Walmart – “The end from the inside”

Pros

With Walmart's size come a lot of flexibility. You can work your way to about anywhere in the country. Being the largest corporation in the world, there is little chance it will be going under any time soon, so there is stability in a tough economy.

Cons

The changes that have come to Walmart have made it no longer the company that Sam Walton built. The Open Door Policy is dead. No one above the Store Manager has any need for feedback or opinion. They are right and who are you to question them? The Senior Management's role is to travel around to store's, pick them apart, and threaten the Store Manager's job. They are all about reinventing the Company image, however they do not want to pay the tab to do this. The store is to be perfect at all times, however Store Management is give weekly the number of hours they can spend which is significantly lower the Walmart's own program calls for. The Company has gone to hiring only part time employees so they can cut hours down to nothing based on sales. It has also become completely inflexible with employee schedules due to the implementation of "Scorecards" which require mgmt to fill the shift in the system exactly, irregardless of availability of potential employees in the applicant pool. We are then coached on our performance on scorecards. Everything is dictated to the Store Management through what are known as "playbooks." These are to be executed without fail, however when sales or profit are not on plan, Store Management are berated for not planning for these. Lastly, bonuses are based on budgets set by the financial gurus at the Home Office and feedback from the Store Manager is not accepted regardless how wrong budgets are. Bonuses for Associates and Managers are then based on hitting these budgets.

Advice to Senior Management

Listen to your people. You have trained us on how to run your business and now you won't let us. Fix the budget system so Associates bonuses are based on realistic stretch goals. Don't allow your Regionals/Divisionals treat Store Management so poorly.