How do you hold a retail team accountable without damaging morale?

Ron (00:02): Welcome to season two of Frontline Fridays, brought to you by YOOBIC. I’m your host, Ron Thurston, and this season we’re digging deeper into what it really takes to lead on the front lines of retail and hospitality. Together we’ll unpack the biggest shifts in frontline work and how smart leaders are navigating them to drive results where it matters most. Each episode, you’ll hear from top executives, industry experts, and powerhouse operators, all sharing practical tactics you can put to work immediately.

Ron: Today, we’re zeroing in on one of the hardest parts of leadership: accountability. Get it wrong and you lose your people. Get it right and you unlock their best work. It’s a balancing act that takes clarity, compassion, and real discipline. And my guest, April Sabral, has spent her career helping retail leaders get it right.

Ron: April’s career spans more than 30 years in retail. She’s led teams at iconic brands like Starbucks, Gap, Banana Republic, and David’s Tea. Having grown up in the industry, she knows what it takes to lead on the sales floor and beyond. What defined her was the belief that accountability and compassion don’t have to compete. In fact, they fuel each other, and that thread runs through everything she’s done.

Ron: Today she’s an author, a leadership and mindset expert, and the founder of Ask April AI, her newest venture that brings coaching and training tools directly to frontline leaders. Over the years, April has trained hundreds of managers at brands like Jimmy Choo, Tory Burch, and Sunglass Hut. Her first book, The Positive Effect, has been widely used by retail teams as the foundation for their training programs. Her latest book, Positive Accountability, just hit shelves. It’s the Ron and April show again. We are back. I’m really honored and happy to have you on this show, because this show is driven just for the front line, and that’s your love.

April (01:55): Me too, I’m so excited. I have been listening along and following along the first season, so I’m really excited to be here and honored to. So thank you.

How did Ron and April meet?

Ron (02:20): You and I do live in the same city, but we are not in the same city today, so we’re doing this virtually. So for those that don’t know, why don’t you tell everyone a little bit about how we met and our journey.

April (02:45): Yeah, we met just around the pandemic, right? We were both writing books. You were writing Retail Pride. 2019, through a LinkedIn connection. I just saw that you were writing a book and I was writing a book, and I was in New York and reached out, and you invited me to the office, and we’ve just been friends ever since. That’s how we met, literally.

Ron (03:35): That’s exactly how we met. And for everyone listening and thinking about the relationships that you build in this industry, the networking part of our industry never stops.

April (04:03): Never stops. And I think about that a lot. If I hadn’t reached out, if you hadn’t connected with me, if I hadn’t said yes to that meeting in New York, if I hadn’t made the effort, because my career was not in the States, it was in Canada. I just happened to be in New York for a couple of days and we met up. So yeah, it’s so important, networking.

What is positive accountability?

Ron (04:30): So let’s jump into your latest projects. Tell us about Positive Accountability to start.

April (04:40): Yeah, Positive Accountability is a passion project, a book that really has come out of training The Positive Effect for the last five to six years. It’s the framework I was using at David’s Tea when I was running frontline and stores, and we had implemented it across the chain with 250 locations, and we saw it work, because it clarified what accountability was. As I’ve been training The Positive Effect, this framework is the one that stands out every time. I was training it last year to a large retail organization, and they just said, how do we do more of this? And I said, you know what, I’m going to write a book about it. That’s literally how it happened.

Ron (05:33): For you, having led really iconic brands on a global scale, why is the conversation about accountability the one that everyone seems to struggle with, or maybe feel less confident about?

April (06:00): Yeah, I would say struggle with. I was having a conversation this morning with a CEO, walking through the steps, and he said our team really struggles with that. He actually used that term. And I think it’s because accountability evokes feelings of conflict or confrontation, because it’s associated with poor performance. This has gone wrong, now I need to deal with it, now I need to have a conversation, and I don’t feel confident about that conversation. It’s the human skills, those soft skills of being able to deliver feedback that may not be positive. So people get hooked up and think that’s what accountability is. There is a piece of that in the framework, but it’s far more than that. For us, we think about accountability as ownership, and transferring responsibility. That is powerful, and not just a conversation around performance. It’s actually getting ahead of that.

April (07:30): Retail is all relationship driven. You know the people you work with, sometimes more than your own family. And then you’re like, how do I hold this person accountable? Because I know them now, they’re my work friend, and it gets complicated. So I think that’s why people struggle, because they think it’s one thing and it’s not just that one thing.

Why do people actually want to be held accountable?

Ron (08:10): As I’m listening, you think about other competencies like conflict resolution. That is very different than accountability. It is a different skill.

April (08:25): No, that’s not accountability. That’s dealing with something in the moment as it arises, a differing of opinions or perspectives or misunderstandings. But accountability is like creating and transferring ownership so that the other person can take full responsibility. In the first book I wrote a chapter called account plus ability. You’re just accounting for people’s abilities. And accountability is development. If you see it as development for somebody, you’ll be excited about it, because you’re shifting your mindset around it. It’s not a dreaded conversation. It’s actually a development conversation.

Ron (09:15): It also feels like we sometimes make assumptions that people don’t want to be held accountable. And I believe, likely you do too, that strong leadership, including the ability to be held accountable, is what people actually want. Pride is holding yourself accountable.

April (09:50): Right. When you think back to our careers, and even now in the businesses that we run, we take ownership and responsibility, and it gives you that sense of pride, because you are owning it. I was reading a study on employees and what they want in the workplace, and they want career development. And along with that career development comes ownership and responsibility. That’s one of the things they actually want. Pride, ownership causes pride. It creates that level of, I’m responsible for this and I get to do something about it. I get to create things and innovate things and create amazing experiences.

What are the nine steps of the accountability wheel?

Ron (11:00): It requires your teaching skills to newer managers about how to do that. Maybe you could walk us through the tool that you teach, the accountability wheel.

April (11:22): Yeah, there are nine steps. There’s a personal accountability wheel that reflects for me personally as a leader, and then there’s a team one. So I’ll go through the team one, because that’s the one most people struggle with. It starts off with the right person in the right role. Assuming we’ve got the right person in the right role, and I always assume positive intent. I’ve too many times been given teams where people said the whole team needs to change and gave me the whole rundown on everybody, and I’m like, hold on a second, I don’t even know these people. I haven’t worked with them.

April (12:40): So I always go in with positive intent. The second thing is to make sure everybody has a clear understanding of expectations. And the key word there is understanding, not just clear expectations. I may think I’ve been clear, but do they understand what’s expected of them, and how do I know that? That’s the second step. The third one is agreeing to mutual consequences if the expectations aren’t met. My experience with that was when my regional director said, if you can’t transfer all of your to-dos to your team, you’re never going to get promoted. You will not have multiple stores if your team can’t stop calling you on a day off. And I went home and thought, he’s right.

April (13:10): Then developing an action plan, and then course correcting as needed. Step number six is be consistent, be involved. That’s not micromanaging, that’s being supportive. The next one is assuming nothing. We make a lot of assumptions. People have already done this, they already know this, they came with these skills. When I interviewed them, they told me they knew this. But we don’t know until somebody’s working with us. Then we recognize performance if it’s done well. And then if the outcome is not successful, you go back to number one and ask, is the right person in the right role? You don’t make that decision until you’ve actually followed those steps.

April (14:00): Too many leaders give somebody a direction, the person doesn’t meet expectations, and then they say, well, they’re not the right person, they don’t have the skills, they don’t have the passion, all of these assumptions, and they let them go. We work in a very high turnover environment. Holding onto your people is key. Not holding onto the wrong people, but setting up the right people for success.

Which step do leaders get wrong most often?

Ron (14:40): Of the nine, when you’re teaching it, which is the one people have the biggest challenge with?

April (14:50): It’s really setting up clear expectations and making sure people understand them. And it’s truly because it requires effort and time. If I’m delegating something to you and I’m not taking the time to say, walk me through what you heard me say, tell me what your approach is going to be, help me validate that you really understood what I asked, which requires effort and patience and a teaching approach, then you’re not sure. A lot of people miss that step. I was having lunch with somebody who has their own business, and they were saying about somebody on their team that’s not working out, and I asked if she had done that, and she said, but that means I have to take the time to do that. And I said, yeah. You can’t just tell somebody something and think that’s it, and then be frustrated. That’s where it goes wrong.

Ron (16:39): And the flip side is, if you don’t do this, or you do it for some and not others, there’s a lot of statistics around not managing the underperformer. Your peak performers, the top 10%, have very little patience for the fact that you will do nothing and not hold other people accountable.

April (17:10): Yeah, people that are high performing want other people to be held responsible at the same standard. When accountability is not aligned, it creates misalignment in teams, mistrust, and demotivates high performers. If you asked 10 people at a dinner party what accountability means to them, it’s kind of like saying what does leadership mean to you. You’re going to get 50 different answers. And that’s a problem in itself, because then there’s not a clear expectation about what it actually means or how we’re executing on it. People like clarity.

How does unclear accountability lead to burnout?

Ron (19:00): What do we need to do, how do we get there, what are the steps? This wheel. That’s how you achieve goals. It’s not an accident.

April (19:05): Yeah, and leaders forget when they have a title that people are just going to nod and act like they understood, because a lot of times they’re fearful of saying they didn’t get it. I can remember so many times in my career where I was sitting in a room thinking, I don’t know what they’re talking about right now, but I’m not going to be the one to put my hand up and ask. I’d go and ask five other people outside the room. So make that assumption when you’re going in: when you’re sharing an expectation and you have a title, people are going to agree with you a lot, but it doesn’t mean they understood. It just means they don’t want to look a certain way in front of a whole group.

April (19:55): Because psychological safety is real. And the problem is, if you don’t have clear accountability processes and create ownership and responsibility, you’re going to be very tired as a leader. You’re going to be worrying all night. I’ve had those nights where I was like, my God, I wasn’t clear. Did they understand? Things weren’t getting done. That’s when burnout starts happening, because your brain is worrying and overthinking. You can’t rest at night. And then you start doing everything yourself because you think they don’t know what they’re doing, and you start stepping in, and that’s never a good thing, because you’re going to get really tired.

Ron (21:37): The more responsibility you have, the more important this skill becomes. If I don’t learn how to hold myself accountable first, and therefore teach those skills, and learn how to communicate and test for understanding, all of this is the unlock to successful leadership. If you ask people to describe the best leaders, I think they would say they actually knew how to hold people accountable. They delivered great results through their team. They transferred ownership and skill. They didn’t hold it all in. And they taught me how to do that along the way.

Why do frameworks make good leadership teachable?

April (23:00): That’s a good point. People can usually describe somebody that does it well. But the gap is, it’s one thing to describe what somebody’s doing well and how it makes you feel. But then how do you train it, teach it, and scale it? That’s where frameworks are really important. We grew up at Gap and Starbucks, and they had acronyms and frameworks for everything.

April (23:25): It was a bit of a joke, but it was true, and it kind of worked, because it stuck in the brain. You can remember it and use it over and over and then teach somebody else. When I became a John C. Maxwell coach in 2016, while I was running stores for David’s Tea, I did it because I wanted to figure out how to articulate what I did and then teach it to others, to have the language. In retail and hospitality, a lot of times we have these amazing leaders who are doing this, but they don’t know how to teach it to somebody else. So we need to give them the tools and the frameworks. That’s what makes you an exceptional leader, when you can develop more leaders with that skill.

Ron (24:00): Your role then becomes very much a leadership role rather than a manager, if we were going to define the difference. Managing tasks versus doing more. Why wouldn’t you want to learn this skill? Ultimately it benefits you.

Why do leaders skip investing in their people?

April (24:30): I asked the CEO this morning, why do you think there are CEOs out there that just don’t buy into leadership development and training, don’t invest in it? You do. And he said, I think people get overwhelmed and focused on profitability, on driving the results. That’s a very big, heavy load. If you’re running a company, this is your priority, and you can get consumed by it. But he got told a long time ago, if he didn’t learn how to invest in his people, he would never become a CEO. So he just thinks people go in and get overwhelmed and have a priority task list, and it becomes further down the list. It’s not that they don’t know it’s important.

Ron (26:00): I would push back on that. If you don’t do it, the harder this gets, or the larger the team grows, the success rate is going to continue to fail.

April (26:20): 100%. In retail there’s a big pressure on sales. If you go in with the mindset of I’ve got to sell, sell, sell, but you don’t step back and ask how am I going to help my people be motivated, inspired, trained, capable, that pressure is not going to go away. The goals aren’t getting any smaller. If you do a 10% comp, they’re going to ask for another 10% comp. So do it in a way where people feel like they’re learning and growing, and you’re sharing that with your team. Give them the skills.

What is the difference between coaching, training and directing?

Ron (26:40): We’re speaking specifically about accountability, but holding someone and teaching accountability is not training and it’s not coaching. So how do you define the difference between these very important competencies?

April (27:00): When we run the workshops, coaching, training and directing are three things we talk about, and the accountability wheel is how you bring it all together as a roadmap. A lot of leaders don’t have coaching skills, and if they don’t, it will derail them, because the second step of the wheel is a coaching and teaching approach. Coaching is asking questions. Everybody relates to sports. There’s always a team on the field with a coach on the sidelines, looking at the play, looking at what could be done differently, asking questions, throwing feedback back and coming up with suggestions. So coaching is a two-way conversation. You have to be really good at listening and asking questions.

April (28:00): Directing is giving direction in the moment. That customer needs help now, drop what you’re doing. It requires an immediate response. And training is giving somebody information that helps them be better at their job, a new task, a new process, product training. In our methodology we have a coaching formula and a training formula, and directing is just directing. But when we do scenarios of is this training, directing or coaching, everybody gets it wrong, no matter what level they’re at.

April (28:55): Everybody thinks every conversation is a coaching conversation, and it’s not. You’ve read exit interviews, like I have, and people say they leave because they didn’t have a coaching conversation, or they weren’t developed. And a lot of times we’re not calling out in the moment, hey, I’m having a coaching conversation with you right now. Do you have time for coaching? Then they’ll know the difference. Hey, I want to train you on something right now. Human beings, if we could just be better at communicating clearly, again setting an expectation that you understand what we’re doing right now, it would solve a lot of our problems. And that’s where AI can’t replace that. It can help us, but it can’t replace that.

Ron (30:00): Don’t assume the recipient understands what you’re doing. In your mind you’re very clear: I’m training, I’m directing, I’m coaching, I’m having an accountability conversation. But say the words. The language is actually very important here.

Why is retail such a powerful first job?

Ron (30:30): For people that are even learning to work, a significant percentage of people start their career in retail. They may not stay, but it’s a very common first job. You’re learning how to show up for work. And if during that first or second job you’ve learned the difference between directing, coaching, and being accountable on a team, no matter what you do in life, those are important skills you’ve just developed.

April (31:08): It’s so true. And don’t you get messages from people from 15, 20 years ago who worked for you, saying, I remember when you said this to me, it changed the trajectory of my career, now I’m doing XYZ. They would never maybe have got there if you hadn’t had those moments with them. We have a huge impact on people in first-time jobs. My son’s first job was at Burger King. He learned a lot in that job that’s helped him six years on.

How do you lead a team under real pressure?

Ron (32:00): As we sit here in fall of 2025, the retail industry is under significant pressure. There’s always a sales goal, but this year the headcounts are smaller than they used to be. Pressure on margin puts pressure on payroll. When you’re in these large rooms with retail teams, what’s your approach, how are they feeling, and how do you teach accountability when it’s just one of many things they need to learn?

April (32:50): Yeah, one of the things that comes up the most is mindset, because everything you just said feels very heavy. That comes from the second pillar in the book: create. Create the mindset that is going to help you solve things positively. We teach this thing called above the line, below the line mindset leadership. It’s not a new concept, it’s been around a long time, but every time we teach it, we ask the room, has anybody ever heard of this? And maybe two hands go up in 200. So we bring it back from the past and make it more current.

April (33:36): Being above the line, catching yourself, helping people reframe. Understanding how the mind works, how many thoughts we have a day, the percentage that are negative. That’s a National Science Foundation study, not my numbers. We make people aware of that and teach them how to overcome it, how to let go of limiting beliefs and adopt a positive mindset. Because if they can do that, they’re not in fight or flight, they’re in an open awareness state, and then they can use all of these tools and they’re not stressed. When we use above the line, below the line, and the three Rs, reframing, releasing, and reaching for new thoughts, that’s very powerful. How do I stay positive? How do I lead my team more positively? Mindset is a big thing now. I think it always was, but now in particular it comes up more than ever.

What can a leader do today to get started?

Ron (35:00): That’s kind of linked to mental health conversations. As we wrap up, is there one thing everyone listening could do today, maybe around mindset, to get started on this journey?

April (35:15): Yeah, around mindset it’s becoming more aware of your thoughts. I ask people in the workshops to close their eyes for a minute, take a pause, count to five or ten, open their eyes, and write down the thoughts they’re thinking. Then look at those thoughts and become aware of how many could be negative or a limiting belief, and then rewrite it into a positive one. If you can’t believe it, just say, I’m choosing to believe a new thought. This goal is really stressful, I don’t have traffic. Okay, that’s a reality. But how do you release it, reframe it, reach for a new thought? Maybe it’s, I’m choosing to believe that today we’re going to do everything in our power to convert more.

April (36:30): And secondly, take a teaching approach and learn skills. If you can learn something new and teach somebody something new every day, you’ll see that compound exponentially over time. When people are more skilled, they feel more confident, they engage more. I used to say to my team before I left the store, what did I teach you today? What did you learn today that you didn’t know before I walked in? And if they couldn’t tell me something, I’d say, okay, what do you want me to teach you before I leave? Because when people learn, it inspires, it motivates, it evokes positive emotions, and you’re building capabilities.

Ron (37:10): And I would challenge everyone on that learning mindset: don’t wait for the company to do it for you. There are resources, there are books. Don’t sit and wait for your boss or your company. Take this upon yourself. That, in my opinion, is personal accountability.

April (37:29): Have a personal development plan. Where do you want to go, and what do you need to learn to get there? We have so many resources now, videos, books, YouTube, blogs. You can learn so much compared to when we were growing up in the business.

Ron (37:48): Well, this has been so much fun, as always. You and I will continue this conversation offline like we always do, but thank you for being on Frontline Fridays and for sharing your wisdom with the audience.

April (38:00): Thanks so much for having me. I feel really blessed and honored. So thank you.