Archived Your store culture

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I was just reading this article over at Gawker, and while reading the comments it made me think about my own store culture. With my favorite executives leaving to different stores in our area I couldn't help but think how our culture changed over the past three years. Before, everyone was terrified of our old STL. I only spoke to her once the entire six months she was there. Then with our new execs (the ones that are leaving) I really felt like I could go to them with issues and they helped understand the standards that were expected of me. It made working a lot easier for me and I wasn't (and haven't been in a while) as stressed as I used to be.

However, there are certain things that do irk me such as the rumors, policies and false promises my executives make. When I read the horror stories on the board or over at Gawker I realize that I'm fortunate to have a store that really does try to the best for everyone.

Or I could just be ignorant.

So, what's the culture like at your store?
 
i'm currently very scared for my store. I work at an amazing one and couldn't be happier with our ETLs and STL.. Sadly our STL is retiring and we've lost a couple of our ETL's recently to transfers and promoting to STL's.. We'll see where we are when we get our new STL.

but for now.. we are one team.
 
My store is terrible. Open door policy is a joke. Inept supervisors and managers. People treated like dirt and given completely unrealistic expectations. I know this is completely on the store level. Nearby stores have a completely different culture.
 
EVERY store is different, just like every personality is different. I've worked at stores where it felt great actually being there and I've been at stores where every ETL had chips on their shoulders. I've even known TM's to transfer and try to ride the coattails of a favorable ETL they know. IMO unless you're holding stock or have extremely great incentives, go else where.
 
high school, part 2. (it seems to be that way at a few of the nearby stores also) Mean girls, rumor mills, no accountability, cliques. It was getting better with our new STL and then it's backslid.
 
At my store we have some very good ETL's and TL's (though not all). Our HLETL is new but she has been impressive. She holds us accountable, comes up with great solutions, defends us to others and she doesn't put up with our BS. The SL and AP ETLs are great also. I think if it wasn't work I could be friends with both of them, etc. Now our HR... very poor attitude (though not to me but to most of the team). She will not help you with anything (speaking HR related concerns) and most people do not go to her for anything. Our STL...I honestly don't know wtf to say. If he likes you then you can do nothing wrong...literally. If you are give or take with him then you are not performing your job effectively. Nothing you do is good enough or fast enough and you need to be coached constantly. If he dislikes you well you might as well look for another job. He will make your job hell and you'll get in trouble for things others do constantly. He will find the smallest detail to hold against you even if you did everything correctly or wasn't even involved.

Overall not many people are happy in our store and it looks like that won't be changing anytime soon.
 
Its weird hearing people talk about how bad their stl is.. I hardly ever talk to ours, and he never gets involved with coaching tms on the spot
 
Its weird hearing people talk about how bad their stl is.. I hardly ever talk to ours, and he never gets involved with coaching tms on the spot
Actually, according to the leadership protocol, the STL technically cannot coach TMs. The STL is supposed to speak with the ETL, who is supposed to speak to yours or a TL on duty, who is supposed to coach you. They can immediately speak with you, as part of their duties and authority, but not coach. Several times our STL has been spoken with about this by the ETLs.
 
Our store is a busy one so our stl usually only deals with upper management. He will help out the front end though in times of need :)
 
Our store is a busy one so our stl usually only deals with upper management. He will help out the front end though in times of need :)

Epic STL is epic. The old STL at my store (it's since gotten a new one, for reasons I have not found out yet, but I will, lol) when I worked there would hop on a checklane in a damned heartbeat if needed.
 
Epic STL is epic. The old STL at my store (it's since gotten a new one, for reasons I have not found out yet, but I will, lol) when I worked there would hop on a checklane in a damned heartbeat if needed.

My STL tends to make herself useful every now and then too. She's not like our old STL (who was very friendly and everyone loved her) and she's not great with managing payroll, but she gets along with most of us and helps out wherever she's needed.
 
I generally like the culture in my store, especially with our new STL. It's not perfect, but I can't imagine any situation where 100+ adults with such varying personalities can be thrown together for several hours a day and there wouldn't be any sources of friction. And unfortunately, some stores will have more friction than others.
 
It took a while but we managed to get a pretty good (all things considered) culture going at our store.
Right now we're going through the typical two year switch over and all the newbies are very, very young.
I'm hoping for the best but remain realistic.
It will take another two years to get these bunch trained and then it will start all over again.
 
It took a while but we managed to get a pretty good (all things considered) culture going at our store.
Right now we're going through the typical two year switch over and all the newbies are very, very young.
I'm hoping for the best but remain realistic.
It will take another two years to get these bunch trained and then it will start all over again.

That's one thing that gets to me sometimes. I understand that many ETLs have aspirations of continuing to move up in the company and thus benefit from working at different stores and in different roles, but it seems like every time you get accustomed to everyone's personalities and expectations, the whole roster changes on you.
 
Our store culture is pretty depressing. I recently visited another store in our district for training and nothing opens your eyes to how miserable your co-workers are then spending a week in a store full of laughter and smiling faces. I dont know where the problem stems from pretty much everyone below ETL, almost without exception, hates walking through our doors most if not all days of the week. I would include ETL's but imo they get paid enough to deal with it. Alot of the cause is issues that trickle down from STL to the lowest of TM's but even those who arent directly affected by the STL wear their misery on their sleeve. We've been approached multiple times by our ETL-HL who is relatively new about where this comes from and how to fix it, and none of us have any good answers outside of our own annoyances.
 
our current store culture seems to be to hire as many tm as possible to each work 5-10 hours per week.

in a word - miserable
 
Having a strong STL makes all the little FOCs coming in (Fresh Off the Campus) bearable because, not having any Target experience, they are easily shaped into proper behavior. You can tell them "Hey, there's 2 of us closing in the backroom right now, and there's 13 people on the salesfloor. We have 15 vehicles of CAF to push. If everyone just took one vehicle, we'd have a chance to actually get all the backstock done and also get the planos pulled," and they'll go along with it, not knowing any "better" because all of the 15+ year old timers aren't there anymore to tell them how much it perfectly makes sense for 2 people in the backroom to push 15 loaded vehicles of CAF instead of the the 13 people on the salesfloor, (LIKE THE CORE ROLES FOR SALESFLOOR SAY) - so that those 13 people can spend 7½ hours making the shelves look pretty.

So, yeah, my store's culture is pretty good now. Although it's a pain having to explain everything slowly in small words to the little kids that are FOC, especially as we seem to be the training ground for them, on the other hand it's good because you can instill proper behavior in them very early on, from the beginning. Our STL has all the ETLs on the same page with each other, like they've been lifelong friends/family that grew up and went to school with each other. And it's a good page.
 
Our store culture is pretty depressing. I recently visited another store in our district for training and nothing opens your eyes to how miserable your co-workers are then spending a week in a store full of laughter and smiling faces. I dont know where the problem stems from pretty much everyone below ETL, almost without exception, hates walking through our doors most if not all days of the week. I would include ETL's but imo they get paid enough to deal with it. Alot of the cause is issues that trickle down from STL to the lowest of TM's but even those who arent directly affected by the STL wear their misery on their sleeve. We've been approached multiple times by our ETL-HL who is relatively new about where this comes from and how to fix it, and none of us have any good answers outside of our own annoyances.

Visiting other stores under work conditions is the best way to learn and share new ideas. I don't understand why the corporate culture doesn't see value in this concept.
 
The store that I work for doesn't really care to train anyone new. Even team members tend to discourage others from training people because they don't get paid for it and they sound as if they are company men.

(Mine is a ghetto Target unfortunately)
 
I hate training people. I don't hate it because I hate people in general. I hate it because they stick someone with me without warning. I also hate training unreceptive people who aren't even interested from the get go.
 
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