Glad to see that hard work & dedication means nothing...

KingofOldSchool

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Okay, I'm going to hit on a subject that I know some of you can relate to. So you should understand where I'm coming from with this. Now this is not about me, this is about my girlfriend. I just got off the phone with her and she was in tears, I know what it was about and I knew it was coming, but I still had the outside chance of hard work actually paying off for someone.
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*start rant*

So my girlfriend works at a retail store and not to directly call this store but its name, I'll just say that it's a place that would make you not want to grow up. She's been there for two years now and works front end. She busts her ass out day in and day out, she shows up to work on time, never calls in, and always bails people out of trouble.

The previous front end supervisor was a total flake, she never did her job and always passed of her duties to my girlfriend even though it was against the rules. But, my girlfriend never batted an eyelash and did these things. While the department supervisor slacked, my girlfriend took responsibility and did all of the supervisor's work for her.

She even corrected mistakes that the supervisor made that would have cause the store to fail the LP audits. Just to sum up how much my gf worked her ass off, EVERYONE would always tell her that the store falls apart when she's not there and she helps make the store in general a more calmer place.

Well not only does she handle the front end, around this time last year she moved into the cash office. Which basically is what is, she handles the money each morning, makes the deposits, and sets up the registers before the store opens. And she totally took charge of the job and has been doing it every since, she was at least the main cash office person.

Let's go back to earlier this year, one morning she noticed something going through paperwork. Thousands of dollars were not accounted for. So she brought it up the manager and after further investigating found out that one of the CSR's stole over $20,000...but here's the thing he could not have acted alone and needed someone on the "inside" to pull off the scam. That person needed to be in the cash office and the only person besides by girlfriend who worked cash office was the front end supervisor.

Well the store manager couldn't accuse her of having a hand in it, so she didn't get busted. And the funny thing is that she would break SP left and right but would only get slaps on the wrist. Not to mention how she conveniently got hurt right before the Christmas season and conveniently came back to work right after the holiday season. And you know who took charge of the front end during the holiday season?

Yup, my girlfriend.

So finally early April, the front end supervisor got another job offer and took it. So that position opened up and everyone was pulling for my girlfriend to take over since she basically knew the job front and back. All of the department supervisors and the current and former assistant managers all gave her the vote of confidence.

Well about two weeks ago the District Manager and the Store Manager were interviewing the candidates, all three of them. Let me run down the candidates for you.

1. 40 year old woman who has had management experience at Wal*Mart and K-Mart. However she came off as a total flake, not to mention they weren't really wanting to outsource for this job.

2. An 18 year old stoner/borderline alcoholic. She hasn't even been there a year and she has is the pricing coordinator for the store despite not having any prior retail experience. She's currently making $12 an hour.

3. My girlfriend who is older and has more leadership experience than you can shake a stick at. And like I've stated before, she already knows the job and has excelled at said job. Not to mention she's done all of this working barely above min. wage

Once the interview was over, she was upset because she didn't think it went well because they only gave her 15 minutes while the other two had 90 minutes each. I tried to reinforce positive thoughts by telling her that they may not have needed that much time with you because they already knew how good she was.

As time went on, this whole thing stressed out her and me. I knew how much she deserved the job, pretty much everyone who works there knew she deserved it. Yet, they were stalling on making the decision. Well the last few weeks they had my girlfriend train girl #2 in the cash room. This is understandable as they need another body in there since my gf was the only person left that is trained in there. And they needed someone since she is going to Lexington for the week starting tomorrow.

And let me say that from what I've been told, the girl has done nothing but FAIL since being trained in there. My girlfriend would have to go in each morning she works and literally make corrections to all of the paperwork that the other girl smurfed up on.

They told her that she would find out if she got the job on Monday, Monday come and she wasn't told anything. Well then they told her that she would find out on Thursday like everyone else, but she had Thursday off. Well she was told "Oh well then you'll just have to wait until Friday."

So forward to about an hour ago, she called me bawling her eyes out because they gave girl #2 the job over her. And the manager had the audacity to tell her that she didn't get the job because "she wasn't responsible enough to handle the job."

Nevermind the fact that she has basically done the job for a year now, how she has NEVER scored below a 90 on her evaluations whereas the last eval came back and the girl who got the position scored a 14! That's 14 out of 100, mind you. Ontop of that they've started a star system where you get little pins on your name badge to show off how well you do. Well the girlfriend is getting 4 stars whereas the other girl is only getting 1. Chew on that for a minute.

And if we go into character flaws let's get into the fact that this girl is a known pot head and heavy drinker who has called off work repeatedly because she's either A) Drunk B) Getting high C) A and B or D) Hung over. Not to mention she's come to work drunk before, I don't think that's something you should be doing let alone at a kids store.

I think the most mind boggling thing of is that MY GIRLFRIEND TRAINED THE GIRL TO BE A SUPERVISOR. Okay say that with me, my girlfriend basically trained the girl on how to run the front end and cash office so she can become my girlfriends SUPERVISOR.

*ahem*

And I think what frustrates me the most is that I gave up my job there so she would be able to take the supervisor job once it became available.

See, I worked at a store with a big red bullseye for while and literally two weeks before Christmas they fired me without any explanation. Well my girlfriend talked to the assistant manger and then to the HR person and they gave me an interview. They hired me on the spot and I worked there for literally two weeks.

Well I had figured they would offer me a job past Christmas, which I was going to turn down for the reasons I stated before. However, the store manager found out and decided just to let me go the day after Christmas. And the funny thing was that my girlfriend was the one who told me the news. Although all of the supervisors and Asst. Manager had a vote on who to keep and they all voted to keep me because they knew I was a hard worker and I knew my crap.

About two months ago, the new HR guy specifically asked my girlfriend if I would be interested in coming back because he knew I was a good employee. I balked at that chance because I didn't want to ruin any chances my girlfriend had.

Now everything went down the crapter, I know have an upset girlfriend and rage that I can not begin to describe right now. I'm usually cool, calm, and collected but this angers me to no end. It seems like no matter how hard we work, we never get the recognition we deserve.

*end rant*
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Hopefully all of you actually read that, I know I spewed off a lot, but this is the only way I can release steam without causing damage to something.

Good thing the gf's best friend picked her up from work today or I would've caused a scene at the store and rip the crotchety old geez a new one.
 
I worked at Target when I was younger and they constantly stuck me on the harder lanes. For those who don't know, watch the lanes at Target and see which ones get the most people. You'll find the typical customer there isn't willing to walk ten extra feet to a line with no one in it, and instead will just sit there and wait at a cashier closer to them.

Ultimately I had to quit for school related reasons, and I suggested to a buddy of mine that he could go work there. So I put in a good word for him and he took over my job.

I found out later on that all the managers and supervisors told him I was a "terrible employee" who didn't work hard. Which was total bullshit, of course - there were at least 2-3 people there every day who literally walked around and did nothing. My buddy even used to brag about how he took naps in various break rooms, played games in the electronics department, and basically used to just avoid work as much as he could.

Retail is exactly like Office Space - generally those who are worst at their job somehow magically get promoted up. I'll never understand it.
 
Yep, retail is the worst, whether it's big box or grocey. I used to think it was working in a restraunt but after working retailing I would have to change my mine. Your girlfriend should get quit, with that experience, you can get a better job somewhere else if that's how they treat her.
 
I work at the blue shirt electronic store, and my manager flirts with me, she's 28 and rather attractive. I get as many hours a week as I want, I get to request time off and if a customer acts like a douche, I tell him to take a hike.

I guess retail depends on what you make of it.

OP - Look into being a union electrician, they train you and you work WHILE they train you. Starting pay for a trainee is $14 an hour here in California, you get 40 hours a week, uniform hours 8-5 and every 2 months you get a dollar raise. By the end of your first year, you'll be making $17 an hour.

By the time you become a journeyman electrician (5 years if you don't mess up and pass all your tests) you make anywhere from 35-45 dollars an hour and you still get raises, the best benefits, vacations. Any Saturday/Sunday you work is AUTOMATICALLY double time and anything past 8 hours in a 24 hour period is over-time, even if you missed a day before and your weekly total isn't 40 hours yet.

Making that much, you could take care of yourself and your girlfriend and put her in an environment where she'll be treated right.
 
Either the supervisors are complete fools or they plan to use your girlfriend as much as possible. Regardless, there seems to be little point in staying. They will never give her the chance to make more/move up. As everyone has been saying she should find another job then quit.
 
This happens in far more places than retail. It sucks, but there is little you can do. I'd tell her to move on to something else and never look back.
 
Yep, typical retail. I'm a 3rd-shift manager and run a stock crew, and I have heard of many many stories just like this.

The bottom line is, that all the crappy decisions start from the top (the store manager). But, if the manager is especially inept, the more he/she will always pass the blame to someone else below them. So, the way I see it in your GF's situation, all the new girl's screw-ups will be blamed on your GF. Either she'll say something like she didn't train her right, or it was your GF's responsiblity or some other BS, just so the other girl don't get the blame for any screw up.

Time for your GF to move on, IMHO. Transfer to another store, or start looking for another job elsewhere. Cause in the end, that shit just ain't worth the trouble.
 
[quote name='ToadallyAwesome']Either the supervisors are complete fools or they plan to use your girlfriend as much as possible. Regardless, there seems to be little point in staying. They will never give her the chance to make more/move up. As everyone has been saying she should find another job then quit.[/quote]

I told her to stop trying days ago when we knew she was going to get passed over. I told her if another employee asks her to help them with something, to tell them to get a supervisor since she's only an entry level employee.
 
She should either look for a better job somewhere else, or just say fuck it and quit trying to fix everything and bail everyone else out. Let the new girl fail miserably and fuck everything up, then hopefully once they realize that your girlfriend really was the one fixing everything they will have no choice but to promote her if they want things to go back to normal.
 
The best thing your girlfriend could do is look elsewhere and move on. I spent 8 years in retail and 4 of them as management. Our company claimed to prefer promoting from within, but it seems like people who did got the shaft compared to outsiders. (I know I did) The decision making never seemed to have any reason or logic to it and to validate my opinion, I can say that I'm a college grad with a BS in Business Administration and have formed academic and first-hand opinions on these matters.


The bottom line is that retail is a low-end industry. You get crap pay, you get crapped on by customers and inept(?) management, and you have crap experience for real-world jobs in the future. My girlfriend worked for the same retail drug chain (Ohio based) as I did, and I constantly pushed my cynicism towards her to get her to leave. She was an amazing worker and tried harder than she should have to move up within the company but was held back by her boss. When she wasn't allowed to leave the day after her Aunt died even though she tried to pull it together and go in, it was the straw that broke the camel's back. She put out dozens of apps/resumes and got a job waitressing at a new restaurant. She loves her new job, makes more money, and is generally happier.

It's a double-edge sword when you work hard in retail because they know they have their hooks into you. You work hard and get strung along for nothing. Encourage your girlfriend/yourself/anyone to get into school regardless of what they have to give up along the way because it will pay off in the end.
 
[quote name='NamelessMC']I work at the blue shirt electronic store, and my manager flirts with me, she's 28 and rather attractive. I get as many hours a week as I want, I get to request time off and if a customer acts like a douche, I tell him to take a hike.

I guess retail depends on what you make of it. [/quote]


way to add to the shittyness of Best Buy customer service/relations
 
King, that is pretty much every retail story I have ever heard. Tell her to start looking elsewhere or switch stores.

Years and years ago, when I worked electronics at a popular office supply store, I got along well with all the management. They knew I was a hard worker, knew my stuff and was one of the best at selling the add-in insurance crap. I worked with a guy that never did anything but play with mixing music on the demo computers. He's a really nice guy, but I hated working with him - a lot of people did. We ended up getting a new assistant manager, and he and I didn't get along from the start, but this manager worshipped the ground my co-worker walked on. No one in the store understood this.

This manager made my life hell, but the rest of the management team were the only reason why I stayed around. Before long, a supervisor gig opened at another store, so I transfered over and took the job. The asshole manager ended up transfering to a different store, as well. I still would have to deal with him from time to time, and he was still a cock to me. Since he wasn't my boss anymore (and I'm a tad passive-agressive), I'd transfer our broken demo units or useless crap over to his store. He would call and ask me why I did it, and I'd tell him that I got a call that his store needed it. I found out through the grapevine that he was such an asshole at the new store, that his employees loved that I fucked with him.

In the end, I moved on to much, much better (and non-retail) things. Last I heard, he was still an assistant store manager.

The point is, unless she wants to make a career of this, tell her to start looking for something else. In my experience, if they did this once, they'll keep doing it to her.
 
[quote name='NamelessMC']I work at the blue shirt electronic store, and my manager flirts with me, she's 28 and rather attractive. I get as many hours a week as I want, I get to request time off and if a customer acts like a douche, I tell him to take a hike.

I guess retail depends on what you make of it. [/quote]

Yeah...sorry, but I'm gonna have to call MAJOR B.S. on that story
 
Human beings have a habit of not wanting to take the blame for things. It happens at the retail level all the way to the federal government. There isn't a lot you can do about it, except try to go over their heads.

But yes, this is just one of the many reasons that working retail sucks, i will never do that shit again.
 
Maybe it has to do with your girl just doesn't have "it". The other's are probably more sociable, like the 40 year old you say flakes, probably a lot of the people there can go up to her and say "Ay bay bay, I got tickets to a Bon Jovi Concert, I gotta split, ciao."

You sure your girlfriend just isn't a total bitch? Or ugly?
 
If she's as dedicated as you say she is then she should:

A. Be in College
B. Getting an internship where dedication actually does pay off.
 
Your girlfriend shouldn't have flipped a shit so to speak, but she definitely should have stood her ground and use a few choice words in explaining her "disagreement" with their decision.

You didn't exactly mention whether or not she will be continuing to work there, but if she still is, she's literally going to look around every day and see the missed opportunity, both in advancement and retaliation.

I understand your frustration, but she needs the anger, you need to comfort her.

~HotShotX
 
[quote name='ph33r m3']Maybe it has to do with your girl just doesn't have "it". The other's are probably more sociable, like the 40 year old you say flakes, probably a lot of the people there can go up to her and say "Ay bay bay, I got tickets to a Bon Jovi Concert, I gotta split, ciao."

You sure your girlfriend just isn't a total bitch? Or ugly?[/quote]

Just so you know, my girlfriend is very sociable. She sells stuff that no one wants likes it's nobody's business. And the "store director" is a old nasty senile guy who doesn't know how to wipe his ass properly anymore. The assistant manager is the one that makes all the "harder, more thought out" decisions.
 
[quote name='HotShotX']Your girlfriend shouldn't have flipped a shit so to speak, but she definitely should have stood her ground and use a few choice words in explaining her "disagreement" with their decision.[/quote]

She wears her heart on her sleeve, but she's working on that.

You didn't exactly mention whether or not she will be continuing to work there, but if she still is, she's literally going to look around every day and see the missed opportunity, both in advancement and retaliation.

Well I wasn't quite sure, but she is going to search for another job. But here is the twist of fate, the former supervisor is offering her a manager position at the store she works at now.

I understand your frustration, but she needs the anger, you need to comfort her.

~HotShotX

That's the thing, I try to comfort her as much as I can but words can only go so far in a situation like this. And this has been going on for a year, I listen to her always talking about shit that goes on there, that's how I know so much. Not to mention the fact that I'm ALWAYS there. Hell, I know more about some the shit that goes on than most of the employees.

I'm just very particular on respect. I'm the person that commands respect at every job I'm at. And I try to hammer that fact home with other people.
 
Jesus Christ, that was a long read. Most of us figured out extremely quickly in our youth that working retail sucks ass and working hard gets you NOWHERE FAST. Working smart, on the other hand, is how to get ahead. You've got to have the smarts and the hustle. Either that or the connections to get anywhere significant in this life.

Disregarding the obvious bias you have for your girl, OP (no problem with that as you should have it) and going under the premise that everything you say is absolutely and completely correct...you honestly and truly don't understand how they could pick the incompetent, absolute worst choice for assistant shmoe to the local head shmoe or whatever management position this was?

They picked Stony McStoner because (A) they already have your girlfriend completely under their control (as you said, she goes well above and beyond her job...i.e. she is a sucker...why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free) so that whenever little miss drunky screws up or isn't around due to being passed out/hung over/high, they can rely on your girlfriend to pick up the slack and do double the work for the minimal cost. Really they are abusing her. And (B) because the higher management doesn't want any real competition for their job, so they put the incompetent dufus in underneath them - this allows them to maintain their job security in their little fiefdom as well as be able to use the drunkard as a scapegoat whenever necessary.

Your girl's efforts are wasted...as almost everyone else has said, she needs to find better.
 
Retail goes nowhere, if you work too hard 99 percent of the time that just means the managers will take advantage of you. The key is to half ass it, like someone said it isn't like retail really helps all that much with future jobs so why bust ass now for no reward? If for some reason your GF stays at that store OP tell her to stop working so damn hard, personally though I would be looking at other stores at the very least .
 
I worked a job similar to your gf's (Customer Service/Office Associate/I handled all the cash and paperwork). They paid me more than other employees from the start b/c I had a kick ass resume and even better references. Retail store employee policy has nothing to do with fairness or common sense, it's all a bunch of bureaucratic bull and managers on power trips with a chip on their shoulder. I just wanted a summer job, so I didn't tell them I'd be leaving until two weeks beforehand b/c they treated the seasonal workers like crap.

It might be a good idea to take the manager position; maybe they had her in mind for it when they gave the stoner chic the other job (optimistic thinking, probably not true).

If she wants to work somewhere else, she should try getting a job at a bank. It's the next step up, can be much less stressful and pays pretty well since you're handling money. She should look for other similar jobs, compare salaries and opportunities for promotion, and then make her decision. If she wants a job at a bank, she should definitely try to apply for a slightly higher than entry-level position; it pays better and her experience handling money and training other employees will earn her kudos and if she doesn't piss anyone off at her current job she can get good references.

I'd go for the bank job, even if it's a pay-cut at first.
 
Sounds typical for retail. I also hate to say it since its so cliche but life isn't fair. Just because you may be the best person for the position doesn't mean you will get it. Deal with it and move on. Best of luck to your girlfriend and I would suggest finding a different line of work.
 
If there's one thing I've learned working in various retail places, the people at the top don't know or care about what goes on with the lower levels. Especially district people, they come in once a month or so, walk around go out to lunch and never come back.

Also, someone like your girlfriend is threatening to them. Either she's going to leave soon for something better or she'll get promoted into positions they want for their friends or family. In my experience with big stores family/friends often gets middle level positions which seems to be what she was looking at.
 
Short answer is she should've left as well as she shouldn't have been doing her supervisor's job... It's a great way to not look like she's doing hard work and dedication but more like being part of the problem. If the supervisor was really that bad they would've gotten fired by thereself.
 
I am sorry really i am. But I could never understand you people who care about retail jobs. They are commonly known as the shittiest jobs on the planet. Stop trying to make it into something that its not. You need to understand that no one cares whether you quit or stay. If you quit they will just replace you with another person and life will still keep going on. You have to learn to let it slide off your back.

Quit that bitch and find another crappy retail jobs. If you dont like that one quit it and find another one.

Unless you are going to college to work as a cashier who gives a shit what they think or do. If your going to college to be a lawyer do you think Johnson and Berghimer is really going to call up fucking K-Mart and ask them how you did as a manager?

I grew up extremely poor. So I had a ton of retail jobs 2 or 3 at a time from age 15 to age 21-22ish. I know how it goes to bust your ass for nothing. But you have to realize the overall goal and let everything else go. There are many a co-worker/manager that hate my guts right now but guess what? I finished college and now living my dream of working in TV/film while they are still working at sears/Van Maur/K-mart/Target etc etc.
 
Tell her to threaten to quit unless she gets a fat raise (excess of 25%) or a promotion in addition to a fat increase in pay. But don't make them empty threats.
 
[quote name='KingofOldSchool']LOL

Ummm she's well beyond a Double D. :D[/QUOTE]

So that's why you care so much about her problems. I was wondering why you didn't drop her and find someone more assertive and less whiny. :D

The sad truth is hard work and dedication are not rewarded when you work in retail. Most often you just end up being used by everyone around you. I worked various retail jobs for ~5 years and saw this exact thing at every single company. Different people, same shit every time. The best advice I can give her is to stop doing other people's jobs. Hopefully she's learned this by now. If she was getting paid for it then I would understand but she's just another low level employee. She should also look into getting out of that place in one way or another. College or another job, anything with a fresh start.
 
[quote name='Poor2More']That 18 year old Stoner/alcoholic chick sounds hot, probably bob'd for the job[/quote]

fuck. i was thinking of a clever way to say it.

kudos.

to the OP: sorry to hear it. Sounds like your girlfriend would excel anywhere else with her work ethic so I'm with everyone else: tell her to ditch the company and get a job where she'll be appreciated elsewhere.
 
Sorry to hear about the situation.

I've noticed that it never pays off to be really, really good at retail or any other customer service related job. If you're the best employee/rep on the floor you will not be promoted since the company cannot afford to you let you off the front lines. They need their best to take care of customer issues face-to-face in an attempt to remedy the situation and keep business.

However, if you're about the third or fourth person in line in terms of value you have a much better chance of moving up since you can obviously do the job fairly well and the company isn't losing it's most valuable employee(s) to a behind the scenes job. In short, it's often times better to slack off just a little bit in retail/customer service. Know how to do the job well, do it, but let someone else be #1. The hardest worker is hanging him/herself without realizing it.

I think your girlfriend needs to move on. Unfortunately she's never going to advance further than the "best floor rep" and back-up supervisor on entry-level wages there. She needs to go to a company that deserves her dedication, responsibility, and willingness to do whatever is needed.
 
[quote name='AngellicLulu']Sounds like your girlfriend needs to get a job elsewhere and quit. They seem to be taking advantage of her.[/quote]

The thread could've stopped here. If you have a job where hard work gets you no-where, it's time to find a new job.
 
The fact that they only spent 15 minutes with her tells me that she didn't sell herself enough in the interview. Unfortunately, the ability to "talk" goes a lot farther than "hard work & dedication," which are relative terms. Also, since she was interviewing for a supervisor position, they were probably looking for more of a leader. The ability to do various tasks doesn't necessarily make her a leader amongst her peers and you really didn't mention in your rant how she interacted with her coworkers beyond calling them flaky or drunk, which indicates more of a lack of respect than a team building attitude.

But by all means, keep blaming "them" for keeping you down. I am sure you will find enough "get a new jobs" and "retail sucks" on here to make you feel better until the next time it happens.
 
this is normally how it works in retail sad to say. the hard workers that do everybody elses jobs usually will not get promotions. now i know that doesn't make sense, but hear me out. if they see that you are willing to do this hard work for minimum wage or next to that, why would they give you a raise? all they have to do is schedule the person a lot of hours and they basically have a manager without having to pay a manager, see my point?

i worked at the "i don't want to grow up" place as well and i was doing 10x the amount of work than almost anyone else in the store. keep in mind that i was only hired for the electronics dept. of the store which they kept me after holidays. a few months later they decided to demote that dept's supervisor and kept trying to get him to do management work. he got tired of it and found a new job. that left us with 2 normal employees and 1 that was there while he was on break from college. one of the other employees they had that used to work back there was helping out, but got arrested for a reason i wont name and missed work without calling, so they let him go. so they had 2 of us working that dept for a while and had me doing the customer pick ups (swingsets, bikes, etc), zoning and cleaning up on the floor, being back up cashier, and at times even working the customer service desk.

move up to november of this past year, i caught the only seasonal electronics guy they had hired stealing (well over $1,000 worth of things). so that left us with only 2 employees working the electronics until december! me and the other guy were putting in over 40 hours a week, every week until the end of the holiday season. they couldn't find anyone to hire, so i asked my own brother and my old next door neighbor to help out which they did. moving on, the person writing the schedules was constantly leaving the electronics either empty or with only 1 person running it during the holidays. now while for me and the other guy that was fine, but they were scheduling the holiday help by themselves without even noticing it. i ended up having to fix the electronics dept schedule all through the holidays to make sure we were always covered.

after the holidays they decided that they had to cut our hours down to next to nothing because the boss wasn't going to get his bonus for being on target for hours for the year. they scheduled me for 8 hours (2 days of work), my brother who they kept for 4 hours (1 day) and the other guy for 8 hours and made management work the rest. well i live about 25 mins away from this job and with gas prices over $3 at the time, it just wasn't going to be worth the drive to and from there, so i talked to the asst manager and gave my 2 days to my brother (who was making less than me anyways). for some reason the store manager took this as an insult and decided to basically suspend me without a reason for at least the next 2 weeks (which i put in my 2 weeks at that point). anyways, my point to this last part was instead of doing something to help me (giving me some decent hours) like i did for them the entire holiday season, they pretty much forced me to leave since they did not tell me the next time they would add me back on the schedule.
 
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