December 10, 2017 - Barkspawn
Rather Keep My Dignity from this Shithole.
A little of background info from myself: I’m a fast person. I fall easily under their petty category of “working with a sense of urgency”, I also happen to be a very outgoing person: so helping out guests and coming to even help a rude customers comes to some years in experience with restaurants in the past. My brother happens to be working for this horrible company for around 5 years and was the one that gave me a hand to have a head-start in it, and lastly I happened to leave another shitty hole (Hollister) to fall under a worst one, naively thinking i was actually getting somewhere better.
So going back to Summer of this Year:
I happen to already have a bad experience with Target’s Lead Staff even before being hired as i had already applied to this place once and was rejected on the position after a lack of “experience” with sales floor ( even-though a lot of my co-workers got the job even without any experience whatsoever relating to retail. ) Anyways, for my first interview i remember being told to wait in the lockers room for someone to interview me for HARDLINES as a team lead representing Hardlines was going to come by and present the interview to me. Okay, cool. I wait for around half an hour and everyone else that was also waiting for an interview has already been interviewed and gone by the time this stuck-up lady came by and told me to follow her for an interview. Interview goes well and she says she is really impressed on the “interest” i had in working there. Unfortunately, i did not meet HER demands for working there as i had no experience whatsoever and she told me she wasn’t going to offer the position to me. (Little did i know that this woman was only focused on Softlines and not hardlines, so said person that was supposed to be interviewing me didn’t even show up to interview me and this woman took it upon herself to do it under her ideas.)
Fast Forward to September:
My brother felt bad about my previous experience with the interview and told me to re-apply again as the 90 Days trial from my last application was up and assured me that he would actually talk to his Team Leads and LOD to get me a proper interview. I re-applied and was called within the next day to come in for an interview in a week. Interview day comes in and given that I had at least now some experience with retail: my team leads say that it’s a rather good advantage to have some experience already but was not necessary to have some for hire (Interesting…). I was hired on the spot and given proper training the 2 weeks following said interview. Everything went great and was having a blast at work. I actually did enjoy working there the first 2 months: I really enjoyed working with all of my co-workers, team leads and LODs were actually super nice to me, but everything turned for the worst when i was met with my horrible Team Lead B____ . So B is your pretty fake smiles team lead that is basically hated by everyone because like most of the staff this shitty company hires; does nothing but stand around and get everyone to do her petty excuse of work. Every shift i got assigned with her I was handed carts and carts full of go-backs while I also had to do pools and everything resolving: Domestics, Seasonal, Small Appliances, and Stationery. AND To make matters worst i had to answers all the calls even if they were across the store because little B was busy talking and mingling with the rest of the TL and LODs. I started getting pulled out by her and being told that i should smile more and talk to all customers about the rather stupid sales no one really cares about. Sure thing, boss. I continue my days and talk to every guest around in the store and stuck in a department i’m assigned to and little B calls over in the walkie and asks for my zone. I answer her telling her I’m currently working on it but also tending to guests to which results in me being pulled out AGAIN for not working in a sense of “URGENCY” and not tending to my work and not smiling. I found it hilarious when she remarked about the smiling and looking as if i really wanted to work given that my smile faded once I heard her approaching or heard her irritating voice over the walkie.
Today was the cherry on the top however: I was getting used to her act , and she could already tell by now that i’m not gonna put up with fake smiles and act nice and polite just because we work under this shithole of a company. Mind you I had just closed the previous night and was not home and gone to bed until 2 in the morning and was opening yet again at 8 in the morning, so i was really not in the mood. One of the LODs places me in the bulk wrap section to zone and categorize everything since it was a BIG MESS in there. I focus on the task at hand since the store is rather empty and customers just come by and go for a quick shopping spree this early on in the morning. The Major Tit ELOD passes by me and gets mad because I didn’t acknowledge his worthless existence and calls over another LOD to tell them “If i wanted to keep my job” because I didn’t ackowledge him and because i probably haven’t asked the few customers we had around the store about the stupid sales going on for today. (Ha, hurt that big ass Ego of yours didn’t I?) . So my LOD tells me that I didn’t have to tell them about the sales but just go around and ask them if they need help and act busy with them just to please him and so I agreed to do so and stopped all of my work and went around my department asking all the customers if they required all help to which they just simply brushed me aside and continued looking around and so i returned to my position and continued working. ELOD Came back and and asked loudly “ARE YOU TALKING TO GUEST?” to which i replied “Yes, Yes i-” and cut me off mid sentence and yelled “NO YOU ARE NOT , YOU PROBABLY HAVEN’T EVEN OFFERED THEM OUR SPECIALS.” and i responded back “YOU can go ahead and ask EVERYONE around here about the sales we have going on and they will know about it.” and walked off to another area to look for guest while he stared at me to see if i “talked” to guests. There was only a woman in her phone talking loudly with her husband and another one with headphones to which simply translates to cues that they don’t want to be interrupted or talk to since IT’S COMMON SOCIAL CUE KNOWLEDGE THAT IS RUDE TO DO SO, and so I let them pass without even asking them something to which apparently pissed the ELOD since he was fuming with fury. Minutes later and dear little B comes in around and tells me to watch it and lectures me in front of everyone about talking to guest and making sure that i was working “with a sense of urgency” if i didn’t want to be sent home since ELOD was pissed with my “poor” service. Day goes on and i actually didn’t zone a thing at all and focused on talking to guest the whole day and “educating” them about sales that no one gave a flying fuck about it. Here comes 12:30 and B calls me in the walkie and tells me to head over to the team lead office. I head up knowing that i sure am for some trouble given that the only reason to be called there is to be lectured, and so i arrive and she closes the door behind her and tells me i’m being let off for the day because i’m not meeting their expectations of work. She continued to give me every weak excuse possible to simply get me out of the day: 1. Because I wasn’t smiling ENOUGH. (Just because i don’t smile because of your worthless excuse of fucking existence doesn’t mean i’m like that with all of the guests.) 2. I’m not actually making sales. She acknowledge I talked to every guest and told them about it but she said that she wanted me to push them to buy the things. (No ones gives a shit about sales on their fucking app). 3. I wasn’t working with a sense of urgency. Mid way through the lecturing i cut her off and told her that there are many things that I would gladly like to tell about her and her way of working but I was going to be Nice and polite for today, and it would greatly improve the way she operates. She persisted on being this fake ass “nice” team lead that wanted to help me and take the criticism but i refused and told her to take my Walkie and that I should be on my way.
I know damn well that i’m still under the 90 day trial and with her current streak on me with every excuse of not exceeding her expectations and putting up with her attitude; I will simply not cut it to work for them for longer.
I’m tempted to simply walk out on my next shift and keep my head on high.
(17)Dislikes
(4)Comments
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
Sounds accurate. When I was in these situations I wish I did things differently. When you were sent home you should have demanded documentation why. You should should have also signed it and said you did no agree and stated what actually happened. DOCUMENT DOCUMENT DOCUMENT! I also wish I record conversations to prove the harassment and bias that was going on to prove poor working conditions.
This is not how a workplace is supposed to be. I urge you to look for employment elsewhere, it sounds like a psychotic sweatshop at your store.