By Amber Bradley, Editor-in-Chief, TalkLPnews
Most LP people I know spend a lot of energy trying to get a seat at a bigger table—rightfully so. They take the certifications, they chase the speaking gigs, they polish the LinkedIn. Cary Jones, Vice President of Loss Prevention, Administration, Compliance at VisionWorks, would tell them they’re working the wrong end of the problem.
Cary has been at VisionWorks for more than 15 years. The company has over 800 stores, manufacturing facilities outside San Antonio that produce roughly five million pairs of glasses a year, and a corporate office of around 650 people. Cary’s title says VP, but what’s on his plate is broader than the title suggests. He runs loss prevention and administration. He’s also the company’s compliance officer. The customer service call center reports to him. So does corporate administration. So does e-commerce.
I asked him how an “LP guy” ends up with that much responsibility. His answer was the most some of the most useful career advice I’ve heard, and it had nothing to do with adding letters after your name.
Cary’s view is that LP people get pigeonholed because they let themselves get pigeonholed. The way out might not be a different credential but often times the body of work you’ve already accomplished. When VisionWorks needed someone they could trust with privacy, with HIPAA exposure, with an Office of Civil Rights matter, with exclusion screenings tied to a Medicaid contract, the executive team looked for the person whose investigations had already proven he handled sensitive information with discretion, ran a clean process, and could write a report that held up to outside scrutiny. That was Cary. The LP work was the audition for everything that came after.
Here’s a story he told that illustrates what I’m talking about. A government body was looking at something at VisionWorks (he couldn’t get into specifics) and Cary’s recommendation was to send one of his CFIs to conduct the interviews. It wasn’t a normal investigation in any LP sense. But a CFI knows how to ask the right questions, document what was said, and turn it into a clean report. The agency came back and commended VisionWorks in writing for the thoroughness of the work. That kind of outcome doesn’t happen if the CFI is treated as a single-purpose tool for closing internal theft cases.
Cary’s argument is that most LP departments are sitting on a deeper skill set than they’re using. Case management, interviewing, fact-finding, report writing, evidence handling, working a matter that has legal exposure without poisoning it. Those skills translate into compliance, into privacy, into regulated environments like medical retail. The people above you can see that, but only if you’ve given them a reason to. The reason is the quality of the work you’ve already turned in.
What stays with me from the conversation is how plainly Cary makes the case for LP as a career engine rather than a career ceiling. He hasn’t moved companies to grow. He’s grown inside the company by being the person his executives could hand a sensitive problem to. The certifications didn’t open those doors (although I’m sure they helped) but his reputation did.
The full episode covers his views on managing a field team without becoming the boss who makes everyone check in at lunch, his take on what he’s actually screening for when he interviews (it isn’t what you’d guess), and the single worst thing a vendor can do when trying to reach him. Worth a listen for anyone who wants to widen their lane inside the company they already work for.