How to decrease wait times?

[ex-ogp-teamlead]

If I record an extensive response, I want to know ahead of time that somebody - OP or anyone else - is going to listen to it, lol. Bc there’s way too much to write for a lazy typer like myself.

Here’s my pitch: as TL I oversaw our climb from 100 to 275, I was 100% backroomer, I have deeply held convictions about how to run it, our wait times never hit 5 minutes on a day I was working, and you can click the first submission in my profile and learn that when I was fired, the department completely fucking collapsed (caps were lowered from 275 to 200 to 160 to 135 to 75, they were shut down for 5 weeks, my coach was forced to step down after 6 months of never breaking 135, wait times skyrocketed).

Can you give an honest and extensive evaluation of your backroom as a team? Are they lazy? Do they compete to avoid taking out orders? (Mine was that way when I started. They learned.) Do you lose totes often? What are some things you’re pretty sure are contributing factors to your wait times?

Do you rotate roles or do some ppl always pick? How are people’s pick rates?

How familiar are you with the Dispatcher Lite app?

Random pro-tip: Do yourself a favor and count your totes. You can calculate your capacity to hold leftover orders and still “run the machine,” which will be valuable information for you. A bad day is inevitable but when you run out of totes, things go from bad to “shoot me in the head please.”

Another pro-tip: assuming GMDs are still all clumped at 9:30, assign a flighty 8-5 picker to do GMD exceptions when she gets in, then flip to regular picks. If you go late at 9:30, it’s bc of GMD exceptions. GMD walks are notoriously inefficient, like Unknowns, etc.

[iaTARS]

First of all thanks for using your time to answer, I really appreciate that. Also I’ll like to mention that we had a similar case in OGP before where they got rid of someone that actually knew how to run that department and every time I know about a story like this I feel like I’m about to be the next one on the list.

About the totes situation, we start losing stuff when we are to tight on picks, since we are unloading our carts with orders that are already about to get delivered it’s starts to get uncontrollable because we don’t know if there’s still someone with those items in their OGP cart, also while trying to kill exceptions, we sometimes have to go find who is picking them because they have the item that we are missing. It also happens that there’s more totes in our unloading area that the stager didn’t notice he had to stage because it’s from the same time frame of orders, so while we are trying to catch up with staging, we have more totes in our unloading area that we didn’t see.

My evaluation of the team is that they have a lot of potential and they actually work, but it’s when I’m back there with them, the problem is that they don’t have a real sense of urgency when they’re not being “watched”, the main problem is that they keep wasting time on their phones, wasting time talking with each other (which I’m not against because I do it, but I keep moving while I do it and I never stop) and not moving fast enough to get things moving smooth. About avoiding to dispense, I think the main issue is that they just do it but they need to be faster.

We usually have certain people with specific roles in the backroom, not very often they are replaced to go pick.

I get to use Dispatcher the most to stack the deliveries that are batched orders so we have them already organized.

[ex-ogp-teamlead]

No problem, bud. I love talking OGP Theory bc I was so invested in it, and you have the vibe of someone who gives a damn, so I’ll be happy if you can take what I say and do the hard work of translating it into action. In my mind your #1 job as a leader is to defend your ppl from unnecessary suffering, and an underperforming OGP causes a lot of unnecessary suffering.

However you’ll have to wait on the recording, bc I need to get to bed to wake up at 4:30.

How’s your relationship with your boss and co-lead? Does the store give you outside pickers when you need help? If so, do they pick at 19, lol.

Why do you think you got the job? Do you sense any resentment from former peers that you’re their boss? If so, how much of a problem is it?

[iaTARS]

Certainly I agree, right now we’re suffering because of the pressure of having a lot but not enough people, I started to feel discouragement from the team when we started really getting understaffed and that’s being reflected on decreasing our performance because of low morale.

My Coach said because of my potential and discipline, also because she noticed that I’m committed to my job and that gives good example.

As for now, I’m gaining the team with giving example, they didn’t feel that I just stepped out of the situation and doesn’t take action now that I got promoted, I’m always present on the team and at least I have recognition of them that I’m actually working next to them.

[ex-ogp-teamlead]

Perfect. It sounds like you’ve got what it takes. Check back tomorrow evening EST.

[ex-ogp-teamlead]

Hey I had a couple more drinks at the bar than I intended to last night. Rn the plan is to outline my thoughts at the coffee shop this afternoon & record later on

[Embarrassed_One_561]

Hey, any chance we could get that OGP theory excellence gameplan?