Archived Current ETL--AMA

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BobtheETL

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Sep 21, 2014
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Hi there,

Long time lurker, first time poster. I'd like to answer any questions any of you might have for an ETL currently in position. Interested in sharing as long as there is interest.
 
Greetings and salutations.

Welcome to The Break Room.
 
You say a couple of assignments so I will assume you have been with the company 3-5 years. Do you feel the quality of ETLs has dropped recently?
 
Two-fold answer here.

On the recruiting side I've been pleased. At least in my area I've seen Target moving away from the fresh-out-of-college, random liberal arts major hires and grabbing some experienced candidates. Some even retailers by trade.

Though I do feel that the quality of ETLs is dropping. Like any other position in the store, we are asked to do more with less. Many great ETLs are being pushed out as their skillsets fall behind with the enhanced roles. Or as they just fall behind with the increased responsibility. Some are just tired of the pressure. I think it's a tough spot we're in.
 
Welcome, thanks for your offer of input. I'm sure I'll come across some questions I'd like answered..
 
Sure. I found thebreakroom.org very early on. Even prior to my first interview as I was digging into the company for interview prep. I've used this site as a tool- staying ahead of many things thanks to the incredibly knowledgeable and friendly TMs posting here.

Would love to return some of that!
 
I am a newly hired ETL that is set to start Business College in early October. I don't know my position yet. Do you have any info or tips about the six weeks?
 
I actually have two questions, if you are uncomfortable answering them that's okay!

Back story: I had an ETL once disappear from the store for 'personal reasons'. Some said it was because his long time boyfriend dumped him, others said that it was because he was intentionally cutting the hours to the bare minimum to get a big bonus.

Question: Do ETL's get bonuses based on how many hours they can cut? Can you be put on leave if you are found to be cutting too viciously?

Second question: Does spot tell you how many O, EX, E, reviews you can give out? Can you give any specifics 75%-E 0.0000000001% - O (Ha ha)

Thanks for your insight!
 
GoldenGopher said:
I actually have two questions, if you are uncomfortable answering them that's okay!

Back story: I had an ETL once disappear from the store for 'personal reasons'. Some said it was because his long time boyfriend dumped him, others said that it was because he was intentionally cutting the hours to the bare minimum to get a big bonus.

Question: Do ETL's get bonuses based on how many hours they can cut? Can you be put on leave if you are found to be cutting too viciously?

Second question: Does spot tell you how many O, EX, E, reviews you can give out? Can you give any specifics 75%-E 0.0000000001% - O (Ha ha)

Thanks for your insight!
Click to expand...
I can answer those for you it's yes and yes. But with a footnote that allows ETL's and STL's to wiggle out of it. there is a budget for every thing you make your budget you get a bigger bonus, if you only have x amount for raises then you can only give out a certain amount of each grade. in the end the TM gets the shaft while the STL's get Taylor Swift and Coldplay.

- Edit -
autocorrect does love to make TM into ™
 
Last edited:
GoldenGopher said:
I actually have two questions, if you are uncomfortable answering them that's okay!

Back story: I had an ETL once disappear from the store for 'personal reasons'. Some said it was because his long time boyfriend dumped him, others said that it was because he was intentionally cutting the hours to the bare minimum to get a big bonus.

Question: Do ETL's get bonuses based on how many hours they can cut? Can you be put on leave if you are found to be cutting too viciously?

Second question: Does spot tell you how many O, EX, E, reviews you can give out? Can you give any specifics 75%-E 0.0000000001% - O (Ha ha)

Thanks for your insight!
Click to expand...

There's probably a decent reason why that ETL didn't return, but the hours story is bogus. There really isn't an incentive to cut payroll for the sake of cutting. There is an incentive to make payroll goals, which can sometime mean cutting back. This may be due to overspending earlier in a time period- usually that month. It could also be due to negative flex implications. My goal is to grow comp sales by 2%, sell REDcards, have great Guest Surveys, and have a team that gets along. No incentive to cut payroll, other than to stay within limits that are determined by the company. In many cases, you'll have ETLs meeting behind closed doors trying to spend more payroll, or determining what allocation will provide the best bang for the buck.

I don't have a whole lot of input on TM reviews, other than providing a bit of oversight to the process. Making sure review scores match performance conversations and the like. I've never been told that there is a limit at the TM level for each rank. At the TL level, there may be more restrictions, as those typically come with much STL oversight and guidance. No hard and fast rule in either scenario to my knowledge though.
 
I cornered my new etl-log, at least he's new at this store, and asked him about the scheduled hours versus the sales floor adjacency.

His answer: we never get (I assume he meant hours allocated from corporate) enough hours to set everything. We just have to make it work.

My question: why compute and send the adjacency if the hours are bogus? Doesn't it just set us up to fail?
 
The process team hours match up decently. It's your STL's job to know the team, and allocate more to teams when they need it. It's our job to set everything faster than the company's expectation and every now and again there will be a serious blunder on the time allocated for a set. Power through it. One thing you can't build into any forecast is your store specific status at the time that workload is taking place.

Is the BR current?
Do you have 3 callouts?
Are you prepping for a random visit and cleaning basedecks?

All variables that can't be considered.
 
Thanks BobtheETL. I appreciate your strange insights. The problem we are having, in my opinion, is that 1) we do not schedule enough hours to complete sets correctly in the first place and 2) any call offs are not replaced, furthering the problem.

We recently had two call offs, a total of 16 hours. Those hours were not replaced. It was not a shock that we were scrambling on Saturday to finish. And, we didn't.

All I heard that week was ... You guys are behind. We have to make it happen. I don't mind working hard, and I can easily set faster than the adjacency calls for. But we are constantly behind. It is very frustrating. And now, our pog team seems to be getting a bad reputation as always being behind.

Eh, sorry for the venting.
 
POG team is the hardest to catch up once behind, that's certainly not telling you anything new. It's also one of the most dependent on other workcenters to execute their job well.

Ironically, there are usually more ETLs in a store than POG TMs, and in my experience, there are only two or three cross-trained POG backups. These backups are usual tied to another process team and unavailable for support.
 
GoldenGopher said:
I actually have two questions, if you are uncomfortable answering them that's okay!

Back story: I had an ETL once disappear from the store for 'personal reasons'. Some said it was because his long time boyfriend dumped him, others said that it was because he was intentionally cutting the hours to the bare minimum to get a big bonus.

Question: Do ETL's get bonuses based on how many hours they can cut? Can you be put on leave if you are found to be cutting too viciously?

Second question: Does spot tell you how many O, EX, E, reviews you can give out? Can you give any specifics 75%-E 0.0000000001% - O (Ha ha)

Thanks for your insight!
Click to expand...

From my experience, we didn't receive bonuses based on cutting payroll. We worked with the payroll we had and did our best to maximize it. However, the STL gets a nice bonus for being a Golden Contributor.

We had an ETL meeting where the amount of Os, EX, Es alloted was discussed, mainly at ETL and TL level. Our STL said there could only be 1 of each at ETL (O or EX). Whether that was a local thing or corporate I do not recall.
 
I have two questions

Question #1: Do you see this template (AE2014) actually sticking? I am a PA in Market, yet I know (Most of the TL's and Sr. TL's in my store trust and talk to me almost as if I am a TL) every single TL in my store is grinding their teeth every day so they don't pull their hair out... Being in Market I am beyond used to having absolutely no help but my own damn hands and if my day ISN'T stressful I actually have no idea what to do.

Question #2: I was told I was looking at to be benched 1st by January, then by December, then I got huge recognition from our group visit and it was bumped to by October... While it almost October I have yet to really hear anything about it since I was told "by October" and that was about a month and a half ago... I kind of knew it was more likely a Carrot-on-a-Stick, as they did it to the PA who trained me, and actually quit about 4-5 months before I was I would be looked at to be benched.

My question is, what should I do I guess, haha. I have a BA and could actually apply for ETL in training if I cared too as well.
 
As far as reviews are concerned, as a former ETL-HR, I can tell you that while there is not a specific number of each rating you can give out, each store and district does have a merit budget they must meet. What this generally means at most stores is that once the HR keys the initial scores the TLs and ETLs want to give, the store is over budget. So then they adjust down scores to make budget.
 
Strangely at our store it seemed the yearly raises didn't meet the letter grades you got very well either. ie. Not everyone who was a "E" got the same raise. I actually think my "E" might have been a bigger raise than I have heard of people getting for "EX" or "O". Are the letters more likely determined by conversion scores whereas the actual $ amounts have more wiggle room to be affected by other factors?
 
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