Soul-killing nightmare - Operations Manager Michaels Employee Review

1.0
Sep 17, 2015
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

The team members, managers and associates, at the store level are great people. They care about each other and work hard to help each other out. Store level managers can be very understanding about both work and personal issues and will usually do the right thing. Customers can be awesome, showing me new ideas and bringing me to new levels of creativity while trying to help them solve a problem.

Cons

All management above the store level is out of touch. Communication is non-existent. Constant knee-jerk, not thought out reactions to everything. Say one thing on paper, but do another thing in reality. Productivity expectations and goals are unrealistic and unachievable. Our DM is a petty tyrant who plays favorites and constantly berates employees in public. I am always terrified of having to ask for clarification or try to explain that a process/procedure does not work in reality as it did on paper. Management about the store level consistently lies; and the favorite lie is to say the team is receiving extra payroll hours for a special project. The reality is whatever payroll hours were added to the special project, were removed from another area like sales floor or replenishment.

Explore other reviews about Michaels

5.0
Jun 18, 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Benefits and the people there.

Cons

It was far away from me.

2.0
Jun 22, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Some great co-workers, employee discount, on site office benefits including a gym and cafe for breakfast/lunch, full suite of employee benefits at reasonable prices

Cons

Ridiculous amount of stress. Retail in general is often stressful but the amount of stress at Michaels is unnecessary and over the top. Constant last-minute changes by leadership to creative, promotions, products, and any other kind of changes. Things will be finalized and signed off on and delivered, and somebody will make a change at the last minute and things are constantly having to be redone. People are worn down and worn out. It’s the highest turnover rate of any place I’ve worked in retail at the corporate office. I’ve seen people take jobs and be gone within weeks. Leadership in some departments are extremely micromanaging and controlling even with employees that are tenured and have multiple years of experience. The stress level for both tenured and new employees is very high. Projects get discussed over and over and over again, decisions are made and then revisited again after decisions were made making delivery late and causing people to work unnecessarily in order to fix things that could’ve been done correctly the first time. The company tries really hard to make the workplace fun and offer activities, motivation, and incentives. Unfortunately they don’t offset what the environment is like working inside with some of the teams and expectations to actually deliver the work. Would not recommend.

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