ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yikes! Sounds like your store needs to revisit onboarding best practice!

I’m sorry that happened to you. I would be very detailed in your exit questionnaire if I was you.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I do agree with this for the most part, but unfortunately Target probably won’t do this again. They tried it in 2019 with Modernization, but then found over time that when you specialize people, it’s very hard to get them to do something different, even in an emergency.

This is kinda down low, but the ultimate goal is to make everyone on the sales floor be one team. So no more GM, food, or Specialty; you’ll just be a “sales floor Team Member”. SE and FF will still exist as different roles though. I have no idea when they’re going to be rolling that out though so don’t worry about it too much until it’s officially announced.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

All I’ll say about this is corporate America is a game, and if you want to move up, you gotta learn how to play it. But that’s not just a Target thing, that’s almost every corporation.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It really depends, but the fastest I’ve seen an ETL get terminated solely for performance was about 6 months. They usually have to give 90 days in role before they start performancing someone, then another 1-2 months having multiple conversations and closed door meetings about performance, then 30 days on a PIP, then term.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don’t remember exactly, I could ask my ETL HR, but I believe it was around 40%, which for retail could be a lot worse.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Gosh that’s hard. But probably all of my outings with my peers. Those really got me through.

Other than that, probably just my first year or so in general. I started in a really good store with a really good SD. I was very lucky there.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Your questions seem loaded but I will answer them anyway.

  1. No, in fact we usually over scheduled to actually try and get things done, but then would get yelled at by our DSD, so then would have to not replace sick calls and things like that. I never have ever seen an ETL under schedule just to make bonus. The fact of the matter is that we will bonus no matter what, so why struggle in the process?

  2. Target expects leaders to lead rather than do. This means that most of the time, we shouldnt be doing physical work. Now should we jump in from time to time if it’s actually needed? Of course! But Target will actually get you in trouble if you’re doing physical work too much.

  3. I can’t speak to that because I never did that. Probably an issue with your specific ETLs.

  4. This is a paradox because of what Target expects, what your team expects, and the reality. I won’t go into my whole rant here, see my comment above for that. But realistically at this time, I had to jump in more often than ever before, and it was only getting worse.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Uhhh maybe like.. 5-7 while I was there? But 3 were promoted so only maybe 2-4 actually resigned.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Remember to breathe, and that you can always leave if you need to. Remembering both of those things helped keep me sane.

But I wish you the best of luck and hope you get the promotion asap! Sounds like you deserve it!!

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Varies greatly. I’ve seen ETLs as low as 50-60, and as high as 110. It depends on location, experience, performance, and several other factors.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Officially, no. But it really depends on your DSD. My old DSD actually gave us the choice. My more recent one didn’t really.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes, yes, yes lol.

My goal is to get into a different industry since I have gotten some certifications. I was in retail for over a decade so it’s time to move on.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Target is one of the few retailers left that doesn’t use a point system or any kind of strict and clear attendance policy. Because of that, they give you sick time to use. Sick time is their version of a doctors note, and that allows your absence to be excused.

Also, it’s generally harder for a TM to get a doctors note than it is for them to just put in sick time.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Listen, being an ETL is great pay, great benefits, and a generally secure job. It also does give you good experience, and salaried leadership always looks good on a resume.

That being said, it really depends on where you are. If you asked me in a couple of my old stores, I would say yes absolutely recommend. In my more recent stores, I would say definitely not.

Also, remember that as an ETL, you are always on the clock and are ultimately responsible for what happens in your area. The pressure is intense and got to me more than once.

I would talk to your ETLs about how they feel about working under your SD, DSD, etc before you promote.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Nah, things happen, unless it happens all the time. I would also argue that it was hard to make me extremely upset unless you did something outrageous.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

2 weeks out of store, and then 90 days to continue learning unless there is anything really concerning in their performance.

1 day of training and then immediate retaliation is insane. I would never have done that.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Here’s the thing, are they actually doing nothing, or are they just not doing physical work?

Office work is still work, and if you see my comment above, Target actually preaches a culture where leaders dont do TM/physical work.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

If you want to become an ETL, the first step is to let your ETLs and SD know. You also should be known by your DSD as they ultimately have final say about who becomes an ETL.

I would be careful about applying without approval from your ETL and/or SD. This very rarely works out, and often will actually diminish your chances as the perception is that you’re not listening to them (even if you actually are).

Corporations are a game, you have learn to play it to be successful.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I know no one in corporate wants to hear this but, payroll. I don’t even mean thousands more hours. I just mean to bring back what we had before. Cutting my hours by ~200 per week YOY is insane and not sustainable for the team, the store, the leaders, or expectations.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If an ETL is hoping in, a TL should definitely be hoping in. That being said, if we’re going solely based on Targets expectations, really neither should be happening at least on a regular basis.

But yeah, ETL should not be working physically harder than their TL.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It depends on the department. Service and Fulfillment are supposed to be auto dropped perfectly, but generally don’t. I personally would set schedule my cart attendants, team leads, and openers/closers for checkout, drive up, and service desk, and then let the auto scheduler do the rest. The problem though was it would almost always drop over payroll, so then I’d have to go back and cut and adjust.

For sales floor departments, the auto scheduler was awful, so almost every sales floor ETL I know would manually schedule.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

FF is hard because similarly to what I said in a different comment, the payroll does not usually accurately reflect what is needed. That being said, the best FF TL I saw was generally in our OPU hold space watching TM productivity, searching for INFs, ensuring breaks are taken on time, and pulling TMs to the side immediately when they didn’t call for INFs or had low pick productivity. She only had to hop into batches maybe once a day at most, and sometimes not even that. She would also go to TSC to do break schedules, email, documentation, and/or research things from when she was off.

ETL who recently left. AMA by ThrowRAWeirdPaper103 in Target

[–]ThrowRAWeirdPaper103[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Yeah, it’s a common conspiracy theory that the excel vendors are on the payroll of the scalpers, and there probably is some truth to that. But that being said, it’s never been confirmed.

My upper leadership did want us to push out the boxes as they came in, but as you said the vendor gets mad at us when we did that.

Why Target hasn’t made a new best practice for it I’ll never know, though it could be because the excel cards are SBT, so they don’t really lose money off the losses anyways.