Warehouse order selectors strengthen the foundation of fulfillment operations by organizing, sorting, selecting, and moving items to and from inventory storage. The job requires communication, teamwork, organization, attention to detail, some technical literacy, and even heavy machine operations experience. With the right career visibility, these skills can be used to advance to higher careers in warehouse fulfillment.
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This article provides clarity on career path options for warehouse order selectors and their employers. It includes tips on how to help order selectors build transferable skills that open doors to higher positions while helping managers support their staff and improve their operations.
What Are The Skills Needed To Be An Order Selector?
In order to advance to other careers, warehouse order selectors should be experienced in their current position. For example, order selectors need a good attention to detail to sort shelves effectively. Excelling in this path can seen in managing inventory more closely, using handheld scanners to alert reorders, and notifying management about stock issues.
Order selectors also need physical stamina to lift boxes and move merchandise. Many order selectors are certified to operate heavy lifting machinery, such as forklifts, pallet jacks, and other PITs, making them more valuable to fulfillment and more likely to advance.
In addition to organization and machine operation, order selectors must have effective communication and teamwork skills. Organization between the shipping and inventory storage areas takes fulfillment to the next level in terms of efficiency and productivity.
What Careers Can Order Selectors Advance To?
Depending on their skillsets, order selectors can advance to higher careers including:
Option 1: Lead Picker
Selectors who are proficient on the line can advance to the role of lead picker, making them the senior order selector in charge of managing teams of pickers. This role oversees order fulfillment accuracy, safety controls, and staff training initiatives.
Option 2: Supervisor
Warehouse supervisors manage daily operations, optimize workflows, oversee safety compliance, and align the business’s logistics with its upper-level productivity goals. This position can also involve customer service.
Option 3: Inventory Control Specialist
This role involves optimizing the organization’s stock controls to prevent shortages, overstocks, and customer service bottlenecks. Specialists oversee inventory audits, records, and supplier relationships to maximize accuracy and efficiency.
Option 4: Logistics Coordinator
The role of a logistics coordinator is a natural progression from order selection, since it involves many of the same picking, packing, and shipping duties. The difference is in a greater emphasis on problem-solving, accuracy oversight, and team leadership as logistics coordinators take a more hands-on approach to internal warehouse communication and supply chain management.
Option 5: Warehouse Manager
Warehouse managers oversee daily operations, including storing, packing, picking, and shipping. Their duties encompass multiple areas of fulfillment and organization, including budgeting, safety oversight, inventory management, and systems operations.
Option 6: Training Supervisor
Experienced order selectors can advance to the training supervisor role to lend their expertise or certifications to the organization’s newer members, overseeing training, safety protocols, OSHA certification, and more.
Next Step: Beyond basic levels of proficiency, selectors choose aspects of their career to nurture, turning order selection from a dead-end position into a stepping stone to better careers in supervision, leadership, coordination, and more. Managers should look for ways to encourage this career growth to improve their operations and strengthen retention.
Rapid Response Warehouse Personnel Can Help Your Warehouse Teams Advance
Warehouse order selectors often feel trapped in their role. When warehouses lose regular personnel to seasonal changes or turnover, the remaining staff often work to fill in the gaps rather than advance their careers. Rapid-response staffing helps by providing temporary personnel at a moment’s notice, allowing regular staff to focus on their current workflows and career opportunities.
Rather than worry about their current operations destabilizing due to staffing gaps, managers focus on helping long-term staff build transferable skills, get certifications, and complete training to become more productive assets to their fulfillment team. Taking pressure off regular operations provides them room to seek leadership and broader supply chain careers to the benefit of the warehouse operations.
Pro Tip: Rapid-response personnel are skilled, certified, and experienced in the roles they are selected for. By supplementing regular staff with these skilled stop gaps, your order selectors can focus on the steps needed to advance their careers and increase their productivity without being burnt out by staff shortages.
Temporary Support Leads To Long-Term Growth
At NVT Staffing Warehouse Division, we target fulfillment operations that need short-term, skilled staffers to fill seasonal gaps or strengthen operations. Our goal is to provide skilled workers in roles such as order selectors to give long-term staff exposure to more experienced personnel and relieve pressure off their workflows so they can focus on advancement. With the right skill investment, order selectors progress to higher-level careers as supervisors, coordinators, leaders, and more.
Our rapid-response teams can be deployed within 72 hours of contact and require no long-term contracts, so you can support your team with skilled workers for as short or as long as you need. Contact our team today to help your long-term staff build transferable skills that will open doors to leadership positions and improve your operations with higher skill progression and fewer turnovers.