Pros
Can think of absolutely none
Cons
Good Morning Gerry, I am sending you this email because I have had the unfortunate luck of joining a company that cares nothing for its people. On June 1, 2015 I started with this company and within one month of being a part of this company I realized that this was a bad choice. As you will see from the history of emails below not only have I not been supported in my role, I was also targeted and mistreated by Our past DM who was fired for a slew of integrity based offenses. He would write up store DM audits and never actually visit locations. He would then go to the stores where he did not like the SM and fail the SM on audits. This DM did everything in his power to get me fired and he did not work alone the LP DM was involved with him. The LP DM's part was to also come into my store and fail me continuously in order to try and get me fired and make me look bad. His goal was to destroy my credibility even if he could not get me fired, but I am stronger and much more valuable than this company will ever be able to see. I have had associates transfer into my store who have worked at stores where this same LP DM conducted audits. These associates would inform me that when LP came in their old store he would not even check on some of the things that he would hold against my store. My OPS even mentioned that when he walked the store he would tell the ops that he makes up his own way of doing the audit. To my understanding there is a set standard, I would do the WAZUGA LP audit that is in the portal. Then when I would tell him he would tell me "I don't even check that" so he forwarded me a sheet that I should use. When I would use that and not the system he would take points off. Your thought here is I should do both and I agree. But think about it why would anyone do it if you tell them that you don't even check it, eventually I did both. My ASM and myself would have to fight to make sure the LP DM saw that we were compliant because he did not check anything properly He would visit my store on my day off and would not properly check the LP binder saying things were missing. when I looked the documents were all there he just missed them. He would give me points off for leaving credit cards from customers on top of the safe and not in it. Now keep in mind the same people that have access to the cash office have access to the safe the managers !. Regardless I complied and put the credit cards in the safe and not on top of the safe for more security, I don't have a problem with that. It's the principle of it that bothers me. That store was a constant victim of ink shortages from the warehouse, thousands of dollars missing each truck that I was blamed for. And I will also attach just some of excel sheets from missing ink some $8000 at a time or $2000 at a time. I was then blamed for the high NIA and attacked again, but I needed to adjust the items to stay correct with on hands and re receive the product (see second Email). Even though the x dock would consistently short other stores certain higher up individuals kept pushing that the x dock had 99% efficiency. Through Constant battles via share point I proved that the x dock did not have that efficiency. I was told that quote "take this how you want but you may not be very operationally focused" which is completely inaccurate. Ask your self a question sir Why does it take a big company like this 4 years to streamline a logistics process after a merger. I am speaking about operation sunrise, that speaks to this companies "operational focus". My name has been dragged through the mud over the x docks inability to get our shipments right. As well as my superiors ability to see that it could only be the x dock. Even recently I was called back to my store after transferring away to another location and had to go to store XXXX again and now be questioned about the shortages. And again another individual mentioned that the loss could not have come from the x dock, as if the x dock is perfect. If you look at share point and check the history you can clearly see that the x dock is hurting all the stores. I have run out of patience with this company, which is horrible to put it nicely. I promise to speak of this to anyone who thinks to join this company and become an advocate to save people from joining this company. As I have already done. Now I don't expect anyone to hold my hand to do my job, but for someone coming into a new company during the busiest time of the year (BTS) as a rookie to the company. You have to give them the tools and the support, not just bark orders. The DSM would come in my building during BTS and complain about the high dollars in MOS and say I was making him look bad. This is all while I am short staffed, have 5 shopping carts that are all broken, have 37K in buybacks combined, 30 pages of Discontinued scan put away, 220K in clearance on a 3.5 Million volume store, over 10K in MOS. A Broken store that is 1 year behind in Plano-grams, I have no access to order items, schedule, hire, or open tickets for the entire first month in the building. That's not right !!!, he could have instead set the expectation. Maybe work with me on a time line and a plan to get it taken care of. Or even send help if payroll permits. Since I was short staffed and had no access to people-soft. Again as soon as I had access a MONTH LATER, I was conducting interviews during BTS !!. did I mention I had a total of 5 shopping carts and all of them were broken, and I had NO ACCESS TO ORDER FOR ONE MONTH. Customers would walk in literally cuss and leave. This was his opportunity as a leader to coach, train, develop, and win an associate over during a tough time. Associates appreciate it when you lead them not attack them. Employees want to feel like they are part of something bigger than themselves. All I see is every man for himself in this District and maybe even this company. OFFICE DEPOT has created a culture where employees feel alone. I can remember sitting at a table in the technology road show events an over hear my fellow managers talk about the horrors they have been subjected to as employees of this company. Why they continue with this company is beyond me, maybe it is because they haven't found an equal salary else where. A jeans day is honestly a joke, and the associates know it. Since associates have commented "what is this middle school". Real appreciation does not have to be monetary but it has to be sincere. First Email Good Morning, Since I have taken over Store XXXX in late July 2015 I have discovered 2 rooms full of D&D, MOS, and Buybacks. As you will see the MOS not donated report (attached) has items that have not been processed starting with Dec 12 2014. This MOS list goes on for months until it reaches Oct 2015. I have taken action to resolve the Issues with MOS by scheduling my Ops Manager to work over nights to complete these as well as dividing the list among the freight team during the days. So far The Ops Manager has successfully process over $1000 worth of MOS merchandise, I have also held him accountable with Verbal warnings and a PCD. The Operations manager has also been put in charge of one associate who comes to work solely for the purpose of processing these categories. I have set the expectation with the operations manager and printed SOP's for all three categories for him to review, gone over his job description and followed up with him. I have also partnered with store manager from XXXX to borrow his operations associate to process open buy backs etc. As you will see from the attached open buyback PDFs we have eliminated over $20,000 in open buybacks and are currently in good standing with the process. The report may show $17 K but this is after we began scanning and processing that day. In addition I would like to point out that well over 90% of the items from those back rooms and that back corner are over 2 years old. For reference of old items please see "V tech item Example" jpg. Also as I write this email I have XXXX from store XXXX here in my stock room processing the Expired buybacks which total $17,000 and currently as of right now has been worked down to $9700 and will be gone by today. The biggest opportunities in this store are MOS and Clearance items. Our plan for moving this product is as follows 1. Print and work the expired items reports from the mobi and from store inventory 2. Merchandise the Technology clearance items on a table up front 3. Utilize flex area to merchandise clearance to match area/dept 4. Use Flex end caps in to Merchandise Clearance Office supplies 5. Scan and fill these clearance areas daily 6. Offer Clearance items technology and otherwise as attachments when using ARC 3 7. Give front cashier a goal of selling clearance items from the front table as part of the total solution. Second Email Good morning Yesterday I received a PIP from my DSM in this document he has added several items that have already addressed and fixed within my store. Namely MOS and D&D, he states that as of 2/16/16 my MOS was $6341.85 which is incorrect because as of 2/9/16 I reduced MOS to $5,548.84 and as of 2/26/16 MOS was again reduced to $3706.10. Currently my store has no MOS and all Preliminary MOS was worked before the drop date on 3/18/16. In addition to this he claims that I did not attend Weekly calls or the LP inventory call which is untrue I attended the call and I attend all conference calls for SM's. I have corrected MOS, D&D and have continued to maintain these operational standards since I fixed them. When I began at this store it was in horrible shape due a lack of operational follow through. It had $37,000 in expired buy backs which I fixed, it had $20,000 in open buy backs which I fixed as well. This store also had 26 pages of Discontinued Scan Put away most stores only have 1 page after discovering this I personally cleaned up that entire report and I consistently maintain that report to this day. This store was way beyond just having a bump in the road this store was completely and utterly neglected for a very long time. I have communicated this in the past and will forward you the emails that I have sent with my findings. It is worth mentioning that my volume store had over 200K in clearance when stores double my volume didn't even have half of that. This PIP should be scrubbed from my file due to the numerous hurdles that I have faced and fixed with this problem store. He also goes on to state that my store has the highest in adjustments but does not give a measure against who (district, or region) I would like to point out that this store has been neglected for the past 2 years before me. As I worked the many rooms piled up with printers, computers and other technology I have found that many of these items are 2 years old and have not been processed through the negligence of the past managers. I do not feel that it is just that I am not given enough time to fix a building that has not been managed for so long. I have to make adjustments in order to get this store back on its feet, no matter how painful the numbers or dollar figures may be. As I have told my DSM if I do not adjust I will not receive the merchandise. He states that my Mos and D&D have contributed to the adjustments, but please remember I did not create these issues I have been fighting to fix them. Even though when I first came to this company for the first month I did not have proper access to the store systems. For ONE MONTH I could not Order, Schedule, Hire or control any Management functions for my store and this was in the Middle of Back To School, so you can imagine how crippling this was. Those events set me back and should never have happened, I should have had the tools I needed to make an impact. You don't send a man to build a house with no lumber and no hammer. please see the attached documentation to support the above statements, as stated before I will forward you the communication I had in the past about this store Kindest Regards,