Verizon needs to completely rework how they view and train middle management. In the stores I’ve been involved in there is a complete misunderstanding by our highly overpaid store leaders as to how to lead and how to be a productive member of a team. With a recent GM change it only got worse. There was more of an effort in putting in place “perks” to being managers such as rarely closing, enforcing an attitude of SMs shouldn’t be helping customers, and a culture of the managers showing up 5 minutes after their shifts on the dot and sprinting out of the door the second their self given opening shifts are over with regardless of people waiting or if their opening rep counterpart is stuck in a transaction with no end in sight then there was at instilling practices such as enhancing transactions, taking over unnecessary trouble shoots/ escalations, or falling on the sword and allowing reps to leave instead of the overpaid professional texter called Verizon managers. It would be one thing if their lack of customer interaction was used to amplify other transactions but sadly it’s used to call/text or homework. I consistently observe my managers check people in and then go back to playing on their phones with customers standing around fuming only for me to find out that the person that’s been standing next in line for 30 minutes just needed a quote. I know my local leadership will read this and I know nothing will change. The change starts from the top and the top of our structure is the equivalent of grabbing a random person walking by and asking them to check people in. I’ll say this one more time for Verizon DMs and below…your job isn’t to do OMM and relay messages from above you because anybody with 3 brain cells can do that….your jobs are to provide actual leadership and to contribute to the team on the floor because in the end we wouldn’t be a company without customers. Like previous posters have stated, this company is plagued by the good ol boy system and it starts and ends with our DM who has somehow managed to retain an iron grip on the same district for a decade with a consistent track record of hiring bag stuffers as managers, not hiring qualified reps solely based off the fact that they work in the store they’re applying for, being one of the worst districts in numbers, and constantly berating the very few SMs that slip through the cracks and show up to work everyday to lead and do whatever needs to be done to make everyone’s life easier. I’m not completely sure if it’s just our DM that’s incompetent at hiring managers or a company wide problem but it’s embarrassing that a company this big can allow such a terrible group of people to permeate our stores with their complete lack of leadership. Spend a few less dollars on social justice and reallocate those to leadership training and some kind of accountability system for them.
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Hey NY / NJ, get promoted and stop whining. You don’t know anything past helping customers anyways.
East Texas hasn’t had leadership in years. We have a guy that thinks he knows everything and pretends to listen. Ours SMs and GMs sit in meetings that we never get anything out of. Three hours and what comes out? Nothing important. The biggest weakness is the lack of follow up on anything. It’s hilarious when we get told we’re going to do ‘this’ and we do “this” for two days then nothing, why ? No follow up, no action. Over and over. Our GM had to do an action plan like a grade school child because of his lack of skills, what will that accomplish? Nothing. Why? No follow up. They need to perform a business laxative in East Texas, get rid of all the cr-p they have built up.
So, noticed I got down voted and I’m assuming because I stated as an SM I was at times a glorified door greeter and when slow doing OMM and ordering… running the front of easily be helping 2/3 people at a time and trying to clear up as many folks as possible, directing them on either got to do ISPU, basic trouble shoot, billing Q’s, sales quotes for when I rep would become available… you name it. Plenty of times I set reps up with ‘Easy sell’ after doing the leg work… no breaks and constantly go go go and I’d make a customer check themselves if they were being ornery before I let them see a rep.
If you down voted because I stated to take advantage of the benefits, work hard for your own integrity and look elsewhere… it seems your work ethic is questionable… and if it’s in relation to pay. It’s not rocket science, any one could’ve deduced that pay would eventually get cut… but maybe I’m just more observant than your average person 🤔
If you can’t see that the changes are working you all out of a job then I feel sorry for you. Unless of course you plan to work for an indirect agent. Or maybe a pure clerk at a remaining express corporate location.
With this comp plan if a customer says no they don't want it why would a rep try to overcome the objection.
The more they pay reps the more money the make the company. Even the most liberal colleges in the country recognize that ideology!
As a recently left as SM, I feel for those of you with poor management. Times are stressful enough and poor management does not help the situation. I definitely was a glorified door greeter at times but I managed that like crazy to set proper expectations and wait times and took the brunt of angry customers so my reps could focus on the tiring job of taking guests back to back with three hour wait times… and when we were slow it was then trying to catch up on OMM and ordering that inevitably was always past due… coaching? GROW trainings? One on ones? Impossible to do. Literally did not do them once in the last four/five months I worked and luckily upper management didn’t come down on us for it because I literally would come back with, ‘how to you propose I get it done?’ And they couldn’t give me an answer lol
Look, Verizon has it’s perks, but ultimately it’s retail and both reps and managers were over paid a looooot for years. The market is saturated so the only way to increase profits is take aim at benefits and staffing 🤷🏼♀️ Take advantage of the perks, keep your options open. Ultimately if you don’t like where you work, work hard for your own integrity and find something else.
SM's are all worried there jobs will be cut. This is because they are paid more than a rep is and add a fifth of the value a rep does. There day is 10 percent as difficult as a rep is. Why did reps take a pay cut? Fire the managers and give the reps more pay. Any SM that wants to say well you don't know what this role is like if you haven't done it.. prove it instead of saying that then. What are we missing that you deal with that we don't see? Saying a manager is there for coaching is laughable at this point. Managers that add no value in the day should be monitored documented and fired and held accountable.
1qxb+1bBx3yds Where in the country do they call customers " guests " I'm in Ny/ NJ and have never heard the customers referred to as guests, Also, you said the Sm role is not there to help customers directly? That's the attitude thus the problem that the stores have and has been happening for years even before staffing shortages, it seems to be a " culture" in the stores. In our area we refer Sms as the " Do nothing Club" The position should be eliminated or given a new job description to help in Ris and sales! Hire and train door greeters on really how to control door traffic not part timers who do such a bad job the Sms are back up there a week after they are hired. This will free up Sms to help more " guests ".
Your response is typical of what most management in this company’s response is when anybody has a problem with them. It has nothing with being salty. Your mindset of what a leader in this company should be is a relic of old times where stores were properly staffed and selling was actually expected and desired. In the times of purposeful skeleton crews and team commission where us reps have codes for everything the only thing separating us from managers are gossip from GMs and getting to choose our own shifts. The new Verizon demands that everyone be the jack of all trades so they can hire less people which managers are quick to bring up in response to reps complaints about having added responsibility with pay cuts but quickly forget that logic when the line is 9 deep and the extent of being involved in transactions is checking people in and saying “a rep will be with you” and proceeding to sit around providing zero other things to the store. Our managers will spew your logic when they can tell we’re getting fed up with them and even go as far as blaming it on the DM for docking them for helping customers. If I’m a manager with half a brain then I’m grabbing a tablet and helping anyway possible to get those wait times down and the RIS scores up since RIS is the biggest factor of our checks. But alas, I guess the best way to make money is to avoid customers and walk around and double teams some customers and maybe add a screen protector or two to some transactions and maybe a Verizon credit card once a week. That totally embodies what a leader should be and justifies the bloated salaries.
The structure of the SM role lends itself to not helping guests directly. Essentially as an SM you need to be monitoring transactions so you can “coach” the rep based on that interaction. You can’t do that helping guests for reps all day.
The point of getting promoted to SM / GM is to not have to help customers. As a rep that’s your literal job. I get that you’re salty and you have good reason to be. But honestly if you haven’t been an SM you don’t know what’s expected of them. Your team is definitely taking advantage but that’s what is being allowed by your upper leadership, if they know about it. Usually the leaving early thing is kept in house and the DM might not know until they find out at a store visit.
Bottom line though, if you’re mad at being stuck with customers and looking for someone to bail you out of bs transactions, you might need a new job. I used to do that, take over troubleshooting so reps could move on to sales. In the end the reps still didn’t reciprocate with a better attitude or really appreciate what I was doing for them.
I’ve been posting for months that our SMS come and go as the please. One leaves at around 2 one day a week, the other comes and goes as they please. The irony is if you punch in 6 minutes late they take 1 hour of uia time from you while they’re obviously manipulating their time sheets. Because there is no way they have been making up their hours by coming in to make the time up. I’ve talked to other reps in our zone and the same thing happens at their locations.. Some SMS do it more subtly than others. Otherwise the 2 in our store are glorified greeters Lastly.we’ve had days when ones been on vacation the other has the day off the reps have ranthe store without mgmt!
There is a Cancer in Verizon.
Care leadership is also sorely lacking, poor change management, poor communication, and poor execution. The top 2 need to go.