- Joined
- Nov 29, 2018
- Messages
- 192
There are quite a few things that need to be addressed here in terms of the state of the company, the state of the economy in general, CEO pay, worker pay, Target's social political stance and ultimately their real political stance.
I just want to say... first and foremost, it is true that Cornell is likely a sociopath that doesn't care about the workers or long term health of the company. He has no vision, no strategy, no idea what made Target successful in the first place... I have no doubt whatsoever that is accurate. It was the same thing with Steinhaffel. No care in their hearts for the long term success. They don't know how to right the ship. So they just bleed it dry and slow over time.
However, to be fair to them... there are numerous things going on here to their detriment.
1) Consumer habits are changing... drastically. There is a massive shift to online sales and complete and total convenience for your typical American consumer. Amazon is the primary driver of this, because of their insanely quick and cheap delivery method via Amazon prime. There is also a plethora of information about a product at the consumer's fingertips without having to gamble as to whether or not it works. If Target wants to stay competitive long term, they're going to have to offer up something in stores that goes above and beyond what Amazon offers. They're going to have to figure out how to radically evolve for a significantly better experience. So far, they haven't done it. No brick and mortal retailer has. Once Amazon roles out drones with free delivery, you are going to see an extreme rapid closing of physical retail locations. Exponentially fast. On top of that, Amazon's number of hires year over year continues to go down despite exploding sales, because of their automation evolution. I digress...
2) As a result of rising social unrest across the country surrounding wages and unemployment due to automation, Target came out and said they would take their minimum wage to $15 an hour as a means of trying to get ahead of the curve and the political tide and try to win people over. Target pretends to be a socially conscious company that's about diversity and inclusion, but at the end of the day... they're a company. They're a capitalist company.... for profit. They don't care about the workers. They don't care about diversity. They don't care about inclusion and tolerance. They care about profit. They have shareholders to answer to. That's pretty simple.
With the wages going to $15 an hour, operating costs were always going to go way way up if things remained the same, and as such, they had to maintain their level of profitability if not increase it... so they found a way to reduce hours. This is why the stores are going to shit. You could make the minimum wage $200 an hour, and it's not going to matter if you don't give someone enough time to actually physically do something. Target would like to move to a world in which every single employee they have is worthy of an "O" review score. This is an ideal that is incapable of manifesting in reality. People that work hard enough to consistently deserve an O aren't going to stay with a company like Target long term no matter what, because it's retail. People that work that hard... they come and they go. Thus their current operating model is quite simply an impossibility without one outcome... insolvency.
3) As far as CEO pay goes... you guys said Cornell made $19 million last year and that he's just such a greedy fuck that should make way way less so that workers can make more. Well, let's look at the math. 360,000 people work for Target. If Cornell donated 100% of his salary back to the company and worked for free, guess how much that comes out to each employee?
$52 annually.
Yes, you read that correctly. $52. Hardly enough to make a difference in a worker's life in a 2 weeks pay period, much less stretched over a year. Pull your heads out of your asses. CEO jobs suck in the sense of you have a massive amount of responsibility. If you aren't a sociopath, your stress level is going to be through the roof. As such, you deserve to be compensated for it. Again, even if he worked for free, it wouldn't make a huge difference in his workers lives. So his salary is of little consequence to the company's health. It's essentially irrelevant. It's just a number for those of you that are ignorant to lash out about and pretend it matters to make you feel better. It doesn't.
However, Target made almost $3 billion in profit last year. If they took just 1/3 of that and reinvested it into the workers, that's an additional $2800 annually. That is not a huge amount, but it's still something. Far more consequential than Cornell's salary.
4) In any event, the problems within the company aren't completely self inflicted, but a lot of it is. As covered in point 1, consumer habits are rapidly changing. Target has to figure out a way to compete and bring something incredibly new to the market or they will eventually find themselves out of business. They have taken some strides in terms of online integration, but they are still way, way off... and their methods so far are extremely faulty. The path they have taken between point 1 and 2 is going to cause the company to fail even more rapidly if they stick to it because of the turnover rate. You can't stress your workers out to this degree, regardless of what you pay them. The stress levels are too high. There is no getting around it. The workers can't make $15 an hour at a minimum wage. The company isn't profitable enough for that operating model to continue. The product itself, which is the store brand and experience to the shopper, is suffering in a major way as a result. The base pay must be cut, so that the stores can be staffed. The road they have been on for a long, long time is going to lead to a degradation of the product, which results in consumers coming even less... basically it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy, essentially. It is coming to pass.
5) I genuinely don't think Target has anyone on the leadership horizon that knows how to right the ship. The company is going to fail. It's going to take years. It's not going to be an overnight thing. Target has been in the process of failing for over a decade, as the store brand has continued to slip during that time frame. It's currently in a rapid decline, but it's still going to take years to go under, if not a decade or two.
So do yourself a favor and stop trying to fight against a tide that won't be denied. Do whatever it takes to develop some new skills and seek other employment. There is no long term future with this company, and it's not entirely its own doing.
I just want to say... first and foremost, it is true that Cornell is likely a sociopath that doesn't care about the workers or long term health of the company. He has no vision, no strategy, no idea what made Target successful in the first place... I have no doubt whatsoever that is accurate. It was the same thing with Steinhaffel. No care in their hearts for the long term success. They don't know how to right the ship. So they just bleed it dry and slow over time.
However, to be fair to them... there are numerous things going on here to their detriment.
1) Consumer habits are changing... drastically. There is a massive shift to online sales and complete and total convenience for your typical American consumer. Amazon is the primary driver of this, because of their insanely quick and cheap delivery method via Amazon prime. There is also a plethora of information about a product at the consumer's fingertips without having to gamble as to whether or not it works. If Target wants to stay competitive long term, they're going to have to offer up something in stores that goes above and beyond what Amazon offers. They're going to have to figure out how to radically evolve for a significantly better experience. So far, they haven't done it. No brick and mortal retailer has. Once Amazon roles out drones with free delivery, you are going to see an extreme rapid closing of physical retail locations. Exponentially fast. On top of that, Amazon's number of hires year over year continues to go down despite exploding sales, because of their automation evolution. I digress...
2) As a result of rising social unrest across the country surrounding wages and unemployment due to automation, Target came out and said they would take their minimum wage to $15 an hour as a means of trying to get ahead of the curve and the political tide and try to win people over. Target pretends to be a socially conscious company that's about diversity and inclusion, but at the end of the day... they're a company. They're a capitalist company.... for profit. They don't care about the workers. They don't care about diversity. They don't care about inclusion and tolerance. They care about profit. They have shareholders to answer to. That's pretty simple.
With the wages going to $15 an hour, operating costs were always going to go way way up if things remained the same, and as such, they had to maintain their level of profitability if not increase it... so they found a way to reduce hours. This is why the stores are going to shit. You could make the minimum wage $200 an hour, and it's not going to matter if you don't give someone enough time to actually physically do something. Target would like to move to a world in which every single employee they have is worthy of an "O" review score. This is an ideal that is incapable of manifesting in reality. People that work hard enough to consistently deserve an O aren't going to stay with a company like Target long term no matter what, because it's retail. People that work that hard... they come and they go. Thus their current operating model is quite simply an impossibility without one outcome... insolvency.
3) As far as CEO pay goes... you guys said Cornell made $19 million last year and that he's just such a greedy fuck that should make way way less so that workers can make more. Well, let's look at the math. 360,000 people work for Target. If Cornell donated 100% of his salary back to the company and worked for free, guess how much that comes out to each employee?
$52 annually.
Yes, you read that correctly. $52. Hardly enough to make a difference in a worker's life in a 2 weeks pay period, much less stretched over a year. Pull your heads out of your asses. CEO jobs suck in the sense of you have a massive amount of responsibility. If you aren't a sociopath, your stress level is going to be through the roof. As such, you deserve to be compensated for it. Again, even if he worked for free, it wouldn't make a huge difference in his workers lives. So his salary is of little consequence to the company's health. It's essentially irrelevant. It's just a number for those of you that are ignorant to lash out about and pretend it matters to make you feel better. It doesn't.
However, Target made almost $3 billion in profit last year. If they took just 1/3 of that and reinvested it into the workers, that's an additional $2800 annually. That is not a huge amount, but it's still something. Far more consequential than Cornell's salary.
4) In any event, the problems within the company aren't completely self inflicted, but a lot of it is. As covered in point 1, consumer habits are rapidly changing. Target has to figure out a way to compete and bring something incredibly new to the market or they will eventually find themselves out of business. They have taken some strides in terms of online integration, but they are still way, way off... and their methods so far are extremely faulty. The path they have taken between point 1 and 2 is going to cause the company to fail even more rapidly if they stick to it because of the turnover rate. You can't stress your workers out to this degree, regardless of what you pay them. The stress levels are too high. There is no getting around it. The workers can't make $15 an hour at a minimum wage. The company isn't profitable enough for that operating model to continue. The product itself, which is the store brand and experience to the shopper, is suffering in a major way as a result. The base pay must be cut, so that the stores can be staffed. The road they have been on for a long, long time is going to lead to a degradation of the product, which results in consumers coming even less... basically it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy, essentially. It is coming to pass.
5) I genuinely don't think Target has anyone on the leadership horizon that knows how to right the ship. The company is going to fail. It's going to take years. It's not going to be an overnight thing. Target has been in the process of failing for over a decade, as the store brand has continued to slip during that time frame. It's currently in a rapid decline, but it's still going to take years to go under, if not a decade or two.
So do yourself a favor and stop trying to fight against a tide that won't be denied. Do whatever it takes to develop some new skills and seek other employment. There is no long term future with this company, and it's not entirely its own doing.
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