Archived BTS is killing morale

[tellmeaboutatime]

BTS is killing the morale of the flow team. Between the huge trucks and the skeletal staffing they are going to start dropping like flies. Our trucks are averaging 2500 and payroll is allowing me 16 total team members for a 4am SuperT. Does anyone have any suggestions for keeping the morale high, while not killing the expectations of working safe and fast? They are working hard but it just seems like we are fighting a losing battle. Any help or insight would be appreciated.

 

[signing guy]

That sounds pretty brutal. What volume store is this? I would try to have backroom work out an easy section, like toys, after pulls/break is completed. Set the bar high so TMs don't wander off too high, and make sure they know what expectations are. Give good recognition at the morning huddle. Let people know if they aren't up to par without beating them down.

 

[Hardlinesmaster]

Relax. Have one or flow m's to work bts & office. There is a flip side to this madness, it goes mpg/ptm within 2 weeks. Think about the tm/tl after flow leaves & have to push the auto pulls for bts. Start flexing on out items. Stage any bts back stock to be reworked next day. The accumulator is really messed up now. So you will be dreaming nasty guest bts from hell, pencils, glue sticks & crayons. Oh yeah, comp books & plastic folders too. You will be ok.

 

[tellmeaboutatime]

I always make sure we have BTS done simply because that is where the sales are. We do not generally leave anything, I just don't want to get into that bad habit. I guess it could be worse, I could be on price change and be looking to ticket 1000's of items of BTS. I just don't want the team to feel as stressed as I do right now.

 

[Leonhart621]

That sounds pretty brutal. What volume store is this? I would try to have backroom work out an easy section, like toys, after pulls/break is completed. Set the bar high so TMs don't wander off too high, and make sure they know what expectations are. Give good recognition at the morning huddle. Let people know if they aren't up to par without beating them down.

How about backroom's workload?

 

[tellmeaboutatime]

I have a total of 5 early am b-room team members. They take care of the autofills and the backstock from the truck. As soon as they are done with the pulls they will help finish the unload.

 

[invictustaylor]

That sounds pretty brutal. What volume store is this? I would try to have backroom work out an easy section, like toys, after pulls/break is completed. Set the bar high so TMs don't wander off too high, and make sure they know what expectations are. Give good recognition at the morning huddle. Let people know if they aren't up to par without beating them down.

The leadership uses that exact language at our store ie "The expectation is that we come clean with today's truck" or "The expectation is that no backstock is left for tomorrow" but atleast at my store, anybody who's been there more than 90 days will just get a good laugh out of it. Definately get on somebody who is obviously loafing around, but don't expect that good recognition or lip service about expectations is going to make anybody get an unreasonable amount of work done day after day.

 

[Red11]

To be honest I think corporate wants low moral, it helps bring the high turn over they would like to see. I tell ya as fun as this BTS has been I am not looking forward to Christmas at all.

 

[NoRedCards]

I know that BTS is killing our backroom, both flow and dayside......we are selling a bunch of the stuff, so the pulls are huge, and the staff is stretched so thin, there is no chance to work on it during the day, and even O/N can't get through it all (the dayside pull amounted to 3 flats and 3 3tier carts)......so happy it is going to PTM today in our store.......

 

[Dr Laytex]

The leadership uses that exact language at our store ie "The expectation is that we come clean with today's truck" or "The expectation is that no backstock is left for tomorrow".

I like to say that expectations are disappointments in training.

 

[commiecorvus]

Everyday our huddles have been smart huddles in seasonal pushing BTS.
It's hard to take care of our workload when you spend half an hour every day trying to knock out the BTS but I don't mind helping flow.

 

[dek067]

BTS is killing the morale of the flow team. Between the huge trucks and the skeletal staffing they are going to start dropping like flies. Our trucks are averaging 2500 and payroll is allowing me 16 total team members for a 4am SuperT. Does anyone have any suggestions for keeping the morale high, while not killing the expectations of working safe and fast? They are working hard but it just seems like we are fighting a losing battle. Any help or insight would be appreciated.

it's rough here too with the large trucks, and flow leaders and tm dropping right and left. just pitch in, if your team sees you're having a good time it will help them get through it; in the end that's all we can do 🙂 . talk to your etl/stl about snacks or a special reward for finishing on time and coming clean.
you could also ask the etlhl/sl about possibly bringing in their good tm an hour or two early to help push. if its a tl, they can help manage productivity while they push. we do this a lot. pog also helps a lot, with the expectation they get helped in return when they need it during heavy sets.

as far as bts, we treated it as ptm the moment it set. we took a couple of aisle in miniseasonal and stocked all the pallets out onto aisles so they would not be in the back. the flow team flexes all bts from the truck, and in the backroom what we have in backstock is sorted into paper/folders/writing/etc. we utilize the endcaps in stationery as flex bts as well. it helps with the "freakiness" if youre in a college town; our pulls are very small for those areas.

 

[NOP]

as far as bts, we treated it as ptm the moment it set.

we did the same thing as well. our POGs broke way before it went PTM (school starts in July/August here).

 

[Softlines Owns My Soul]

If they tried keeping it zoned to plano here, I think everyone would have quit. So no ETL or TL ever said flex, but it was kind of a wink wink type of deal. Now it's PTM.