SExpand

Union-busting retail giant Target is having a tough time: its CEO just resigned, its stock is down, and it faces an existential threat from Amazon. We now bring you one current Target headquarters employee’s thoughts on what’s wrong with Target.

We received the following email from a current mid-level employee at Target’s headquarters in Minnesota. This represents just one person’s experience inside the center of the Target bulls-eye. But it does contain some fascinating insights into their workplace culture. We’ve bolded a few parts that stood out to us. Enjoy.

I started at Target almost 2 years ago, in Sept  2012. Prior to Target, I worked in a technical field and I was job  hunting. I had a lot of friends who worked at Target – in the Twin  Cities you can’t help but know people that work at Target in some  capacity. They seemed to enjoy it so when I got a call from them, I  jumped at the opportunity to work for them. I went through 3 weeks of  interviewing, and then I got an offer. The money was an increase but  their vacation time sucked – only 2 weeks! Most big companies give 3  weeks even at the lowest levels…

After  your onboarding experience you’re expected to still network and have  [30-minute “Getting to Know You” meetings] with new people, either those who join your teams, or that you  meet through networking through the company. And then once you have a  GTKY, you’re expected to continue to have 30 min meetings with various  people to catch up and share what you’ve been working on. You’re also  supposed to have these status meetings with the people on your team,  your manager, your manager’s manager, your mentor, etc.

Since  you’re having all these status meetings, you’re probably wondering when  you should be working. Well you don’t have to worry about that because  you don’t really need to. Target purposely staffs assuming that everyone  is working at 50% productivity. In essence they have 2 people doing a  job that 1 person could do at another company, because the rest of the  time you’re in status meetings or volunteer events or FFF events (that’s  Fast Fun & Friendly, basically an excuse to not be working). You’re  penalized and viewed as unfriendly and not a team player if you spend  too much time in your cube working and not enough time socializing.  There have been times when I’ve taken my laptop and worked from  Starbucks because I need to be out of my cube but I also need to get  work done. Target also doesn’t reward the people who are productive and  good at their jobs. The way to move up at Target HQ is to be popular. At  other companies you need to at least be popular AND produce good work,  but at Target you can be popular and do shitty work or no work and get  promoted. The people who keep their heads down and do the work, they get  ignored and passed over until they get fed up and then quit. Doing good  work won’t get you a good raise though, because Target HQ is known for  giving shitty raises. You can get an excellent score on your performance  review and be rewarded with a 2% raise, and they expect you to be super  happy and thankful for it. If you want to make $ at Target, you have to  leave and come back, but you won’t make it on raises…

The Target culture is very Minnesota – it’s very  passive aggressive. They expect you to conform to them, to be  “Targetized” and drink the Koolaid. If you aren’t super bubbly, super  social and passive aggressive, you get told that you’re a problem. Being  direct, wanting to actually get your work done, asking questions and  pushing back are all viewed as bad things and you’ll be told to tone it  down or you’ll be pushed out. They also do a really bad job supporting  their new hires who moved to the Twin Cities to work at Target. A lot of  people quit after a year and move back to wherever they were before  because they hate it and they don’t have a network of people to support  them.

Target HQ is  in bad shape and in desperate need of help, direction and vision,  starting from the top down. [Former CEO] Greg Steinhafel getting fired was a good  step, along with the CIO being fired a few months ago, but it’s not  enough. The entire executive team with the exception of the CMO Jeff  Jones needs to go. Why? Because everyone was homegrown and “Targetized”  and has no concept of how to run a 21st century business. They still  think it’s 1996 and you can keep throwing up Target stores and suburban moms will love them. They pay lip service to how retail is evolving but  it when it comes to actually making good decisions, they do horribly.  When I started, they were so excited about getting “Buy online, pick up  in store” as if that was some new invention. How many other stores have  that and do it better than Target? Regular customers don’t even know  about it, because people hate Target’s website. They’ve tried starting a  Netflix like service, or a subscription service, but no one knows about  them and they are just copycats of what other businesses are doing.  Target has no original ideas, they are just reacting to what other  companies are doing and jumping the bandwagon. They have a culture that  makes decision via consensus, so it takes FOREVER to make a decision and  implement even the smallest change. That keeps them from being able to  make the necessary changes, and they won’t ever get there without a big  change in leadership and a true vision beyond “keep the doors open”.

Overwhelmingly  the area that has the most issues is Target Canada. From the very  beginning it was a bad decision, but the company had already made  contractual obligations and couldn’t get out of them. So they carried  forth with a really bad plan and had people in charge who don’t know  what they are doing, making bad decisions. Very simple, elementary  things in retail/supply chain are being messed up which is why the  Canada opening has gone so bad. To make it worse, they are repeating all  the things they did wrong in 2013 – absolutely nothing is getting  better. A few execs came back to Target US from Canada and were given  promotions, after a complete failure in Canada. And this is who they  have in charge.

If  Target doesn’t make a serious change in their leadership and culture,  it will end up being a Kmart, a Sears, or even worse a Circuit City. The  Twin Cities would be devastated – around 15,000 people work for Target  HQ at one of their numerous sites in the Twin Cities. The local economy  would be hit super hard. Sadly I don’t see Target getting better, and  I’m actively looking for employment elsewhere. As soon as I get a job  offer I feel is a good fit, I’m jumping ship. I’m not the only one,  since last November, I get at least 5 “So and So has resigned to pursue  other opportunities” emails, and that’s just in my pyramid (a pyramid is  like a big dept, like Finance, or HR, or Merchandising).  When I  started getting those emails and it included people like Senior VPs who  were quitting, I knew it was time to go. There have also been a few  rounds of layoffs, though mainly TTS (Target’s IT group) and Property  Development. I actually really hoped that my area would be laid off but  instead we’re staffing up

I think I’ve rambled enough – even if you don’t publish this, it was therapeutic to write it all down.

It is safe to say that this is not the level of morale that America’s third-largest retailer is looking for in its own headquarters.

Sourced from Gawker.com