Archived Not another 'not enough TMs scheduled' rant!

[mrknownothing]

So........my store had almost no team tonight. Our closing GSA had called in, and no other GSTL/GSA was available to work after the opening GSTL (whose shift was extended) left. The only team lead in the building was our consumables TL, and obviously the LOD can't be stuck at the front end all night. So who watched the lanes and acted as GSTL? Our interns. They had to learn how to do everything the GSTL does, including closing the registers (which would've been somewhat funny to watch if not for the circumstances). During the last 30 min before closing, there were two cashiers left: myself (until 10:30) and a new cashier who was there until 10. Softlines also had two team members left (not counting the fitting room TM) and there was a lot of zoning to do, so LOD asked me to help zone in boys. While one of the interns closed registers, the other was zoning girls. So there was one (new) cashier until 10 min before closing (when it got busy enough that I had to go back to the lanes) with no one to help her except the LOD.

I know they're cutting hours a lot, but this just isn't acceptable. Because if we had been as busy as we usually are on Sunday nights, we would've been screwed.

Ok, I'm done ranting........for now.

 

[mrknownothing]

I feel your pain. One day we had 25 call outs in a hour.

I'll bet your LOD was pretty pissed. I guess it just surprised me that they would put executive interns in such an important position without any prior experience. Then again, they couldn't do the CTL's work if the CTL watched the lanes, and the same with the LOD. The only other person in the building with GSTL/GSA training was the brand TM in softlines (who I had to help zone, so obviously she wasn't available).

 

[mrknownothing]

OP, sorry your store is having those issues. My store used to be that way back april but then suddenly, we slowly started to make sales each week. We have made sales everyday (except for two days when we had a hurricanes weather in our area) but other than that, we have been making sales and we actually dont have enough people to give hours to in certain departments.

Hang in there, things will get better with the holidays coming up.

Thanks for caring, Pfresh. <offtopic>And I hope your freezer issues get fixed.</offtopic> I can't wait until things start to pick up so we can get more than 10 hours a week and actually have a team in the store.

 

[mrknownothing]

I've been looking at the book often, but other TMs always seem to beat me to it. We had the same problem after Easter when it got slow, but they asked TMs in June if they wanted to cross-train. I requested hardlines training because I was hoping to avoid going through this again, but to no avail; I'm still waiting for my training. Though one of the GSTLs had me train for 1.5 hours at Guest Service...

 

[mrknownothing]

Recently, a cashier offered himself to help out with reshop one night. Now, this cashier is our "emergency" hardlines TM when he is working as a cashier. Just ask LOD where you can help in the store. You never know what they might offer.

I will keep that in mind. I've helped sort reshop at Guest Service and I helped with reshop in B and C last week (the GSTL conveniently let the hardlines TL borrow me), plus I zoned in softlines for about 20 min on Sunday night. The problem is that we're often busy at the lanes, so I don't get a whole lot of opportunities.