many of the new employees hired as temporary employees. Walmart has hired more than 400,000 employees during the pandemic, according a company spokesperson.

沃尔玛(Walmart)、克罗格(Kroger)和CVS健康公司(CVS Health)等一些公司增加了员工——但很多新员工都是临时聘用的。沃尔玛发言人表示，在疫情期间，沃尔玛雇佣了40多万名员工。

Home DepotandLowe’smoved forward with plans to hire thousands of seasonal employees during their typically busy spring season — and got a boost from Americans’ spending on DIY projects during long stays at home.

家得宝和劳氏通常会在通常会在繁忙的春季会计划招募数千名季节性员工，这一切因为这段时间美国人时常待在家里做饭而得到提振。

Best Buy, on the other hand, reduced its workforce as it changed how it operated. It initially switched to a curbside pick up-only model, then allowed customers to visit stores by appointment and later reopened its stores but capped capacity at 25%. The retailerfurloughed about 51,000 employees, buthas brought back about half of those employees.

另一方面，百思买在改变经营方式的基础上也减少了员工人数。起初，它采取允许顾客预约上门，专车配送的方式，后来在重新开张时，将容量限制在了25%。这家零售商之前解雇了月5.1万名员工，但如今已经将其约一半员工召回。

Others had to make cuts to survive. Bankrupt J.C. Penney haslaid off 1,000 workersas it closes more than 150 stores for good during its restructuring proceedings.Macy’srecentlyslashed3,900 corporate jobs during a pandemic-induced restructuring, or about a quarter of its corporate workforce.Levi’searlier thismonth said it would cut about 15% of its global corporate workforce, impacting about 700 jobs.

其他公司则不得不削减开支以生存下去。破产的J.C.Penney在重组过程中关闭了150多家商店，裁员1000人。梅西百货最近一次疫情之下的重组中裁员3900人，约占公司员工总数的四分之一。李维斯(Levi's)本月早些时候表示，将在全球范围内裁员约15%，大约会涉及到700个岗位。

Online job openings reflect the uneven fall out. Jobs website Glassdoor had about 458,000 listed openings in the retail industry in the U.S. as of June 6, the company’s latest report said. That’s a drop of nearly 25% year-over-year. It was down 4% from the previous two weeks, but up 5.5%month-over-month.

网上职位空缺反映了这种不均衡的影响。招聘网站Glassdoor的最新报告称，截至6月6日，该公司需要通过线上招聘为在美国零售行业满足约有45.8万个空缺职位。

Job openingsat supermarkets are down only about 10% year over year compared to the nearly 25% drop industry-wide, saidAmanda Stansell, a senior economic research analyst for the company.

该公司的高级经济研究分析师阿曼达•斯坦塞尔(Amanda Stansell)说，超市的职位空缺仅比去年同期减少了约10%，而全行业则减少了近25%。

Some roles are still in demand, including grocery managers and those related to e-commerce orders like warehouse managers and fork lift operators. On the other hand, she said, there’s a noticeable drop for roles with in-person interaction at nonessential retailers, such as for product demonstration and counter sales.

她表示，其中一些职位仍有需求，其中包括食品杂货经理，以及与电子商务订单相关的仓库经理和叉车操作员。另一方面，在一些非必需品销售商那里，鱼人互动的职位，比如产品展示以及柜台销售等方面，需要与人互动的职位，需求人数明显减少。

Many analysts predict the workforce may stay smaller or shrinkeven after the pandemic.

许多分析人士都预测，即使是在疫情结束后，劳动力的人数也可能会继续减少或是萎缩。

An empty parking lot is shownat a closed JC Penney store in Roseville, Mich., May 8, 2020.

2020年5月8日，密歇根州罗斯维尔市(Roseville)的JC Penney商店里，空荡荡的停车场。

Shifting roles

角色转换

Retailers are asking workers to shift roles, take on new tasks and help them“adapt to surges in some areas and lack of demand in other areas,” said Mathews of the NRF.

NRF的Mathews说，零售企业正要求员工转换角色，承担新的任务，并帮助他们“适应某些领域的激增和其他领域的需求不足”。

For example, he said, hourly workers may bounce between are tailer’s different brick-and-mortar locations in their region rather than having a home store. They may pick orders for online fulfillment instead of working as the cashier. And corporate employees may have to step into other roles, such as store manager.

他举例说，或许小时工可能会需要在零售企业的各家分店之间来回奔波，而不只是在自己所在的分店里工作。他们可以选择在线完成订单，而不是做收银员。企业员工可能不得不担任其他角色，比如商店经理。

And he said some employees have moved to positions oriented around safety — like reminding customers to wear a mask or keep social distance and taking colleagues’ temperatures. Others now juggle new tasks, like fulfilling online orders between helping shoppers in the store.

他说，一些员工已经开始逐渐担任起安全员，比如提醒顾客戴口罩或保持社交距离，并测量同事的体温。剩下一些人他们有了新的任务，比如说完成网上订单和在店里为顾客提供服务。

Mathews said he’s optimistic retail workers can get hired back by the industry, even if their job description looks very different.

Mathews表示，他对一切很乐观，他相信零售行业的员工们都能重新返回，尽管届时他们的工作可能会与之前有所不同。

“This pandemic is going to have a profound impact on the industry,but I don’t think it’s going to be as bad as a lot of people are saying,” hesaid. “It’s important when we look at these numbers and we look at the apocalyptic projections, that we recognize on the other side of the scale are businesses being created and jobs being created as well.”

他说“这次疫情对于零售业的影响深远，但我认为情况不会像很多人说的那么糟。”“这些数字对于我们很重要，就像是世界末日之前的预言，我们意识到这一切都得益于更多公司的创立和更多职位的出现。”

But uncertainty remains for workers as retailerstry to predict sales patterns and adjust their staffing budgets accordingly.

但对于员工而言，不确定的因素依然存在。零售商们试图预测消费模式，并相应地调整员工预算。

“Retailers all have a budget for what they can pay hourly workers,” saidCraig Rowley, a senior client partner atKorn Ferryand the head of its Retail practice. “If I have a store that sells$1 million a year ... I can only spend between 4% and 12% of those sales on payroll.”

光辉国际(Korn Ferry)高级客户合伙人、零售业务主管克雷格•罗利(Craig Rowley)表示:“零售企业都对自己能雇佣多少小时工都有预算。”“如果我有一家年销售额100万美元的商店……我只能把销售收入的4%到12%用于支付工资。”

As sales shrink and reach a “new normal,” that percentage is going to shrink as well, Rowley said.For many companies, as they’re looking to curtail expenses during the pandemic, people are the first thing to go.

罗利表示，随着销售萎缩并达到"新常态"，这一比例也将萎缩。对于许多公司而言，他们在疫情之下若要消减开支，首先想到的会是消减人工成本。

High hopes for back-to-school

对开学季所寄予的殷切期望

In the months ahead, retailers may get a clearer outlook of the future — and so may their workers.

在未来的几个月，零售企业的企业主和他们的员工可能会对于未来会有一个更加清晰的认识。

Retailers have high hopes for the back-to-school season, which will indicate Americans’appetite for shopping. Spending is expected to hit a record high this season, as parents buy pricey tech purchases like laptops, tablets and headphones, according to an annual survey by the NRF. Parents of kids in elementary through high schoolsaid they plan to spend an average$789.49 per family, more than aprevious record of $696.70, according to the survey.

零售企业都对于返校季寄予厚望，他们认为这将会引起美国人的购物欲。NRF的一项年度调查显示，一般在返校季之后，零售业的销售量都会大幅提升，因为父母们会购买笔记本电脑、平板电脑和耳机等昂贵的科技产品。调查显示，从小学生到高中生的家长纷纷表示，他们每个家庭平均计划支出789.49美元，高于此前创下的696.70美元的纪录。

But like nearly everything during the pandemic, school could look very different. Some districts plan to teach virtually or limit the number ofdays when kids come to school, which could mean less of a need for new lunchboxes or backpacks.

但是，就像其他所有的一切一样，疫情之下，学校可能看起来有些不同。一些校区计划采用线上教学或限制孩子们实际到学校上学的天数，这就意味着可能不需要之前那么多新的午餐盒和书包了。

“There’s a sense that people are willing to spend— but still a lot of uncertainty about how they’re going to spend,” Mathews said.

马修斯说：“人们大多都愿意花钱，但他们将怎么花这一点仍有很多不确定因素。”

During the pandemic, essential workers have taken on health risks as Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations have continued to rise. Some retailworkers have died, including more than 278 of members of theUnited Food and Commercial Workers International Union, which represents workers in grocery stores, nursing homes and meat packing plants.

疫情之下，由于很多人相继感染，住院病例持续上升，基本上是由工作人员承担了健康风险。一些零售行业的员工们已经因感染去世，包括超过278名商业工人国际工会(United Food and Commercialworkers International Union) ，其中包括杂货店、疗养院和肉类加工厂的员工。

Yetthe pandemic has fueled pay increases, bonuses and more sick leave for low-wage retail workers. Some of those have become permanent.Target, for example,sped along plans to raise its minimum wage to $15as it phased out temporary pandemic-related increases.Best Buywill alsogive hourly employees a raise.

然而，疫情之下，很多低薪的零售业员工得到了加薪，奖金以及更多的病假。其中一些已经成为永久性的。例如，塔吉特(Target)加快了将最低工资提高到15美元的计划，同时逐步取消了与疫情有关的临时性加薪。百思买也会给小时工加薪。

“It’s a reflection of retailer’s recognition that a higher wage, more stable job that keeps people engaged results in better operational outcomes,” said Kent Knudson, a partner in Bain & Company’s retail practice.

贝恩公司(Bain & Company)零售业务合伙人肯特•克努德森(Kent Knudson)表示:“这反映出零售商认识到，更高的工资、更稳定的工作能让员工保持专注，从而带来更好的运营结果。

Allen-McCabe, the former J.C. Penney employee who is still looking for a job, remains up beat, even as he admits this is the first time he’s been out of work since he was a teenager.

艾伦-麦凯布是前J.C. Penney的雇员，目前仍在找工作，他仍然很乐观，尽管他承认这是他十几岁以来第一次失业。

He said it was hard to not get a chance to say goodbye to his former colleagues, as the pandemic kept them out of the office. He’s virtually spoken to them since, though. Many, like him, say they still hope to stay in retail.

他说，他很难不跟以前的同事说再见，因为流感让他们无法上班。不过，从那以后，他实际上已经和他们说过话了。许多像他一样的人说，他们仍然希望留在零售行业。

“My real passion is to be back in a store,” he said.

他说：“我真正的激情时刻是当我能够重返工作岗位之后。”

声明：本文原文来自CNBC官网，仅为交流学习所用，侵权可删