How strict are you about this type of call-off?

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Jan 8, 2021
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The classic where the shift is put up on the board, but nobody takes it, and the person calls off.

I feel we're really soft on this and it's biting us in the ass all the time. How do other stores handle these?
 
You can’t give them a NCNS CCA if they called off their shift. You’d just follow up with an attendance pdd and escalate if there are consistent PDDs about their attendance on workday.
Periodically we pull in everyone with call-offs and chat, and remind them that they are responsible for their shift, and document the reason. I have no say in whether it escalates, as my ETL manages all of that.

But imo, we let them have too many before cutting their hours or doing a corrective. I would immediately cut their hours for just one bad call off - the kind where there isn't a good excuse. Maybe that's just outdated thinking? From my POV there is so much coddling of lazy kids who don't want to work. If it didn't screw us over about 5 times every week, I wouldn't be as bothered by it. I'm just trying to get some perspective here, like am I being unreasonable for having no tolerance for this type of call off? Maybe I just needed to vent.
 
Periodically we pull in everyone with call-offs and chat, and remind them that they are responsible for their shift, and document the reason. I have no say in whether it escalates, as my ETL manages all of that.
Chat about what exactly? What are they saying that's pissing you off so much? I can ascertain consistent patterned TMs or leaders that have an inordinate amount of call-offs or NCNS; that's just asking to get coached, written up, or termed. But generally, if they call in sick, there's nothing you can do about it. Quite frankly, it's none of your damn business to begin with, and what's a good enough excuse for you? Find accurate coverage and forget about it.
 
It is our business when certain TM’s consistently call out “sick”. I’m in HR and I can tell you first hand who the worst offenders are. We have a business to run and when certain TM’s call out all the time then the business suffers and the TM’s who show up are left to pick up the slack.
 
You can’t give them a NCNS CCA if they called off their shift. You’d just follow up with an attendance pdd and escalate if there are consistent PDDs about their attendance on workday.
Not here to debate maybe your store, state. Definitely CCA in mine. Obviously if they “called off” it’s not a NCNS.
 
Yeah if they put their shift up and no one picks it up and they don’t call it’s a ncns. If the ey call it’s a callout. We’ve gotten pretty good at my store for a conversation every week for attendance if they call out or are late once a week.
 
Wow, I suggest you all read over Target's focus on mental health this month. You're all forgetting you're not leading robots, you're leading human beings. In this situation if they posted the shift and couldn't find coverage, then what else do you expect them to do? People have things that come up between the date and the time the schedule is posted and time off requests can be put in. If they made every effort to find coverage, then what? Am I to expect them to change their circumstances? If they need the date off, then they need it off. They are giving me notice "I will not be here this date", it's my responsibility to account for that and plan accordingly. If they can't find coverage, am I doing my part to ensure my area is properly staffed? We know they most likely will not show up for the shift and we know it days ahead of time. Why are we not taking it upon ourselves to ensure our staffing is adequate? So we can reprimand our adult employees like children because they had to take their mother to a doctor's appointment, or they had an appointment of their own, or they had a surprise exam that their professor didn't properly notify them of, or some other unexpected event they need to plan their lives around. Why am I going to write them up for being an adult and trying to cover the shift? Does every employee know how to contact every single other employee to make sure they asked every possible person? Can they look at the schedule and see TM's coming back from leave or that had to give up a shift and wanted hours but hasn't been scheduled in 4 days to be asked? No. If a shift is on the board for more than 2 days and hasn't been covered, then it's my job to reach out to contacts the TM may not necessarily have to ensure my area is staffed and my team is not resentful because they are human beings with lives, and lives are unpredictable and sometimes things come up but they're job disciplines them for it?

What happens when that TM is treated that way? They don't bother looking for coverage next time they need to give away a shift and slowly resent the place. Treat them like people and they'll be more likely to want to come into work on a day off and cover those shifts. I want my employees to feel positively towards their job and management, rather than harboring resentment because we expected them to not be human.

TM's need leader approval before giving a shift away anyway, so why are you going to hold the employee entirely accountable for the situation when you need to OK it anyway? Find someone you'd be satisfied with covering the shift and ask them if they'll cover and sign off on it. Bam, you just fixed a potential staffing shortage and kept your TM's happy instead of forcing your team to be understaffed just to guilt someone into feeling bad that life happened. Just because you may think it's not enough of a reason for the TM to switch their shift doesn't mean that it isn't significant to them. Joey had to give away his Saturday shift because his family decided to go on a vacation in a time period that isn't accomodating to Target. He can't find coverage and ends up being absent from his family event because he only knew of a handful of TM's who could cover him. A family member later passes away unexpectedly and Joey is reminded that his last interaction with them could have been much more recent were it not for us demanding he cover his shift without any help. Do you think he's going to be a bright and happy and enthusiastic cashier and leave guests with a positive experience?

Treat your TM's like people, and you'll find the attendance problems will work themselves out.
 
Chat about what exactly? What are they saying that's pissing you off so much? I can ascertain consistent patterned TMs or leaders that have an inordinate amount of call-offs or NCNS; that's just asking to get coached, written up, or termed. But generally, if they call in sick, there's nothing you can do about it. Quite frankly, it's none of your damn business to begin with, and what's a good enough excuse for you? Find accurate coverage and forget about it.
I have to say that's not a quality post when I've specified that I'm talking about the "put up my shift then call off when nobody takes it" situations. I understand legit call offs. I also understand bullshit.

When we talk to TMs about their attendance, we ask why they called off. We also ask if we can change their schedule or if they're having problems we can help them with. It's definitely our business. It's literally our business. Maybe in your view, by the same token it's none of their damn business if we cut their hours? That would be consistent of you, I suppose.
 
Wow, I suggest you all read over Target's focus on mental health this month. You're all forgetting you're not leading robots, you're leading human beings. In this situation if they posted the shift and couldn't find coverage, then what else do you expect them to do? People have things that come up between the date and the time the schedule is posted and time off requests can be put in. If they made every effort to find coverage, then what? Am I to expect them to change their circumstances? If they need the date off, then they need it off. They are giving me notice "I will not be here this date", it's my responsibility to account for that and plan accordingly. If they can't find coverage, am I doing my part to ensure my area is properly staffed? We know they most likely will not show up for the shift and we know it days ahead of time. Why are we not taking it upon ourselves to ensure our staffing is adequate? So we can reprimand our adult employees like children because they had to take their mother to a doctor's appointment, or they had an appointment of their own, or they had a surprise exam that their professor didn't properly notify them of, or some other unexpected event they need to plan their lives around. Why am I going to write them up for being an adult and trying to cover the shift? Does every employee know how to contact every single other employee to make sure they asked every possible person? Can they look at the schedule and see TM's coming back from leave or that had to give up a shift and wanted hours but hasn't been scheduled in 4 days to be asked? No. If a shift is on the board for more than 2 days and hasn't been covered, then it's my job to reach out to contacts the TM may not necessarily have to ensure my area is staffed and my team is not resentful because they are human beings with lives, and lives are unpredictable and sometimes things come up but they're job disciplines them for it?

What happens when that TM is treated that way? They don't bother looking for coverage next time they need to give away a shift and slowly resent the place. Treat them like people and they'll be more likely to want to come into work on a day off and cover those shifts. I want my employees to feel positively towards their job and management, rather than harboring resentment because we expected them to not be human.

TM's need leader approval before giving a shift away anyway, so why are you going to hold the employee entirely accountable for the situation when you need to OK it anyway? Find someone you'd be satisfied with covering the shift and ask them if they'll cover and sign off on it. Bam, you just fixed a potential staffing shortage and kept your TM's happy instead of forcing your team to be understaffed just to guilt someone into feeling bad that life happened. Just because you may think it's not enough of a reason for the TM to switch their shift doesn't mean that it isn't significant to them. Joey had to give away his Saturday shift because his family decided to go on a vacation in a time period that isn't accomodating to Target. He can't find coverage and ends up being absent from his family event because he only knew of a handful of TM's who could cover him. A family member later passes away unexpectedly and Joey is reminded that his last interaction with them could have been much more recent were it not for us demanding he cover his shift without any help. Do you think he's going to be a bright and happy and enthusiastic cashier and leave guests with a positive experience?

Treat your TM's like people, and you'll find the attendance problems will work themselves out.
This post is all over the place. You lead with mental health but then say almost nothing about it at all. Maybe you were just trying to be insulting, but failed? You seem to have zero regard for the TL's mental health in your post. Are we robots to you?

Your solution of "put the shift up for 2 days and then the TM has no responsibility" is absurd. If a TM tells me in advance that they definitely cannot make it in on that day, and their reason makes sense and is legitimately a day they have to miss, that is a different story than the typical version of what I'm talking about. But you're putting your whole case on the TM being an infallible, besieged victim of their schedules and follies. And that shit ain't true. Or I can sell you a bridge.

I want to act human too. Can I tell a guest off? Can I ask out my TMs? I'm just human, bruh, and stuff.

You act as if it's trivial to get people to cover shifts. Your general point of view seems to be that leaders are not important and can suck it to the hilt for a few extra dollars an hour while working three times as hard, while even the most truant of TMs are flawless angels. Way out of balance and the attitude would be insulting if it made any sense.
 
This post is all over the place. You lead with mental health but then say almost nothing about it at all. Maybe you were just trying to be insulting, but failed? You seem to have zero regard for the TL's mental health in your post. Are we robots to you?

Your solution of "put the shift up for 2 days and then the TM has no responsibility" is absurd. If a TM tells me in advance that they definitely cannot make it in on that day, and their reason makes sense and is legitimately a day they have to miss, that is a different story than the typical version of what I'm talking about. But you're putting your whole case on the TM being an infallible, besieged victim of their schedules and follies. And that shit ain't true. Or I can sell you a bridge.

I want to act human too. Can I tell a guest off? Can I ask out my TMs? I'm just human, bruh, and stuff.

You act as if it's trivial to get people to cover shifts. Your general point of view seems to be that leaders are not important and can suck it to the hilt for a few extra dollars an hour while working three times as hard, while even the most truant of TMs are flawless angels. Way out of balance and the attitude would be insulting if it made any sense.
So you're one of those leaders who likes the position because being a manager at Target makes you feel like you're powerful? Why do YOU hold the ultimate authority on whether or not someone's reasoning is valid or not? At this point, Target does indeed want us to take them at their word. If a team member doesn't want to work there, then they'll leave on their own 9/10 before we can get the corrective process going forward to do anything. Further, if they are not working any of their shifts and put them all up on the swap shift board, then why are you still scheduling them? Why haven't you had a discussion with them about why they aren't working any of their shifts?

If people are doing this same exact thing to the point where it's a consistent problem, then perhaps your leadership is just terribly poor and they don't respect you enough to be honest with you and not leave you stranded. Also, come on. You want to argue that leaders ARE important when Target has eliminated so many leadership positions in the past few years? Clearly they aren't important beyond a point, and that point is the financial whims of the board. They will cut your ass immediately if it makes their income statement look better. My store has 15 leaders. Of those, only 2 of them are actually doing LEADERSHIP work, while the rest of the leaders are just doing TM work for a higher price. Are you really working three times as hard as any team member? Or are you overwhelmed by your role and grasping for exaggerations to explain it away?

What is so stressful about taking a look at a schedule grid and pulling up your list of TM's and trying to find coverage for a role in your work center? You can do that with a series of calls in about 10 minutes. If a TL is having a mental health event because they have to handle the scheduling in their area, then they probably shouldn't have gotten a TL position.

My work center has great metrics because it is adequately staffed because filling a shift that a TM has raised in advance isn't a monumental task. As an addition, your TM's are also more likely to come to you with scheduling issues because they know you actually take care of it, rather than put all of the work on them. Less surprise call outs, less non-covered shifts, means less angry guests and less rollover day to day.

Sure, you can tell a guest off. You can ask your TM's out. You'll face consequences for it though because your role expects you to not curse out guests or hit on TM's. In fact, if you can't de-escalate a situation and have to resort to cursing out a guest then you shouldn't be a leader anyway. Or if you're willing to use your position to try to get in your TM's pants.

If someone doesn't post their shift, tells everyone they won't be in, and NCNS on the day of, then yeah, have a conversation with them. They're not doing their part. But if someone says they can't work a shift, posts it on the board, makes attempts to fill it, and that shift is still not filled when the time comes, then tell me where exactly the TM failed there? They did their part. Ultimately, YOU are responsible for the area's schedule. Trying to write up a TM for calling out on a shift they made attempts to cover is just shifting the failure from yourself to them.
 
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Throughout many of your posts, it seems like you are just frustrated and angry that you have so many attendance problems and end up having to do extra work to make up for the absences. But, you're not looking at the big picture. WHY are you having so many problems with attendance? It's unlikely that the problem is that no one has disciplined people for it. Instead, maybe it's a morale issue that has your team members preferring to lose out on income in order to have a day away from the stress and negativity of it all.
 
If a TM comes to me with an appt or something last minute that would cause them to not be able to make their shift I am understanding and will help to cover it. BUT- the majority of the shifts I see go up are because a team member waits until the week the schedule goes up to say “oops- I forgot to request off for something”. Those I don’t understand. There is a sheet printed each week that our HR posts that even states when requests off must be submitted for in time for the new schedule. So your friend decides to have a cookout and you decide you want to go and it’s a day you’re scheduled then it is your responsibility to find somebody to take the shift or else you are still responsible for it. I know we are all human but Target is also trying to run a business.
 
I think all of these posts are raising valid points and it’s nice to have a safe space for us to vent, be frustrated, collect opinions, seek veterans advice....etc. However, every store is obviously different. Yes, although some are treated or talked to as if their isn’t any possible way they are experiencing it. It’s said,” it starts with the top “ when there is no support, communication, trust amongst, directions, accountability,reliability I could obviously keep going. I am using my own experience, for myself at my store, team leaders are TIRED, exhausted, and fighting to stay that asset to team and store. When you’re ETL sabotages your schedule or allows to happen take, delete move tm you run out of tms to be prepared and plan ahead . That’s just one example. Anyway, today we have the chance to start a different day.
 
LOL I was just looking at the swap board yesterday. I was kind of impressed that A came to work even though she was begging people to take her shift. I'm pretty sure B will be a call out when her shift roles around. Same goes for C. The people in our work center (GS) are maxed out on hours. My team is either full time or in high school and crying because they are scheduled 30 hours. We need to hire a few new people. It sucks when you try to get a day off, but there isn't a single soul who can take it. I was one of those call outs for this reason. I didn't get a convo though because I never call out. If you go to work when you are scheduled, people generally don't get pissy when you miss a day.
 
Target's attendance policy is too lenient. There are absolutely things that happen that may require a TM to unavoidably need a scheduled day off, and a quick conversation with leadership/HR should take care of that. But it is naive to think that all leadership is 100% on top of those who abuse the system. Yes, they are dropping the ball, and OP is just frustrated as most of us who have worked as managers responsible for scheduling get.

If one is a good, reliable TM, the very occasional schedule change or callout is no big deal. We all know for too many TMs that is often not the case.
 
I've been on every end of this situation.

Both as an employee and as a leader.

I think everything truly has to be situational.

I am an amazing planner and typically have my stuff together and never miss a request off.

I also could count on one hand how many times I called out sick in my first 10 years with the company.

I had tickets to an all day music festival that had one of my favorite bands headlining. I also at the time worked overnight. The schedule came out and I was scheduled the same day as the festival. I had forgot to request it off! I tried talking to my boss 2 weeks in advance and they told me to put it on the swap shift board and see if anyone takes the shift. I tried asking several people but they declined or were already working. So I pleaded with my boss and tried to negotiate other days but they were not willing to work with me. Honestly it pissed me off because they were forever asking me to come in on my day off and I almost always was a team player and helped them out. However since I basically screwed myself from just being able to "call out" by trying to do the right thing I went to work. Luckily I was able to sell my tickets for a little bit of a profit. My favorite band was playing the same show a few hours up the road a few days later. I will admit that time I just straight up called out and nothing happened. I had no regular history of call outs so it was never questioned. I didnt feel exactly good about doing that but at the same time when you only have one side always taking and never giving it gets kind of old.

A few years later I was a leader and an employee had a similar situation. While it wasnt for a concert it was for a basketball game that they were being given club level all inclusive tickets for a game to see Lebron James. They were a great employee and always did me solids by staying late or coming in on a moments notice. I told them to try and someone to switch. I also asked a few people for them. We were not able to find anyone. However I still let them take the day off. I just did a better job planning and adjusting my team based on the bodies who were there. Guess what the store still continued to operate. Sure the day would have been a little bit easier had they been there but sometimes you just have to do the right thing for the person and they deserved it. They continued to always have my back as I needed for the rest of the time they were with the company.
 
I've been on every end of this situation.

Both as an employee and as a leader.

I think everything truly has to be situational.

I am an amazing planner and typically have my stuff together and never miss a request off.

I also could count on one hand how many times I called out sick in my first 10 years with the company.

I had tickets to an all day music festival that had one of my favorite bands headlining. I also at the time worked overnight. The schedule came out and I was scheduled the same day as the festival. I had forgot to request it off! I tried talking to my boss 2 weeks in advance and they told me to put it on the swap shift board and see if anyone takes the shift. I tried asking several people but they declined or were already working. So I pleaded with my boss and tried to negotiate other days but they were not willing to work with me. Honestly it pissed me off because they were forever asking me to come in on my day off and I almost always was a team player and helped them out. However since I basically screwed myself from just being able to "call out" by trying to do the right thing I went to work. Luckily I was able to sell my tickets for a little bit of a profit. My favorite band was playing the same show a few hours up the road a few days later. I will admit that time I just straight up called out and nothing happened. I had no regular history of call outs so it was never questioned. I didnt feel exactly good about doing that but at the same time when you only have one side always taking and never giving it gets kind of old.

A few years later I was a leader and an employee had a similar situation. While it wasnt for a concert it was for a basketball game that they were being given club level all inclusive tickets for a game to see Lebron James. They were a great employee and always did me solids by staying late or coming in on a moments notice. I told them to try and someone to switch. I also asked a few people for them. We were not able to find anyone. However I still let them take the day off. I just did a better job planning and adjusting my team based on the bodies who were there. Guess what the store still continued to operate. Sure the day would have been a little bit easier had they been there but sometimes you just have to do the right thing for the person and they deserved it. They continued to always have my back as I needed for the rest of the time they were with the company.
Perfect examples. It really is case by case. The frustration comes on both sides when there are abuses that do not seem to get addressed.
 
The classic where the shift is put up on the board, but nobody takes it, and the person calls off.

I feel we're really soft on this and it's biting us in the ass all the time. How do other stores handle these?
It would be a write up. You should have notified your TL that no one picked it up to see if they can cover your shift or be prepared for you not to show up.
 
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