- Joined
- Nov 13, 2012
- Messages
- 60
OK, prepare yourself. I'm about to build a wall of text.
First, some background info. Last March we lost our Instocks TL. We'll call him "Ted". Ted decided he wanted to go back to school. Management wouldn't let him take Saturdays off even though he said he would forfeit his schedule rotation and work every Sunday in exchange. So, he stepped down and moved to the POG team and eventually transferred to a different store. Since then, we haven't had an Instocks TL that scans with us. Now we have a combination BR/IS TL - we'll refer to him a "Bill" - who only oversees the process. He is never directly involved. As such, I have taken on the role of de facto ISTL as I am, by far, the most experienced and knowledgeable Instocks team member in the store.
Prior to Bill taking over, we had another BRISTL named "Jack". Jack's main focus, however, seemed to be with the backroom. He knew almost nothing of Instocks. When he took over, management promised he would go to a different store to be trained on the IS process. It never happened. Anytime the other IS team member (yes, there are only two of us in a Super Target) and I had problems, we couldn't rely on him to help us. We would always go straight to our ETL-Log. I began to get really frustrated that our process was falling apart and I was continually complaining to the ETL-Log about Jack's lack of leadership and involvement in Instocks. Jack eventually quit right before Christmas. I'm fairly certain he was avoiding being terminated.
After Jack quit, Bill moved from his position as early morning Flow TL and took over the BRISTL spot. Bill tries to be involved with our team a lot more than Jack ever was. However, he has only trained for a couple of days at a different store so he really is still a beginner as far as Instocks is concerned.
Now, a while back, the PDA's were updated with the awesome Store Tie function and, eventually, the process moved to only Research in the Instocks task list. We explained to the team how great this would be in helping team members locate items on the sales floor while working pulls; our inventory numbers would be more accurate as well as helping to reduce process errors that contribute to shortage. However, to this day, there is only one person that I know of in the ENTIRE store that actually uses the Store Tie function. Ted always talked at morning huddles about how important it was to use it, as well as the importance of stocking to the piece, not overstocking, and using the proper applications to pull items from the back rather than using EXF on active POGs. I have continued to do this as well but it just never works I'm the only one who makes it an issue. The ETLs and STL never enforce those practices fully. This is in addition to the fact that our Flow team hates backstocking things after they are done with the morning push, so they end up stocking things in the wrong location and overstocking things in order to reduce backstock. Most times when I am working RIGs, I end up with a ton of overstock that I have to bring to the backroom to be backstocked. I'm constantly having to superzone whole sections, and occasionally whole aisles for the big things (infant hardlines, luggage, etc.) in order to accurately count a single RIG, set up rainchecks, and ensure that all active items are being represented on the sales floor and not rotting away in the back until it is discontinued or goes clearance/salvage.
These are all things that have been problems since Ted was still with us. But management never made it a priority because we had plenty of payroll hours to keep our scores always hovering at or just above solid green. Once the only-research task list rolled out (right around the time Ted left the team) our scored slowly dropped and bounced between yellow and green. This is surely due to the various process errors that we mentioned that never got fixed. But no one ever paid attention to our team or our scores so it all flew under the radar. Then headquarters changed the green threshold to 7% and our scores are now red. Right after that happened, our printer went down and we couldn't print substitution signs for a little over a week which screwed our Raincheck Effectiveness score and thus our Sales Floor score tanked. And by tanked, I mean, 66%. Blood red. That's when people started paying attention to Instocks. Management noticed our score was red and they wanted to know why. I explained the printer problem which had since been fixed and we were just waiting for our scores to update to see the Sales Floor score come out of the gutter (which it did). I also explained the various reasons why our Instocks scores were so low: Flow not pushing to the piece, overstocking, failing to use the Store Tie function, bad BRLA score, rampant misuse of EXF, etc. However, the STL got it into his head that the integrity of our morning scan sucks and that was the reason for so many Outs with Locs. I've mentioned many of the real problems to the STL just during casual conversation and to the team during huddle and the STL just dismisses me and chalks it up to only a handful of team members and their lack or either proper training or integrity.
Now we've drawn the attention of the Group Operations Leader and my ETL-Log and BRISTL are freaking out and breathing down my neck to get our Outs with Locations % down. I keep explaining the various things we need to change in our store in order for that to happen. I keep asking for them to have my back on these issues because I can't really make an impact on the STLs decisions as a "lowly" Instocks Team Member. Over the weekend, I discussed the various ways that we can fix our scores with the BRISTL. He said he contacted various stores in our district to see how they do it. The first thing he said he found out was that everyone else was getting lots more payroll for Instocks than our store; something I've been complaining about since Ted left. I'm in an A volume store, and there are only two regular scanners. There are two others that are trained but only one scans a couple days a week for only 1.5 hours and the other is there as a back up in case we call in or request time off. This past Saturday, Monday and Tuesday, I was the only person scanning the entire store which is a pretty typical scanning schedule for our Instocks team.
Anyway, what my BRISTL decided was the best solution to our problem was to use EXF (!) and OUTS until our scores get better. A "solution" that was reiterated to me by my ETL-Log - and backed by the STL - and a solution with which I vehemently disagreed. The ETL-Log basically told me I have no choice. I told her that if we were to go through with it (which we have been for the past couple of days) our scores would most likely be green in the next couple of weeks and everyone would forget any of the problems that still exist and in fact those problems would very likely only be exacerbated. When we go back to scanning research the right way, our scores will most likely dip back into yellow and red almost immediately. And that's even ignoring the fact that, without regular research scans, nothing, or at least very little, will drop into our Drastic Count Report.
Whew. OK, the advice I'm looking for is whether or not I am going about this the right way or if maybe I should go above the ETL-Log's head and try to get the STL to meet with me personally. I've never talked to him about these most recent developments personally. They are always relayed through my BRISTL and ETL-Log. Should I maybe request that I begin attending the team lead meetings so I can voice my concerns to them as well since I'm certain none of this information reaches the group as a whole? Any other ideas? I just want to do this the right way. I certainly don't get paid NEARLY enough to worry about this so much but I just want to be able to say that I did the right thing.
Thanks for your help.
First, some background info. Last March we lost our Instocks TL. We'll call him "Ted". Ted decided he wanted to go back to school. Management wouldn't let him take Saturdays off even though he said he would forfeit his schedule rotation and work every Sunday in exchange. So, he stepped down and moved to the POG team and eventually transferred to a different store. Since then, we haven't had an Instocks TL that scans with us. Now we have a combination BR/IS TL - we'll refer to him a "Bill" - who only oversees the process. He is never directly involved. As such, I have taken on the role of de facto ISTL as I am, by far, the most experienced and knowledgeable Instocks team member in the store.
Prior to Bill taking over, we had another BRISTL named "Jack". Jack's main focus, however, seemed to be with the backroom. He knew almost nothing of Instocks. When he took over, management promised he would go to a different store to be trained on the IS process. It never happened. Anytime the other IS team member (yes, there are only two of us in a Super Target) and I had problems, we couldn't rely on him to help us. We would always go straight to our ETL-Log. I began to get really frustrated that our process was falling apart and I was continually complaining to the ETL-Log about Jack's lack of leadership and involvement in Instocks. Jack eventually quit right before Christmas. I'm fairly certain he was avoiding being terminated.
After Jack quit, Bill moved from his position as early morning Flow TL and took over the BRISTL spot. Bill tries to be involved with our team a lot more than Jack ever was. However, he has only trained for a couple of days at a different store so he really is still a beginner as far as Instocks is concerned.
Now, a while back, the PDA's were updated with the awesome Store Tie function and, eventually, the process moved to only Research in the Instocks task list. We explained to the team how great this would be in helping team members locate items on the sales floor while working pulls; our inventory numbers would be more accurate as well as helping to reduce process errors that contribute to shortage. However, to this day, there is only one person that I know of in the ENTIRE store that actually uses the Store Tie function. Ted always talked at morning huddles about how important it was to use it, as well as the importance of stocking to the piece, not overstocking, and using the proper applications to pull items from the back rather than using EXF on active POGs. I have continued to do this as well but it just never works I'm the only one who makes it an issue. The ETLs and STL never enforce those practices fully. This is in addition to the fact that our Flow team hates backstocking things after they are done with the morning push, so they end up stocking things in the wrong location and overstocking things in order to reduce backstock. Most times when I am working RIGs, I end up with a ton of overstock that I have to bring to the backroom to be backstocked. I'm constantly having to superzone whole sections, and occasionally whole aisles for the big things (infant hardlines, luggage, etc.) in order to accurately count a single RIG, set up rainchecks, and ensure that all active items are being represented on the sales floor and not rotting away in the back until it is discontinued or goes clearance/salvage.
These are all things that have been problems since Ted was still with us. But management never made it a priority because we had plenty of payroll hours to keep our scores always hovering at or just above solid green. Once the only-research task list rolled out (right around the time Ted left the team) our scored slowly dropped and bounced between yellow and green. This is surely due to the various process errors that we mentioned that never got fixed. But no one ever paid attention to our team or our scores so it all flew under the radar. Then headquarters changed the green threshold to 7% and our scores are now red. Right after that happened, our printer went down and we couldn't print substitution signs for a little over a week which screwed our Raincheck Effectiveness score and thus our Sales Floor score tanked. And by tanked, I mean, 66%. Blood red. That's when people started paying attention to Instocks. Management noticed our score was red and they wanted to know why. I explained the printer problem which had since been fixed and we were just waiting for our scores to update to see the Sales Floor score come out of the gutter (which it did). I also explained the various reasons why our Instocks scores were so low: Flow not pushing to the piece, overstocking, failing to use the Store Tie function, bad BRLA score, rampant misuse of EXF, etc. However, the STL got it into his head that the integrity of our morning scan sucks and that was the reason for so many Outs with Locs. I've mentioned many of the real problems to the STL just during casual conversation and to the team during huddle and the STL just dismisses me and chalks it up to only a handful of team members and their lack or either proper training or integrity.
Now we've drawn the attention of the Group Operations Leader and my ETL-Log and BRISTL are freaking out and breathing down my neck to get our Outs with Locations % down. I keep explaining the various things we need to change in our store in order for that to happen. I keep asking for them to have my back on these issues because I can't really make an impact on the STLs decisions as a "lowly" Instocks Team Member. Over the weekend, I discussed the various ways that we can fix our scores with the BRISTL. He said he contacted various stores in our district to see how they do it. The first thing he said he found out was that everyone else was getting lots more payroll for Instocks than our store; something I've been complaining about since Ted left. I'm in an A volume store, and there are only two regular scanners. There are two others that are trained but only one scans a couple days a week for only 1.5 hours and the other is there as a back up in case we call in or request time off. This past Saturday, Monday and Tuesday, I was the only person scanning the entire store which is a pretty typical scanning schedule for our Instocks team.
Anyway, what my BRISTL decided was the best solution to our problem was to use EXF (!) and OUTS until our scores get better. A "solution" that was reiterated to me by my ETL-Log - and backed by the STL - and a solution with which I vehemently disagreed. The ETL-Log basically told me I have no choice. I told her that if we were to go through with it (which we have been for the past couple of days) our scores would most likely be green in the next couple of weeks and everyone would forget any of the problems that still exist and in fact those problems would very likely only be exacerbated. When we go back to scanning research the right way, our scores will most likely dip back into yellow and red almost immediately. And that's even ignoring the fact that, without regular research scans, nothing, or at least very little, will drop into our Drastic Count Report.
Whew. OK, the advice I'm looking for is whether or not I am going about this the right way or if maybe I should go above the ETL-Log's head and try to get the STL to meet with me personally. I've never talked to him about these most recent developments personally. They are always relayed through my BRISTL and ETL-Log. Should I maybe request that I begin attending the team lead meetings so I can voice my concerns to them as well since I'm certain none of this information reaches the group as a whole? Any other ideas? I just want to do this the right way. I certainly don't get paid NEARLY enough to worry about this so much but I just want to be able to say that I did the right thing.
Thanks for your help.