Joined: 06 Feb 2009
Posts: 79
| Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 4:08 am Post subject: CORE AND COMPLIANCE PART 2....WOW !!! | |
|
Well, we're getting ready for the big C&C walk through and the managers are off the wall.
Just to give you a heads-up on what you might expect. - SGM on her hands and knees clawing through the kiosks pulling out bags that are a size that the register isn't supposed to have. - The things that you actually need, transition lists, Sales Today, useful product info....Gone - "Transfer your call to another Department Mr. Customer, sure....Oh wait I can't have a list of other Department's phone numbers at the register." -Rebate forms....lets see they have to be in the Communication Binder....not at the register where we actually NEED them. - "There's a problem with your delivery Mrs. Smith....I'm sorry....I didn't know....BECAUSE MY CO-WORKERS AREN'T SUPPOSED TO LEAVE ME NOTES ANY MORE" Good Lord. Can't we get some management that has a clue about retail? As I've said before, Sears makes its money selling stuff and taking care of the customer. Good luck to all of you who haven't gone through this crap yet. 
|
|
Joined: 03 Jan 2009
Posts: 32
| Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 5:52 am Post subject: | |
| We had ours...apparently we passed...incredible... | |
Joined: 05 Dec 2007
Posts: 526
| Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 3:34 pm Post subject: | |
| I was told this coming week we are having the DM walk through ours. I have to make sure my carts is clean and sparkling (give me a break.) No where on this cart does it state cleaning supplies or equipment I need to help me out with my job. I have spots for stuff I don't even use. | |
Joined: 09 Jan 2009
Posts: 32
| Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 4:21 pm Post subject: | |
| I was lucky enough to be in the day they scrapped all our useful info off the register. I was able to take copies and slip them into the back of my CFL binder. | |
Joined: 13 Jun 2008
Posts: 195
| Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 10:43 pm Post subject: | |
| Except there is a planogram for your binder now as well. All extra paperwork must be removed from them, which means you have to leave all that paperwork you copied in your mailbox, if you have one. | |
Joined: 09 Jan 2009
Posts: 32
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 2:18 am Post subject: | |
| It will be - once they check. | |
Joined: 08 Jul 2003
Posts: 6309
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 2:38 am Post subject: the visit | |
|
The Visit-ooohhh AAAHHH ... UH-OH
Yeah like the average customer is going to worry about what size bags are in the cash wrap or notes taped on the register . Like they'll really buy a PA because they don't see stuff like that. In the meantime availability and delivery problems are still there . The over priced PAs are still there . And the lesser priced competition is still there so POGed Blue Books and registers take care of this by ... |
|
Joined: 09 Jan 2009
Posts: 32
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 2:54 pm Post subject: | |
|
Phase 1: Practicality?
Phase 2: ??? Phase 3: Profit? |
|
Joined: 07 Aug 2008
Posts: 61
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 4:06 pm Post subject: | |
| We had our compliance walk through with someone from corporate, and we failed within the first 5 minutes (we're a reverted test store). | |
Joined: 15 Mar 2008
Posts: 672
Location: stuffed in the back room of a kmart
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 5:55 pm Post subject: | |||
they find scotch tape on something? |
|||
Joined: 15 Feb 2009
Posts: 381
| Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 12:19 pm Post subject: | |
|
blacklisted:
Phase 1: Practicality? Phase 2: ??? Phase 3: Profit? Sounds like the Southpark business model. My ex landlord ran a financial business called Southpark Financial where he wanted to help people manage their money. I decided to look it up and found it on Motley Fool. It was based on a Southpark epidode of the underwear gnomes. when one of the Southpark kids asked the gnomes how it worked, it went something like this: Phase I Steal the underwear Phase 2, no answer Phase 3. Profit. I was amazed at the time to realize some companies were actually basing their business model on this. |
|
Joined: 07 Aug 2008
Posts: 61
| Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 4:32 pm Post subject: | |||||
We made sure we removed tape from the salesfloor completely 
We actually failed because of the process board in the office (mainly the OOS board). Funny part is that since we're an ex-Essentials, we have no idea how to perform half these processes, or what they're even for. However we're all supposed to know how to do them, without proper training. 
|
|||||
Joined: 08 Jul 2003
Posts: 6309
| Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 4:50 pm Post subject: EX Essential skill | |
|
Sounds like SearsSup store actually has a legitamite complaint to the ethics line . It won't mean squat.
They'll probably claim you were told what is necessary in the classes/trainging but if they did not provide the training or ' essentially ' an item on that checklist how can you be held responsible for it. |
|
Joined: 07 Aug 2008
Posts: 61
| Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 5:51 pm Post subject: Re: EX Essential skill | |||
Welcome to the wonderful world of Sears. We've had no prior training on 99% of these processes. Stuff like the TIHT binder, and other processes are completely new to us. Currently we're running around like chickens with our heads cut off trying to figure it all out before the ignorant guy doing the certifications comes back in to do it again. He said he'll be in "any time within the next 2 weeks"... The last time he came (when our store failed within five minutes), he said, and I quote: "this store sucks. I can't even finish this", and walked out. He also threatened the job of my SGM and both of our ASMs. If we fail the next run of certifications, my SGM will lose the job he's held for the past 35 years. |
|||
Joined: 15 Mar 2008
Posts: 672
Location: stuffed in the back room of a kmart
| Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 9:40 pm Post subject: Re: EX Essential skill | |||||
sounds like real class a material. makes me wonder how our clean and bright or what ever kmarts version is called is gonna go this week |
|||||
Joined: 13 Jun 2008
Posts: 195
| Posted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 12:31 am Post subject: | |
| This stuff is crap because everyone is set up to fail. With some 200 "processes" in place, odds are highly against the store passing. | |
Joined: 18 Aug 2008
Posts: 95
Location: Massachusetts
| Posted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 2:13 am Post subject: | |
| I agree, has anyone passed? | |
Joined: 15 Mar 2008
Posts: 672
Location: stuffed in the back room of a kmart
| Posted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 2:17 am Post subject: | |
| yea was wondering that my self jimmy | |
Joined: 13 Jun 2008
Posts: 195
| Posted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 2:57 pm Post subject: | |
Knowing how incompetent my store management is, my store failed. Just in time for inventory too. 
|
|
Joined: 02 Jan 2004
Posts: 227
| Posted: Wed Jul 15, 2009 2:17 pm Post subject: | |
|
My store passed with an A rating. Every other store in my district failed miserably. As a result, corporate sent every SGM in my district last week to my store for a 3 day seminar about how to do the processes correctly. That was so much fun....
My store passed because my SGM is borderline fanatical about implementing every whim that corporate desires. Ever since Clean and Bright started last year, my SGM has made the processes sent down from corporate priority one over anything else, even sales. The salesfloor is almost as sterile as a hospital, we clean everything so many times each day. TVs are continually dusted, the stainless on every appliance repolished after every customer touches anything. Hell, we even have to dust and front the stock area daily, even though no one except us ever sees the stock room. Every square inch of the store has a planogram. There is nothing that can not exist in the store with out first be blessed by corporate through a planogram. Compliance is checked almost on a hourly basis at cashwraps. We cant have any paperwork anywhere in our departments, they have to be in the appropriate binders at all times. Management destroys anything they find that is not in cashwrap planogram compliance during every inspection. Did you know there is a calendar that was written by corporate that listed every activity the stores had to do to be in compliance with the processess since February 1? If a store didn't start on the processes then, it is going to be near impossible to ever pass an compliance inspection now. Don't even get me started about BC people having to use the SNCs for ad setup/takedowns. It's wrong on so many levels. But that's for another thread. |
|
Joined: 08 Jul 2003
Posts: 6309
| Posted: Wed Jul 15, 2009 4:10 pm Post subject: POGed profits? | |
|
How is your 'compliant' store doing in sales and/or profit ?
Are the planos actually working ? |
|
Joined: 28 Apr 2005
Posts: 2175
| Posted: Wed Jul 15, 2009 4:22 pm Post subject: Re: POGed profits? | |||
Good questions. I also wonder about employee turnover and morale. Most of the SHC stores in my area look pretty good. I've even seen employees dusting off the ancient canned goods in the food section of the Essentials store. They have a lot of time for maintenance since they don't have any customers to deal with. |
|||
Joined: 02 Jan 2004
Posts: 227
| Posted: Fri Jul 17, 2009 4:18 am Post subject: | |
|
Sales? Just as bad as everyone else, down double digits ytd.
Of course the planos aren't helping out with sales. Customers generally don't give a damn about how something is planogrammed. They care about actually getting the product, which is what Sears usually fails to deliver to the customer in a timely manner in many situations due to steep inventory cuts. On a similar note, I ran into a retiree friend of mine today where we discussed the lack of customer traffic in the store. He stated that in his decades of service to the store, the store topped out at about $44mm/yr about two decades ago. Looking at historical GDP deflator values around that time (give or take a few years in either direction), in today's dollars that would equate to somewhere in the $65-70mm/yr range. Last year, my store barely made it over the $20mm sales requirement to keep most management positions in the store when they did the last round of cuts. Right now, we are pacing to maybe make it to $17-18mm assuming Christmas follows the same downward pacing trend this year. With a new major appliance and electronics competitor expected to move into the region in full force before before the holiday season, management is very worried about the continued viability of the store as a going concern in Lampert's eyes. The SGM is adhering to the core processes in an attempt to somehow keep the store profitable enough in corporate's eyes for him to snag a promotion to a higher deck on the sinking ship. Morale? <chuckles nervously> What morale problem? Admitting you have a morale problem earns you a permanent 3 hrs/wk schedule until you quit. My store's BC is overloaded with FTs that have survived every inquisition since the conversion. They wouldn't dare give any management any hint of a possibility that they might be unhappy with draw paychecks. There is even one FT that is about to have their house foreclosed on due to bad paychecks in appliances. So in short, my store is eye candy but just the same as every other store out there. The processes are nothing more than a way to force unyielding complience upon the workforce while draining the last few drops of blood of profitability from the store. |
|
Joined: 08 Jul 2003
Posts: 6309
| Posted: Fri Jul 17, 2009 4:45 am Post subject: a common tale | |
|
I'm afraid Xylain's tale is a common one . Sears had 2 windows of oppurtunity to correct things during the conversion of 2002 and the conversion or transition to SHLD in 2005 . Operation scrub a dub 2008 doesn't count for shit.
I saw weak stores doing the 40 mil to 20 mil thing by the end of the last decade . The same for ' the boom ' years/stores as well. The boom years filled with easy credit and a spend mentality prolonged Sears life but did not save it. Planos & process will neither save or prolong Sears life at this point. Sears is running off of fumes/past history but NOT any management idea or strategy. Pretty pathetic when planogrammed cashwraps & hubs become a strategic initative. |
|
Joined: 28 Apr 2005
Posts: 2175
| Posted: Fri Jul 17, 2009 5:41 pm Post subject: | |||
That's a good assessment of the situation for the entire company. Sales and share have been declining for decades and they address it by making a fetish out of pointless processes and programs. Even if managers understand what is really important, they don't dare make it known, or they risk not getting promoted. So they make a rational self interested choice to ignore what is important and concentrate on trivia. Back in the day, we hardly had to worry about dusting and cleaning because stuff was flying out the door so fast it didn't have time to get dirty. I was amazed to see employees dusting food at the Essentials store... |
|||