I've been working with the company almost 4 years now... started as a clerk, became a backup, then a department manager...
I feel like things are becoming more micromanaged by the week... from the way schedules are written, to wanting daily tasks detailed on schedules, the stronger emphasis on key retailing and 5S organization..
Is the pressure on store level employees increasing in the last 6-12 months? I don't ever recall it being this way, perhaps I am under poor store management.
Coming to this store fairly recently (months) has seriously changed how I view the company and I am about 90% sure I am leaving the company in the near future. Like putting applications in tomorrow hoping to get a quick callback within a week so I can put in my two weeks notice even if it means a 25% cut to my pay.
Every time we turn around, it is accountability this.. accountability that... hold your people accountable or we hold you accountable... enough write ups to become a book. It's like no matter what you do, you're screwed.
Expectations... no excuses.. no advice or help on how to get done what they are requesting within the confines of the day to day running of the business.. just get it done. We obviously can't pull time and labor out of thin air to complete these additional tasks to fix things.
Every department head is on the verge of leaving.. and I am curious how it is in other stores right now.
Hell, I've even been prescribed pills to take daily to make me not notice the pressure as badly because it was causing health problems like my blood pressure to spike, and all sorts of pain and dizziness and everything else. Kroger has actually effected my health and well-being.
Let me know how you guys are doing by comparison. This is southwest division (Texas).
This would be an excellent one for Management Drone to take-----particularly that part about your blood pressure/overall health issues.
It appears to me you have a $hitty store manager and/or district manager, completely ruled by greed. I guarantee what you're dealing with is not the company rule.
Kroger's ultimate goal is to get rid of all the full time people in the stores and run them with all part time people making minimum wage and working less than 20 hours a week. To do this, they've come up with Key Retailing and a whole bunch of algorithms (ELMS, E-Schedule, Que-Vision, CAO, CAP, PPST, etc,) that supposedly will allow anyone who comes in off the street to be able to run things. Notice I said, "Supposedly." Kroger forgets that the store is run and patronized by people, not machines.
To answer your question, Yes. They are being more micromanaged. Things that didn't matter much before, matter now. Like being able to use more store-choice options for displays, saddlebags, etc. Now, literally everything has a certain way they want you to do it. It's making the task much more difficult as you have very few options to deal with. One of our department heads, who has been in that position at various stores for over 25 years is just throwing his hands up in the air, all that experience and he has no clue how to proceed because things are becoming too micromanaged and leaving them without the options to deal with problems that arise. Primarily because the "solutions" we are given require additional hours which they are not willing to give.
I've been working with the company almost 4 years now... started as a clerk, became a backup, then a department manager...
I feel like things are becoming more micromanaged by the week... from the way schedules are written, to wanting daily tasks detailed on schedules, the stronger emphasis on key retailing and 5S organization..
Is the pressure on store level employees increasing in the last 6-12 months? I don't ever recall it being this way, perhaps I am under poor store management.
Coming to this store fairly recently (months) has seriously changed how I view the company and I am about 90% sure I am leaving the company in the near future. Like putting applications in tomorrow hoping to get a quick callback within a week so I can put in my two weeks notice even if it means a 25% cut to my pay.
Every time we turn around, it is accountability this.. accountability that... hold your people accountable or we hold you accountable... enough write ups to become a book. It's like no matter what you do, you're screwed.
Expectations... no excuses.. no advice or help on how to get done what they are requesting within the confines of the day to day running of the business.. just get it done. We obviously can't pull time and labor out of thin air to complete these additional tasks to fix things.
Every department head is on the verge of leaving.. and I am curious how it is in other stores right now.
Hell, I've even been prescribed pills to take daily to make me not notice the pressure as badly because it was causing health problems like my blood pressure to spike, and all sorts of pain and dizziness and everything else. Kroger has actually effected my health and well-being.
Let me know how you guys are doing by comparison. This is southwest division (Texas).
I worked at Kroger, Southwest Division for 4 years. We had a walk out at our store. Several people over a weeks time just got fed up and walked out the door. They are not only running off employees, but customers too.
It depends on the management.
At my store I left because I couldn't make a living wage on the hours I was receiving, but my manager for Front End was a mean, vindictive individual.
Her behavior toward her employees was almost always with an intimidating attitude. It was terrible. And all that as a courtesy clerk for minimum wage.
I left for better pastures, and now I'm looking for newer ones. But I tell myself that the only way I could go back to that company is if I was in a department other than Front End. Still, the way Kroger runs things these days, I'm not sure I really would WANT to go back.
I also have sane problem, mngers threaten my job constantly because i dont have the man power to just get it done... im on pressures medicine also and onlt at this new store that i am at has it been so torturing. Good Luck... GOD BLESS... to let you know we are in the same district.
You're probably in District 10 as there has been several new store openings. The meat markets are very understaffed and on the verge of collaspe in several of the shops. Yet, they're working on bringing in prepackage meal and cutting our hours even further. Its bad enough that our district manager is very strict on overtime. I had written in my associate insight that if I feel that I need to stay overtime its not about the money its about actually being customer first. In short, yes it has gotten even worse.
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My Views and Opinions do not reflect that of the Kroger company. I'm an indivdual expressing my 1st amendment right.
I definitely think so. I was the back up for grocery (until i quit, more on that later) And our store manager was ridiculous. If yhere was 1 thing she was concerned about, it was policy. Thats it. Everything had to be 100% to planner. Doesnt matter if the planner was stupid, we had to do it. If the planner wanted an end cap of something we dont sell, it was going on an end cap. We would get hubg up on a ton of stuff because we had to order a bunch that wouldnt sell. And our back room was a disaster.
Our daily pretty much said that we were screwed every day. Even so, we werent allowed to even add a quarter punch. Maybe its because oyr grocery managers are salaried, but even then, one person is only one persin. It got the the point where my grocery manager (who is a total tool) only wanted me (yeah, me. I was the only one who was held accountable. I was literally a faster stocker than anybody on that crew grocery manager included)wanted me to throw the entire nonfood side of grocery in about 3.5 hours and face the entire dry grocery department in 1 hour. Then he would get mad at me because a 1 hour face job didnt look pristine.
The people on the old contract (regular clerks) made more than me as a member of management. By like 3 dollars an hour. And they get time and a half on sundays. Because of the sunday thing, they were allowed to work 6 days a week because the sunday pay made it so that the other days werent overtime on paper. None of them really wanted to, but they still did. I wanted to work 6 days and it would be significantly cheaper for me to do it, but because of ooovertime and me not getting subday pay, i wasnt allowed to. The one person who is more motivated and costs less money worked less than the people who were burnt out and dont care.
Anyway, after having my ass chewed for the store looking like s**** because of not enough hours, i texted my store manager and said i would be leaving in 2 weeks. I decided, with help from a dude on my crew, that i would cash out my sick pay. So after putting in my 2 weeks, i called out for 4 days , the first day of which was a hholiday. So since none of my managers worked hard and only chewed me out (and when they did chew me out, i asked what they wanted to i could avoid future issues. They never even soent a minute helping me, they just continued to chew me out and wonder why nothing changed) i made them work harder. My grocery manager worked about 15 hours less a week than any good grocery manager ive seen, so he had to work pretty close to what he actually should have been working. And when i came back from being sick, nobody from management would even talk to me. It was amazing. I lnew that i had won.
And now i have a better job where i make more money and they dont crunch numbers even close to how frys did.
No, not in D10. We did get one of your store managers moved to our district though. They're a nightmare. You guys have Jason for a coordinator right? Love that guy.
On the plus side, I got a job offer from Safeway today. I'll see what they offer at the interview. Took less than 24 hours to get a response after putting in my application.
If their offer isn't satisfactory, I have a contact to get a manager position for a walmart neighborhood market, as well as an easy-in for Winco.
I imagine things will get worse with the realignment of the districts coming up next month. I'm already seeing co-managers shifted around to stores deep within districts to prevent them from being pushed into a different one. If you are on the edge of your district, either expect a move if they like you, or you'll be kicked to a new market area far from your house.
Once I have solid offers on the table, I will appeal to the district manager/meat coordinator in an email to see if they want to move me back towards my house to retain me. At this point I would probably even be willing to take a step back for the right location.
I do have a personal day left to burn. Under local 540, can I call out and use it to patch the pay for that day? They have no intention of letting me take it.
No, not in D10. We did get one of your store managers moved to our district though. They're a nightmare. You guys have Jason for a coordinator right? Love that guy.
On the plus side, I got a job offer from Safeway today. I'll see what they offer at the interview. Took less than 24 hours to get a response after putting in my application.
If their offer isn't satisfactory, I have a contact to get a manager position for a walmart neighborhood market, as well as an easy-in for Winco.
I imagine things will get worse with the realignment of the districts coming up next month. I'm already seeing co-managers shifted around to stores deep within districts to prevent them from being pushed into a different one. If you are on the edge of your district, either expect a move if they like you, or you'll be kicked to a new market area far from your house.
Once I have solid offers on the table, I will appeal to the district manager/meat coordinator in an email to see if they want to move me back towards my house to retain me. At this point I would probably even be willing to take a step back for the right location.
I do have a personal day left to burn. Under local 540, can I call out and use it to patch the pay for that day? They have no intention of letting me take it.
They have to let you take your personal day. Talk to a union rep. You can call out, but I wouldn't then ask to get personal day pay for it, they will know what you are doing and it could cause trouble. File a grievance.
Called my coordinator.. said I need a move or to step down into another store. Now they have to talk to dist manager.
I'm the second dept head in a week.. dm will see the trend I imagine.
Said I really wanted to stay working for kroger but the environment in this store has changed my outlook on the company and it is to the point of it effecting customers. We'll see.
Hello! It's 2019 now & a lot of people massively leaving this Company due to improved wages in the industry. It took Kroger awhile to increase minimum wage to get more people into the door. But apparently they got what they paid for: a lot of immature kids who don't have good work habits. So , pretty much it became a babysitter to high schoolers! Good luck to Management dealing with all of them
