Archived New ETL-LOG, looking for tips

[Back2Target]

Hello all,

Long time lurker, first time poster.

I started my career at Target in 2008 out of high school. I was hired as a CA and after 6 months the ETL-HR realized I was being wasted there and put me in Meat (Super Target). I worked there for another year and a half before moving to finish my education at a four year college. I transferred to the local Target (apparently only possible because I had perfect attendance) and worked happily there as a Market TM until around May 2012 when I was graduating. I went through interviews for ETL positions and I was approved but there were no positions around the area I was going to be living in so they offered me a Sr. TL position closer to me.

I needed to make a certain amount of money around that time so I took another offer with the largest food retailer in my state. I worked there for three years going from a Management Trainee -> Bakery Manager -> Grocery Dept. Manager/Asst. Store Manager. For the last year and a half I ran a grocery department that averaged $700k a week alone.

Looking for something different I got into banking as an Assistant Bank Manager. I was recently severanced from my organization because after a year and a half of service they decided to eliminate my position in about 30% of their markets. I actually lined up an extremely similar banking job with a competitor but I'm building a house and Target found my resume and, after a series of three phone interviews, offered me an ETL-LOG position. I took the position because I enjoyed my previous experience with Spot.

Of course, I've read the "before you sign your life away" post and I fully understand what I'm in for and how demanding it will be; I am no stranger to this type of retail work.

My question to you all is: Besides supporting your team and working hand in hand and not immediately changing process as soon as I arrive...what are some other tips to ease the transition? I would love to hear from some former ETL-LOGs. Also, how has the company changed in the last four years?

Thanks!

 

[smashandthrash]

Well, shit. can't offer much, but just want to say you seem like someone that is ready to get some work done. Kudos. Welcome aboard.

 

[cobycord]

Accountability, accountability, accountability.....work along side the team, get to know them, set clear expectations for you TLs and stand firm on them and make sure they have expectations for their team that match up with the ones you have for them.

 

[Yetive]

May seem obvious, but hold yourself accountable to those standards too.

 

[HRZone]

We have a new ETL Log. What makes him great is he really gets his hands dirty. He was smart, he let the experienced TLs run the show and as he has gotten experience and gotten to hire his own TMs he is more hands on with them.

Number one thing is most logistics tms feel second rate. My store does plenty of recognition for dayside TMs but overnight people dont get s----, he has changed that. Every now and then he requisitions food and cooks for them. Huge morale boosters.

 

[cobycord]

also, don't forget about your other workcenters because you're so focused on one. Logistics has flow, reverse logistics, pricing, signing, presentation, PMT, and backroom. Think of routines to give yourself so that way you'll know all the key points on how each one is doing and what each one is working on for that week. You have the most departments in the store so you're gonna have to rely heavily on your TLs to keep you updated on projects for the week.

 

[Xanatos]

Number one thing is most logistics tms feel second rate. My store does plenty of recognition for dayside TMs but overnight people dont get s----, he has changed that. Every now and then he requisitions food and cooks for them. Huge morale boosters.

I had never heard a single compliment from a flow TL to their team until my current one. It makes a big difference. Especially the daily recognition - just saying thank you or good job once a day will be the difference between TMs wanting to come back the next day vs dreading it. Make it a habit. I can't imagine getting up super early, busting my ass all day for barely over minimum wage, and then getting yelled at to go faster. There are plenty of team members that need to move faster, but positive recognition can go a long way. It's the difference between someone wanting to bust their ass for you vs busting their ass to keep from getting yelled at.

Also, as others have said, follow up with your team. The vast majority of the company seems to complain about mistakes that the flow team makes. [Disclaimer: every single department makes tons of mistakes, but flow gets shit on the most because they make more noticeable ones. No one is ever going to see a mistake that my Starbucks team makes.] A big one in most stores is overstocking; the flow TM thinks it will save them time, but they don't realize how much time it will cost the rest of the store. And, I don't know how reasonable it is, but zoning as you go. Not necessarily spending time on an entire aisle, but at least making sure that the things you stock are zoned. The store should not look worse after the flow team goes through than it did at close the night before.

 

[HRZone]

also, don't forget about your other workcenters because you're so focused on one. Logistics has flow, reverse logistics, pricing, signing, presentation, PMT, and backroom. Think of routines to give yourself so that way you'll know all the key points on how each one is doing and what each one is working on for that week. You have the most departments in the store so you're gonna have to rely heavily on your TLs to keep you updated on projects for the week.

At my store ETL ops has pricing signing presentation and dayside backroom.

Etl log only does overnight team.

 

[Coqui]

At my store ETL ops has pricing signing presentation and dayside backroom.

Etl log only does overnight team.

My store does too but our ETL-Ops has price acurracy and Reverse Logistics.

 

[FredPanda3]

Don't be like the new ETL-log at my store that was late and made everyone wait outside for him 15 minutes after 4 am.....

 

[cobycord]

At my store ETL ops has pricing signing presentation and dayside backroom.

Etl log only does overnight team.

I think only supers or maybe the occasional pfresh gets an operations ETL. I feel like an operations ETL would help out our store a lot though.

 

[Coqui]

I think only supers or maybe the occasional pfresh gets an operations ETL. I feel like an operations ETL would help out our store a lot though.

My store is a Pfresh store and we have an ETL-Ops.

 

[SFSFun]

Don't be like the new ETL-log at my store that was late and made everyone wait outside for him 15 minutes after 4 am.....

Hopefully everyone did punch corrections. That will get his tardiness addressed pretty damn quickly.

 

[Hardlinesmaster]

Welcome! Spot old days are gone. Depending on store size, you maybe working with less TL's. Payroll maybe cut in all areas. But, be proactive & lead your team well, you should be ok. Take every opportunity to drive sales.

 

[cobycord]

My store is a Pfresh store and we have an ETL-Ops.

lol isn't your store the "We have more ETLs than TMs" store??? LOL, you named ETL titles I'd never even heard of so I don't doubt it

 

[cobycord]

Welcome! Spot old days are gone. Depending on store size, you maybe working with less TL's. Payroll maybe cut in all areas. But, be proactive & lead your team well, you should be ok. Take every opportunity to drive sales.

Yes!! Proactive is the best word I think, when I interned with the LOG ETL and we went to another store to observe an ETL LOG there. Her best advice for me was that if I'm given logistics to know in my mind that, you won't come clean every truck day, BUT you need to come close and you need to have a plan set up so that your entire backroom WILL be clean in the next 24-48hrs. My mentor this summer also said you have to start looking for smoke before they become fires.....dedicated stocker areas not being consistently zoned, truck taking longer than estimated to unload, things being dropped in the backroom by people from the floor. Nip bad habits in the bud quick before it becomes a regular thing that people think it's okay to do.

 

[FredPanda3]

Hopefully everyone did punch corrections. That will get his tardiness addressed pretty damn quickly.

Yup about 20 of us all didn't punch in and HR fixed all of our punches later, that's a lot of precious payroll gone down the drain, I'm sure he was talked to.

 

[keynesian]

I don't know exactly the type of store your walking into, but a couple of tips:

If you're running an early morning push all process and you are struggling, consider switching back to scanning your trucks. I've seen stores make this simple change, and everything improved very quickly.

Normally you will own pricing/pog along with regular logistics. How pog interacts with your backroom is key to getting logistics right. One key change we made was that our backroom team owns pulling for pog and backstocking for pog - which helped improve our overall BRLA, and the speed with which pog team pulls/backstocks.

Trap as much transition as you can: if you can avoid backstocking transition it will improve your efficiency and organization immensely.

The best change thats happened since you've been gone - you can now change salesfloor capacities. Since we got rid of the accumulator, pulls are based on capacities and on hands. Fix those sales floor capacities, and your pulls can be super accurate.

If you're at an SFS or ESFS store, learn that on your first day: and spend at least one full shift back there within your first week.

Avoid excessive distractions: every month or so corporate/regional/dsitrict leadership will come out with a new "focus" that they want you to prioritize. DONT. the business needs are obvious, tend to those first, then worry about the "extras" that senior management wants done. If you run in every random direction they point you in, your sales WILL suffer.

And finally, as others have mentioned, new labour is extremely tight. Hours are at a premium, since the whole target canada/credit card breach fuck ups. I don't know what scenario caused your predecessor to leave their position. I will tell you this though: if your STL refuses to give logistics the hours it needs to get done what it needs to get done, then your job is impossible. You could have the most dedicated, hard working team possible in each of your workcenters - but if your being told "the backroom only needs 100 hours per week" or "you can push a truck with 75 hours on flow" or "it says you have 300 hours of sets to do, finish it in 100" then you're fucked. Many STLs get away with making payroll on the backs of making logistics look totally incompetent, and few DTLs will take the word of a new ETL over the word of an experienced STL. Know what dashboard says you should get, and never settle for at least what it says you should get. if they say "we need those hours for the salesfloor because its so hard to get the zone done every night" push back immediately on the line of thinking - it is completely foolish. There is no salesfloor to zone if the product never makes its way to the floor.

I had one ETL who walked into that scenario - and he saw the writing on the wall. After spending 8 months in training with the company, he spent less than 3 weeks in position before bolting. Honestly, if they are unwilling to give you your hours, your best option is to leave ASAP , because that is clearly a store that just sees ETL LOG as a pawn to make themselves look better, and have a fall guy to mask their own incompetencies.

 

[asidius]

Don't change things just to change things. If it's not broke, don't fix it. Everyone despises (including my TL) our new ETL-LOG because he insists on changing everything. often for the worse.

 

[anathema]

I can tell you what I need from my ETL:

- Getting your hands dirty. There are times for teaching moments and times to just get shit done and we can go over the details and discussion later.
- Offer suggestions often. I know what I'm doing but sometimes bouncing ideas and asking questions helps offer perspective both for yourself and for me. That way we're on the same page about most things and even if we disagree, we know what the next step is if something doesn't work.
- Don't fix things without coming up with a plan for consistency. More for your own sanity, don't do something like clean receiving if your BRTL doesn't have a plan to keep it clean. It's nice to hit the reset button on purging paper and stuff like that, but work to break the cycle, not to just keep your head above the water.
- Accountability. Moreso for your TLs, they need to hold people accountable. Things might be shitty logistically, but if they're holding their TMs accountable, it will get better. Either your process sucks or your TMs/TLs suck. Figure out which.

 

[Back2Target]

UPDATE:

Thanks for the tips, everyone.

After two weeks in training at a store with a great process and a LOG who is very soon to be a STL, I'm really already done with my LOG training. Jumping back into things came back very quickly.

HOWEVER: I happened to see my STL at a different store today and he said I'm actually being moved to an ETL Food. This position was mentioned during interviews and made sense because of my background but I said if LOG was available I'd take it over nothing.

So... any ETL Food specific tips?