Unreturnable
Receiving/Reverse Logistics
- Joined
- Dec 20, 2012
- Messages
- 137
I'm a relatively new Target team member, less than 5 months working and all in the backroom except one single shift. I literally started the day of my orientation - was asked if I could backstock for six hours after the session, and needing money I agreed. Put my orientation papers into a locker, put on my nametag and went back to find three TLs and a number of TMs from other sections frantically trying to put away a truck at 10:30 or 11am, with probably a dozen full pallets still sitting out. At the time of course I didn't know this was a ridiculously bad situation, or that none of these people should even be there, I was just happy to be working already.
I understand no one can assess our problems without seeing the location and our reports, I was just hoping someone might have some insight into what we could do better or differently - or if this is just normal. I've always been a hard worker, and I take pride in my work, still I feel kind of embarassed as a pretty new TM asking for help for our backroom, obviously not my job but I want my situation to improve.
Here's the breakdown:
-At 5 months employment only one other backroom member has been there longer - beats me by 1 month, so there's no one to ask for advice except our TLs.
-Backroom TL was never a backroom TM - (s)he is a great worker and TL but doesn't know any handy backroom tricks. Like...we never set up extra space for seasonal or toys this year, so wound up stocking them each in about 6 aisles totally random and intermixed with other fillgroups. Huge pain to pull.
-Minimum 5 TMs a shift, with seasonal we've had up to 7 or 8 a night.
-Getting trucks around 2500 pieces 5 days a week regular, with the holidays it's every day, high so far is around 2900, low on a weird day was 1700. Not sure what sales category we're in but it's reasonably up there.
-Was informed we have around 1800 errors in our backroom. Pull times are decent as far as I can tell, but seasonal certainly isn't helping with accuracy or speed.
-Backroom has been clean 3 times in 5 months, often we have 30+ vehicles of backstock trailing out the door and far onto the sales floor that we have to find space for somewhere in the back when we leave. Sometimes we don't leave, though - numerous weeks the better TMs have been asked to stay for 12 hour shifts and gotten 10 to 20 hours in overtime. We like the money, but we'd much rather be a functional backroom.
I know having no experienced members hurts a *lot* - like I kept trying to put away a full pallet by myself, climbing a ladder 80 times to put away 80 boxes before I realized I could just ask someone to hand them to me and stock a whole shelf in less then a minute. All our Logistics TL ever says is "You're not getting the job done. You're working hard enough, there's something going wrong somewhere. Don't know what it is." No helpful advice from anyone at the store except "follow the process."
So everyday is a stressful encounter and I come home and think about how to improve it. I've been being a lot bossier lately and politely ordering other TMs to work together to get the pallets moved onto shelves, police ourselves, make sure batches don't get abandoned halfway through, but still it's really bad and I want it to improve. Is this a rough patch made worse by new TMs and the holidays, will it get better as the team comes together? Is this a store that's totally a mess and will stay that way? Any opinions or advice?
Thanks for reading if you finished this, appreciate any comments.
I understand no one can assess our problems without seeing the location and our reports, I was just hoping someone might have some insight into what we could do better or differently - or if this is just normal. I've always been a hard worker, and I take pride in my work, still I feel kind of embarassed as a pretty new TM asking for help for our backroom, obviously not my job but I want my situation to improve.
Here's the breakdown:
-At 5 months employment only one other backroom member has been there longer - beats me by 1 month, so there's no one to ask for advice except our TLs.
-Backroom TL was never a backroom TM - (s)he is a great worker and TL but doesn't know any handy backroom tricks. Like...we never set up extra space for seasonal or toys this year, so wound up stocking them each in about 6 aisles totally random and intermixed with other fillgroups. Huge pain to pull.
-Minimum 5 TMs a shift, with seasonal we've had up to 7 or 8 a night.
-Getting trucks around 2500 pieces 5 days a week regular, with the holidays it's every day, high so far is around 2900, low on a weird day was 1700. Not sure what sales category we're in but it's reasonably up there.
-Was informed we have around 1800 errors in our backroom. Pull times are decent as far as I can tell, but seasonal certainly isn't helping with accuracy or speed.
-Backroom has been clean 3 times in 5 months, often we have 30+ vehicles of backstock trailing out the door and far onto the sales floor that we have to find space for somewhere in the back when we leave. Sometimes we don't leave, though - numerous weeks the better TMs have been asked to stay for 12 hour shifts and gotten 10 to 20 hours in overtime. We like the money, but we'd much rather be a functional backroom.
I know having no experienced members hurts a *lot* - like I kept trying to put away a full pallet by myself, climbing a ladder 80 times to put away 80 boxes before I realized I could just ask someone to hand them to me and stock a whole shelf in less then a minute. All our Logistics TL ever says is "You're not getting the job done. You're working hard enough, there's something going wrong somewhere. Don't know what it is." No helpful advice from anyone at the store except "follow the process."
So everyday is a stressful encounter and I come home and think about how to improve it. I've been being a lot bossier lately and politely ordering other TMs to work together to get the pallets moved onto shelves, police ourselves, make sure batches don't get abandoned halfway through, but still it's really bad and I want it to improve. Is this a rough patch made worse by new TMs and the holidays, will it get better as the team comes together? Is this a store that's totally a mess and will stay that way? Any opinions or advice?
Thanks for reading if you finished this, appreciate any comments.