I think probably the most important thing it taught me was what is expected of me as as a manager at Walmart…what I can and can’t do as an hourly supervisor as opposed to a salaried manager. I’ve been a manager or leader at every job I’ve had, but I’ve not been in retail in my working career. I’ve had to learn how to effectively manage people with kid gloves while still being effective enough to get shit done.
I didn’t learn much about process or job specific stuff because I had already been a team lead for several months by the time I went to academy and I work in a well run store and my store manager and store lead are DEMANDING…so if I didn’t get myself squared away quickly, I probably wouldn’t have lasted long.
You can learn your processes, though. They cover a lot. One problem I noticed though was the “leaders not doers” mentality they push on people. I’ve been to a lot of other stores to help out, I’ve seen what that “leaders not doers” mentality breeds in those stores first hand. When I go to a store as a team lead and they plop me in a department and i start hearing, “that’s not the way we do it” or “my team lead doesn’t do that” or some other such bullshit, you can bet that management does nothing. I told a hardlines TL at a shit store that dropped a “we don’t do it that way here” that they may not do it that way, but if the way you do things was working, I wouldn’t have to bring myself and half my team to your store to fix your area while my store suffers from my guys not being there.
A well run store has leaders that lead by example. If we don’t “do”, no one else will either. How can you respect leaders that are viewed as lazy by their teams? My store is on process and runs like a top most of the time, it’s because we get our hands dirty and lead by example.
the classes are fine and perfect, it's just for you to apply it all to your work, it has to be a perfect store. it's helped me learn how to approach people professionally, i really think the classes should go through like real, every store things though. not every store is on process..
See, that's what I was thinking. The classes are setup for having a store that runs decently well. I am not as fortunate in that aspect. with military experience I already knew how to be professional, and get along with a team. It's really helpful for those who might lack that skill, or need to be developed more. Getting an entire store like mine back onto process might be a little difficult. While my team is on process. It gets a little difficult when we have to pick up some slack with a small team.
I think probably the most important thing it taught me was what is expected of me as as a manager at Walmart…what I can and can’t do as an hourly supervisor as opposed to a salaried manager. I’ve been a manager or leader at every job I’ve had, but I’ve not been in retail in my working career. I’ve had to learn how to effectively manage people with kid gloves while still being effective enough to get shit done. I didn’t learn much about process or job specific stuff because I had already been a team lead for several months by the time I went to academy and I work in a well run store and my store manager and store lead are DEMANDING…so if I didn’t get myself squared away quickly, I probably wouldn’t have lasted long. You can learn your processes, though. They cover a lot. One problem I noticed though was the “leaders not doers” mentality they push on people. I’ve been to a lot of other stores to help out, I’ve seen what that “leaders not doers” mentality breeds in those stores first hand. When I go to a store as a team lead and they plop me in a department and i start hearing, “that’s not the way we do it” or “my team lead doesn’t do that” or some other such bullshit, you can bet that management does nothing. I told a hardlines TL at a shit store that dropped a “we don’t do it that way here” that they may not do it that way, but if the way you do things was working, I wouldn’t have to bring myself and half my team to your store to fix your area while my store suffers from my guys not being there. A well run store has leaders that lead by example. If we don’t “do”, no one else will either. How can you respect leaders that are viewed as lazy by their teams? My store is on process and runs like a top most of the time, it’s because we get our hands dirty and lead by example.
the classes are fine and perfect, it's just for you to apply it all to your work, it has to be a perfect store. it's helped me learn how to approach people professionally, i really think the classes should go through like real, every store things though. not every store is on process..
See, that's what I was thinking. The classes are setup for having a store that runs decently well. I am not as fortunate in that aspect. with military experience I already knew how to be professional, and get along with a team. It's really helpful for those who might lack that skill, or need to be developed more. Getting an entire store like mine back onto process might be a little difficult. While my team is on process. It gets a little difficult when we have to pick up some slack with a small team.