Pros
It gave me a new part of retail management to explore and opened doors for possible new career opportunities with other optical companies should I choose to leave. The harshness of the lack of training as a new general manager has actually forced to teach me everything about optics whether I wanted to know or not!
Cons
To be successful in this industry, your IQ needs to be over a certain number. Knowing that, upper management still treats you like you are riding the short bus to school. They way they speak to you and treat you is demeaning and I have to be forced to put on a brave face for my staff so that I can spare them the pressure and headaches I am receiving. They have cut out middle management on a store level which forces me to work more without getting compensated, spent so much money rolling out a training last year that they did away with this year but they treat me like garbage if I order too many supplies, hire inadequate RDO's that could care less about optics and quality, hire a VP that came from a major company that went bankrupt... the list goes on. Decisions on a corporate are inconsistent. Whoever is in a room making these decisions for us as a company must have Attention Deficit Disorder or suffer from halucinations.