MEGATHREAD Hang Me (The Softlines Thread)

[mrknownothing]

For some reason, Softlines has two TLs at my store. Every other department, including all of hardlines, has only one TL. Not sure what that's about.

Lol my store has 3 softlines TLs. Hardlines has two (not counting consumables) and they're both SrTLs.

 

[Whenindoubtflexitout]

PTM Smart Huddles are the only way to make it happen. Leaving it up to team members/TLs on an individual basis has never worked in my experience. When I was an ETL LOG I had a schedule. The backroom closer would pull dcode for different departments (2 nights ahead of when that department was on the price change schedule). We then did leadership team smart huddles every day at 8 AM to work it out. Our all store huddle was at 9 AM, and we were expected to have it all worked by then. It was painful when we first started doing it, but after we'd been in the routine awhile, we had it down to 15 minutes. This also meant I had almost zero clearance come out of the backroom. My STL was really passionate about reducing A MDs, so he really supported me and helped keep the team on routine.

 

[Quattro]

Anyone know why non-softlines TMs (non-salesfloor altogether for that matter) would be scheduled for softlines shifts? There are a few of us. I suspect it's because they'll have another project for us to do, and softlines had the hours to spare. If not, softlines at our store could get very messy over the next couple weeks.

 

[Hardlinesmaster]

Anyone know why non-softlines TMs (non-salesfloor altogether for that matter) would be scheduled for softlines shifts? There are a few of us. I suspect it's because they'll have another project for us to do, and softlines had the hours to spare. If not, softlines at our store could get very messy over the next couple weeks.

They have been doing it at my store, to make them global....

 

[Quattro]

Boy oh boy. I guess there's some give/take there. A few hardlines TMs are being taught how to pull their own items, and even how to make bales. I guess it's our turn to venture out of our comfort zone.

I STILL DON'T LIKE IT!

 

[sher]

They're doing this in my store too. They're giving all the softlines people consumables and cashier shifts.

 

[RightArm]

In my store we've pretty much learned that where our hours are scheduled does not necessarily mean where we will be working. We've been scheduled for "fitting room" and "consummables" and even "training hours" and still end up doing our regular softlines salesfloor routines.

 

[sher]

My store, if softlines is scheduled anywhere else, that's where they are. On the rare occasion someone who isn't softlines is scheduled with us, they're not working sl lol. The only time a sl tm scheduled in hl or consumables works sl is if we have call outs... Or that one time when mytime didn't put anyone on the floor in sl until 1pm.

So obviously for Valentine's Day, jewelry and lingerie is having a big sale and being shopped hard. The specialist for those areas hasn't been in sl all week. I've been pushing jewelry during my fr shifts lol. The bras and such are a mess because no one has the time.

 

[Bosch]

PTM Smart Huddles are the only way to make it happen. Leaving it up to team members/TLs on an individual basis has never worked in my experience. When I was an ETL LOG I had a schedule. The backroom closer would pull dcode for different departments (2 nights ahead of when that department was on the price change schedule). We then did leadership team smart huddles every day at 8 AM to work it out. Our all store huddle was at 9 AM, and we were expected to have it all worked by then. It was painful when we first started doing it, but after we'd been in the routine awhile, we had it down to 15 minutes. This also meant I had almost zero clearance come out of the backroom. My STL was really passionate about reducing A MDs, so he really supported me and helped keep the team on routine.

Or you give your In-Stocks team hours and they bust it out and make it look good. Smart huddles always look like crap cause no one wants to do it. See my stores seasonal set up.

But they took the PTM away from us again and guess what happened? It comes out as clearance!

 

[RightArm]

Has anyone noticed that one of the sales planners for a front endcap in shoes is ... non-existant? I actually looked this up because ours is empty and with the product from the DC still at an all time low it's not like we have a lot of product to flex to the SPL they forgot. First time I've ever seen this happen on a front endcap.

 

[RightArm]

Has anyone noticed that one of the sales planners for a front endcap in shoes is ... non-existant? I actually looked this up because ours is empty and with the product from the DC still at an all time low it's not like we have a lot of product to flex to the SPL they forgot. First time I've ever seen this happen on a front endcap.

Never mind. I apparently missed it because it was tied to some weird location.

 

[RightArm]

So, how's it looking in your softlines world? I feel like we are stuck in a neverending Christmas with short staff and even shorter hours and piles and piles of reshop and go backs. There really needs to be a bottom line. I wish all STLs would stand up to their DTL and tell them that they have to have "X" amount of payroll (whatever it takes to run their store properly) and can't go under that. I feel like we are diving head first into "it cannot be done" land. -_-

 

[SFSFun]

The entire softlines flow team called off on Friday. The flow TL shrugged it off and said they'll just have twice as much to do today...

 

[Bullselle]

So, how's it looking in your softlines world? I feel like we are stuck in a neverending Christmas with short staff and even shorter hours and piles and piles of reshop and go backs. There really needs to be a bottom line. I wish all STLs would stand up to their DTL and tell them that they have to have "X" amount of payroll (whatever it takes to run their store properly) and can't go under that. I feel like we are diving head first into "it cannot be done" land. -_-

We're down to one closer when we used to have four. For most of my shift, I can't even focus on zoning because I'm the only softlines worker on the floor. So that means guests are approaching me from opposite sides of the store asking for help. In the morning, I'm doing pulls that backroom didn't get to because there aren't enough hours. I'm also constantly going up for backup. If I'm the closer or the 9pm "closer", I'm not even making reshop a priority.

My message to the DTL: "There are 20 freaking lanes at Target. Why do you think that is??? Scheduling cashiers to only fill a quarter of those lanes is just ridiculous. If you want to cut corners everywhere else, at least bring on TMs whose main job it is to cashier. That way, if it's slow, they can help pick up the slack on the sales floor. And when you call for back up, the cashiers can go up instead of the TMs who are responsible for getting their area finished before the end of the night."

 

[jenna]

We're down to one closer when we used to have four. For most of my shift, I can't even focus on zoning because I'm the only softlines worker on the floor. So that means guests are approaching me from opposite sides of the store asking for help. In the morning, I'm doing pulls that backroom didn't get to because there aren't enough hours. I'm also constantly going up for backup. If I'm the closer or the 9pm "closer", I'm not even making reshop a priority.

My message to the DTL: "There are 20 freaking lanes at Target. Why do you think that is??? Scheduling cashiers to only fill a quarter of those lanes is just ridiculous. If you want to cut corners everywhere else, at least bring on TMs whose main job it is to cashier. That way, if it's slow, they can help pick up the slack on the sales floor. And when you call for back up, the cashiers can go up instead of the TMs who are responsible for getting their area finished before the end of the night."

Oh what a wonderful world.

But not likely.

 

[Bullselle]

Oh what a wonderful world.

But not likely.

What about it is unlikely? That we'll get more cashiers or that the cashiers will know how to work on the sales floor?

 

[jenna]

Honestly, both. Though my initial response was to the thought of cashiers helping on the sales floor.

Sometimes they do reshop, but most of the time they stay up front at the lanes.

 

[Bullselle]

Honestly, both. Though my initial response was to the thought of cashiers helping on the sales floor.

Sometimes they do reshop, but most of the time they stay up front at the lanes.

I know, but I'm proposing a different business model where there'd be more cashiers than we normally have. If it was a part of their job to help out on the sales floor when there's no line, then we'd actually finish reshop.

Although I know this is unlikely to happen because it would involve too much payroll.

 

[RightArm]

This is the first year for us where we can't seem to get out of "Christmas" mode.... you know where you have ten carts of reshop sitting around waiting to be folded and hung so they CAN be put away. >< In all my years prior it was always manageable around this time. But you can't close with so few zoners that you require those who would normally do go backs to fix the zone. Mostly we could use a healthy dose of consistency so we could get some sort of rhythm. And the TLs struggle to get their workload done because sometimes they're all alone on the salesfloor on our side. I like the way you think Bullselle. Our cashiers only do hardlines reshop when it slows down. The only thing they do for us is answer the phones if we need it during breaks. And then of course we are back up for them. I don't know about your store but in ours it seems the group with the highest rate of call offs is the front lanes. So it's silly to give them so few hours to spend on cashiers just to have the ones they schedule call off. -_-

 

[jenna]

For the record, I am not saying it's a bad idea. I just think it would take a massive change in the corporate culture within our store to get cashiers to help the sales floor in a meaningful way with any regularity.

I see them standing around chatting and the lanes aren't even stocked. If they can't run the front end efficiently (keep things stocked, zoned, FIFO'd and full) I doubt the cashiers at my store can "help" the sales floor.

Shoot, half the time (most of the time, actually) the candy order isn't finished, and lanes don't have pens, bags or other supplies.

 

[RightArm]

So our leadership decided to get proactive on the problems we're having on the sales floor. They are establishing "routines" to be followed that will be consistent and the new schedule coming out will schedule people according to those routines. I'm actually looking forward to this. It's nice to have a "game plan" again. In fact, in the little huddle we had in the conference room you could actually see that the other TMs were excited about these ideas going forward. They started the new routines the night before last and let me tell you I could already feel the difference last night and that was just in one day. Now, once we get the FR caught up from looking like "Christmas" we have a hope of it staying that way.

 

[BullseyeBabe]

Wow! That sounds like a step in the right direction. Please tell us more about your routines if you can. We need something like that at my store.

 

[calimero]

Our softline looks fine unless one certain tm is at the Fitting room! She doesn't do any of the reshop , she texts and talk to guests , but forgets to work
We have a tight softline team ! We help each other !
Truck was 2400 and 245 repacks , 2 flow tm ( we are beyond exhausted ) , flow is roughly 8 tms short !
The FRO , and the softline tm both helped us , FRO took care of men basics and folded , and the z rack !
Sofline tm also took care of 3 z racks and shoes !
An another tm arrived at noon and helped in kids area !
I am also a softline tm on non truck day ( or adjacency) and try hard not to leave any reshop ! And help the softline research ! I zone and scan!
We are all in together ! Our tl is fantastic in SL ! So we work hard !
For example , a few weeks ago , a pog was tied but not set ,( no product ) we finally got the product today , I will set it tomorrow ( even if I was not the one who tied it ) ....

 

[Ashfromoldsite]

So our leadership decided to get proactive on the problems we're having on the sales floor. They are establishing "routines" to be followed that will be consistent and the new schedule coming out will schedule people according to those routines. I'm actually looking forward to this. It's nice to have a "game plan" again. In fact, in the little huddle we had in the conference room you could actually see that the other TMs were excited about these ideas going forward. They started the new routines the night before last and let me tell you I could already feel the difference last night and that was just in one day. Now, once we get the FR caught up from looking like "Christmas" we have a hope of it staying that way.

It won't work. As soon as a cashier calls in, a tm will be pulled from their routine and put on a lane.

 

[RightArm]

It won't work. As soon as a cashier calls in, a tm will be pulled from their routine and put on a lane.

We struggle with "backup" cashiering all the time. It's almost part of the routine. But we're never pulled off to become a cashier for the rest of our shift. The real struggle is the continuous hack in hours from corporate. If those idiots up top would stop chopping us off at the knees we might actually be able to make this work but yeh, it really is a struggle.