Nebraska Book Reviews

Pros

Working in college environment is enjoyable
Bonus program
Smaller worksites. You really get the opportunity to know your co workers.

Cons

Cuts. Cuts. Cuts. In pay. In support. In available part-time hours. In positions. In a store manager's freedom to run his/her store the best way he/she knows how. In the bonus program. In employee moral. In time spent with your family and friends because you will be at work all.the.time.

Advice to Senior Management

Test out programs on a handful of stores before throwing them at the entire company. Then, your support center won't be so overwhelmed with calls from frustrated managers who have questions that can't be answered because no one anticipated the issues.

You aren't Target. Or Best Buy. Or Amazon. Quit trying to market yourself as a single big box chain. Just because my college bookstore in, say, Lincoln was a NBC store does not mean that I'm going to look for other NBC stores when I'm in other cities to shop at. Each store sells books and apparel specific to its campus. Why would I want a Texas sweatshirt when I'm a Nebraska Alumni?? The brick and mortar marketing makes zero sense.

Respect your employees who are in the trenches every day. Long hours during the busy times are one thing, but the number of hours you are expected to be in the store during the slower times is insane. Respect their ideas and use the good ones. Managers with proven track records shouldn't be micromanaged the same way a newbie manager is. When you go through your next round of layoffs, you may want to consider an employee's performance and value to the company as a more important factor when deciding whether or not lay that person off than how much that person makes.

Pros

The people I work with in the store, flexible hours, understanding that many employees are college students.

Cons

Poor communication from Corporate to store management to hourly employees. Mostly the fault of Corporate, who have no connection to their stores and no idea of what decisions to make that would be best for the store. I don't think they realize that the individual stores are where their focus needs to be, and that includes understanding what products the customers are buying, to how satisfied their employees are. I've been working for this company for nearly two years and have never gotten a raise. Corporate has shown no sign at all that they care about their employees or their stores.

Advice to Senior Management

Store management, you are doing the best you can with what you have available to work with. Corporate, what are you doing?? Seriously, what are you spending your money on? Not the upkeep of your stores. Not the salaries and hourly wages of your employees. You are so out of touch with reality that we don't know anything you're doing until you do it and then you expect us to just know what it is you're trying to do without any notice.

Pros

Hours vary throughout the year, though extremely busy at semester/term start/end times. Benefits were nice, and did offer a bonus plan... Wrote my own annual review a number of times.

Cons

During those busy times you better not even think of having a life outside the store. That bonus plan didn't apply to any store that didn't serve a huge market already. Corporate loves to test their ideas live and then punish the stores for their own lack of planning. Upper level management changes often and not always from within, new regionals each year and none of them know even the basics on which they're supposedly rating others. Wrote my own annual review a number of times. No respect, no appreciation.

Advice to Senior Management

Appreciate the people making your money for you, y'know the employees? Seriously, none of you know what it's like to really run a store (even those few of you who did have forgotten). Oh, and one size certainly does not fit all.

Pros

Everyone at the individual store was nice.

The managers at my store are great.

Pretty flexible scheduling for the most part.

Everyone usually bonds over their hatred of corporate

Cons

HORRIBLE Upper Management

Nonexistent Job Security (Frequently have layoffs and massive hour cuts)

As others have said, Corporate tests out policies on a company wide basis, then completely changes their mind a month later.

They have a very "Cookie Cutter" approach to management, that doesn't work.

They expect to be able to layoff or cut hours of all non-managerial employees, and have managers run the store.

Changes ownership frequently, leading to inconsistencies.

No appreciation for longtime employees.(After working there for two years, in every non-managerial position at the store, was awarded a 5 cent raise... Which was later taken away when I left for my school's winter break)

They expect managers to work extremely long weeks during busy times for low pay.

Managerial training program gives you a "choice" of where to go ( As in if you don't like the first assignment, they will assign you a second and you must take it)

Advice to Senior Management

Management should give some power back to the stores. I can understand trying to keep some things consistent but not every store is the same. Also, stop punishing low level employees for corporate mistakes.

I have worked at my store for over 3 years. I still make minimum wage, have had my hours cut back repeatedly, and have been basically treated more like a disposable tool than an actual person. I am a number on their employee roster that they feel they pay too much, and would much rather put the money towards new signs, more branded stickers, or ugly t-shirts.

I still work at my store as a favor to the local managers, as they cant retain employees due to the poor treatment.

Upper management needs to learn that they cannot create a corporate culture by posting signs and making handouts, they need to treat their employees at least decently and the culture will come. Right now the "coprorate culture" is everyone against corporate.

Pros

On-Campus stores have better hours.
This place makes you look for a better job or go back to school so you can find a better job.

Cons

Every program is executed poorly. They cookie cut every school and wonder why sales decline. They care very little for the textbook department. When we had a "free textbook raffle" we were told to pick a freshman instead of making it fair for everyone. When you ask a question you are told to ask someone else. Overall, this place is a nightmare to work for. STAY AWAY!!

Advice to Senior Management

Before you roll out a program to the entire company test a few regions first so it doesn't become an execution problem/nightmare.

Pros

The individual book stores did a decent job of understanding that their employees are often students themselves. This allowed for much better tailoring of the schedule to meet individual needs.

Some management seemed to understand that while Corporate set policy, it was up to the individual locations to make the most of it and tailor their store and look to meet the needs of their specific campuses.

Cons

Too much corporate interference.

Too much micro-managing.

Employees below management level are almost never paid more than minimum, which makes it hard to pay the bills.

Employees below management level are almost never allowed to be full-time, which limits their access to benefits, and further decreases the amount they are paid.

Advice to Senior Management

Let the campus book stores make the decisions which will specifically target their own schools and keep their own customers happy. People don't care about the corporate brand, and when they walk into their local book store they want to see employees wearing their own school's colors and logos.

Pros

The people were nice to work with. The pay was OK.

Cons

Received very little training, and it is a college textbook store so I had to know a lot of in depth things very quickly. Could be very frustrating at times.

Because it is a textbook store, the periods of business very GREATLY. Some times you are overwhelmed with customers and sales. Others, you're left standing around with nothing to do.

Also be prepared for lots of "whiny" college kids who complain about buyback policies, and also be prepared for their equally whiny parents.

Advice to Senior Management

Better training. Mock register purchases, role playing, etc.

Pros

The down times are nice. Working in a college atmosphere keeps you young. If you work at a school with good sports teams, game days are fun. The industry is rapidly changing and NBC actually adapts pretty well. The Neebo.com site has potential to be a big player in the industry. The job is always challenging and keeps you busy. Bonus structure is nice if you are lucky enough to reach it.

Cons

You have to be able to handle a lot of stress. If you can't, this job is not for you. They tend to micro manage the heck out of everything. Little trivial things take up more of our time during the day than the important things. The Store Manger title should be changed to the Store Runner position because they managers don't manage anything anymore. Unless you are willing to relocate, there is little room for advancement.

Advice to Senior Management

The communication is horrendous. We often times don't find out our marketing plan until it either shows up at our door or the customer brings a coupon in. Nearly everything is dropped on the field at the last minute. Nobody knows what is going on out in the field. There are times when everyone from VP's to Regionals to Store Mangers to hourly employees worry about whether or not they will have a job the next day and it's just unnecessary. Treat your hourly employees a little better. They are more than just hours on a spread sheet.

All that said, this still isn't a bad company to work for. Communicating better would make a world of difference.

Pros

Decent bonuses. The store managers try to help each other when possible.

Cons

Nothing that this company comes up with works the first time out. You need to wait for at least the 3rd revision before you attempt the project. Be prepared to learn on your own.

Advice to Senior Management

Get your heads out of the clouds and your hands off of the spreadsheets. Dispose of the marketing department and let the store managers do what they were hired to do. I've never seen such a bunch of crap that doesn't work. You are losing customers because you are trying to cookie cutter all of the stores. That is not working. Each store has it's own type of clientelle. You have cut the labor in the stores so much that morale and motivation have left the building. Store personnel should not have to worry about their jobs continuously when they are busting their butts for you. Your RM's are a joke. They're too busy worrying about making brownie points with the big dogs to perform as they should. You have them so spread out that when someone really needs them, they are not even available to respond. Beware...the economy will shift.

Pros

You are somewhat left alone if you are doing your job.

Cons

Long hours. Some store managers work 14 days before getting a day off.
Not enough payroll through out the year. Hard to train employees to answer questions that take years of experience to answer.

Advice to Senior Management

Lesson to your people. Add the payroll back to the stores. Provide tools that actually work.