Assistant Store Manager - say goodbye to work-life balance
Pros
The people, and the sense of teamwork, that Kohl's has built is great. It is a very collaborative environment. Salary and full benefits are higher than what most recent college grads can typically achieve in their first position. Fast paced environment, in which day is different and challenging in different ways. You start with 3 weeks of vacation and 1 comp week (earned by working 6 days a weeks from Nov-Jan) Commitment to training is present, if not great. You are really empowered to take care of the customer and provide great customer service
Cons
For salaried managers, Kohl's has rules in place as to how you can be scheduled (two days off a week, alternating weekends, no closing the store and being scheduled to open the next day,etc.) These rules are typically disregarded by store managers, who make the executive teams schedule, and there is very little effort made to make sure that there is balance. On a slow week I work a minimum of 60 hours and my fellow managers act as if I am slacking off by not working 80...this is not even during the holiday season during which we are required by company policy to work 6 days a week and a minimum of 10 hour per day. I ranged from 80-105 hours per week during the holidays, for which there is no overtime since all salaried managers are exempt. There is a very high turnover of managers that leave for this reason alone; working a lot of hours with your days off being disregarded, and then being scheduled routinely to close the store (leave at 12am or 1am) and then opening it (be there by 5a or 6am) leaves many feeling worn. Outside of that people are usually wonderful, but there is at least 1 customer per day that leaves you wondering how human society could have reached a whole new low.