Despite being told that IT continues to be an important asset to the company's long-term success, and great company profits, cost-cutting is still prioritized. Many jobs in IT are now contracted out to places like Brazil and India. California tech office is close to 80% contractors, most on H1B visas. Innovation can only happen if it saves the company money.
Much like other companies of similar size, the concept of loyalty is dead. Once you start to no longer become useful to the company, or can be replaced by either less experienced or outsourced labor, you're gone. The IT layoffs earlier this year took those with experience and useful Kohl's-specific knowledge out to be replaced by cheap contractors, some with contracts as small as 3 weeks to do one task on a project. Contractors are treated like second-class citizens with no appreciation, smaller desks, and sometimes abuse from managers.
Teams are incredibly siloed and do not work well together. Teams also have individual cultures. Some IT teams are made of people who work laid-back 35 hour work weeks, while others are pulling 60+ hours rushing to get a pile of tasks done.
Store associates are treated poorly depending on location. Credit signup and application quotas, low starting pay with insulting raises as low as pennies (yes, one got a $0.03 an hour raise), and competitive (sometimes cut-throat) atmospheres exist at all stores. Not worth the pay in my opinion.
Oh yeah, as others have mentioned, some co-workers can be racist or otherwise make inappropriate comments without intervention from HR.
