Monday, August 17, 2009

Out With the Old, In With the.... Well Out With The Old, Anyway

I can't believe how much time has passed since I have been able to post a blog. I have no excuses, only reason is that my life keeps getting in the way. I have found time to speak with many former associates. The one thing that they all have in common is their time served with the happy haven of retail. When I walk into a store that I am familiar with, I do not recognize one person in five that I see. Why is that? Because so many of the former employees had the misfortune to be employed by Mr. Sam's company for a period of time that made them expendable. That is to say, they were finally making a living wage, and that as you all should know by now, just isn't going to make the nation's biggest employer( outside of the US Government) any money. Can any one say Kmart? Walmart seems determined to cut costs at the employee level until the employee level is decimated. The people that I talk to now are all timed for everything. Timed for their freight, timed for the clean up, timed to death. And where is customer service in all of this? Sorry, no time for that. I feel like I should apologize when I have to interrupt an employee to help me find something. What a great way to run a business. If Walmart is so determined to run themselves into bankruptcy, I can only hope they manage to do it while the current administration is socializing everything else. Can you imagine how much less efficient Walmart can be if they have the Government meddling even more? I spoke with a long time associate about a week ago. He had been with the company for over 10 years and had retired from a factory job years before that. This gentleman is a hard worker, no question. He had been named the associate of the month and had received glowing evals for years. But he made one mistake in staying with the company that cares. He kept coming to work! Silly, silly man. But Walmart in their infinite wisdom found a solution to keeping an experienced hard worker around. They complained and nagged at him until he had enough. Good job. Mr. Sam would be so proud! So if you have worked at Walmart for more than five years, I hope you can update your resume. Trust me, you'll thank me later.