A day in the life of a Walmart manager

https://www.wsj.com/business/retail/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-walmart-manager-who-makes-240-000-a-year-3248037f

by impish9208 • 2 years ago

146 249 2 years ago

Hart has seen that change firsthand. About 20 years ago, then 19 years old and a mother of two, she started part-time at the same Walmart she now runs. Her first job was cooking live lobsters pulled from a tank in the deli.

Was definitely expecting this to be a story about someone who graduated college and walked into management. I have respect for anyone who could rise though the ranks of retail.

She deserves every dime.

dewey3• 2 years ago

This reminds me of a very interesting interview I've listened to a while ago (It was posted on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38924101): https://inpractise.com/articles/aldi-culture-and-operations-...

There they talk about the Aldi culture and how "walking into management" isn't possible there, as everyone goes through the ranks of a store. That means of course that hiring someone from outside is almost not possible, but people there usually stay a very long time or even retire at the company.

Tostino• 2 years ago

I honestly respect companies with that attitude way more than your standard American company culture.

troad3• 2 years ago

So the main qualification for being an Aldi executive is years of experience throwing people's groceries from one side to the other, never making eye-contact? And this translates to the skills required to run a multi-national business how exactly?

Don't get me wrong, sounds like a great deal for mediocre 'lifer' employees, but seems like a terrible deal for anyone bright (years stuck 'waiting the ranks' - or more realistically a massive brain drain for places that do let them 'walk into management'), or just corporate strategy in general (the skills required to run international JIT food logistics and the skills required to mop a spill in aisle 12 don't exactly have the greatest overlap.)

dec0dedab0de• 2 years ago

When I worked at best buy we called them “lifers.” Last time I was in there I noticed one of the managers was a guy I worked with when we were teenagers. I’m still kinda mad he got picked to be the idea box over me, but in retrospect it looks like they picked the team player.

blackhawkC17• 2 years ago

Walmart’s current CEO, Doug McMillon, also began working there as a high schooler unloading trucks (before completing college and returning to a corporate role).

https://www.businessinsider.com/walmart-ceo-doug-mcmillon-pr...

paulpauper2• 2 years ago

It's inspiring because it's in large part an outlier and not applicable to the vast majority of people who lack college degrees. It would not be remarkable it it were common or realistic.

TMWNN2• 2 years ago

Was definitely expecting this to be a story about someone who graduated college and walked into management. I have respect for anyone who could rise though the ranks of retail.

Some huge percentage of Americans's first job is at McDonald's (another business that has historically found management talent in-house). They learn the importance of cleanliness, customer service, accuracy.

hx83• 2 years ago

A lot of Walmart management are promoted into it. While certainly not a great job, it's not too bad to make a career out of it. The average Walmart location will see about $70M/yr in revenue, so her responsibility is fairly high.

olddustytrail2• 2 years ago

Near the cereal aisle, a customer walks up to Hart while recording on his cellphone.
“Hi! Can we get some Snoop Cereal here on the shelf?” asks the man. Earlier that month the rapper Snoop Dogg sued Walmart, claiming the retailer, along with Post Consumer Brands, had worked to suppress sales of Snoop Cereal. Some fans were recording videos related to the dispute for social media.

It's like you think you know America because you see it on TV and film so much, and then you read something that makes it sound so weirdly foreign.

svnt• 2 years ago

There are few things more American than the passage you just quoted. It is about a fan of an aging stoner/rapper talking to a Wal-Mart employee about the fact that he wants cereal.

pavlov2• 2 years ago

Indeed, but it's an example of the kind of real America that doesn't feature in Hollywood scripts very much.

quantumfissure• 2 years ago

This is not a normal human, less then probably .5% of 340 million Americans are like this.

It's called being an attention-whore and hoping to strike it big by filming a non-controversy and making it into one on Tik-Tok. You can thank social media (and regular media) for the profiting off clicks/algorithms/non-controversies and driving this nonsense. This isn't filming a cop making an arrest to keep them accountable, it's filming a store manager hoping to create controversy and rid her of her job because she 'said or did the wrong thing' on film. It's no different then filming a fat/alt-lifestyle/whomever person on the bus without them knowing and then making fun of them to drive clicks to your video.

olddustytrail2• 2 years ago

The guy filming is not the weird part. You don't think the fact Snoop Dogg has a cereal and is suing Walmart for not carrying it is strange?

Perhaps I missed the evolution of Gansta Rap and that's the main lyrical content these days...

sandspar4• 2 years ago

Yeah TV America is a different thing. Anime and Japan.

avalys• 2 years ago

$120k base and $120k bonus, but okay.

I don't like shopping at Wal-Mart but you have to respect a company that's operating a real business at massive scale and about a 2% -3% profit margin. And Nichole seems to be good at her job.

It's interesting how the bulk of the decisions about displays, ordering, stocking, are apparently made in each store and not centrally.

pixl97• 2 years ago

Having worked around a particular system of Walmart I have to say they are brutally efficient and typically hire good people to run their internal systems. This would be at the corporate level and not store level, can't say much about that myself.

When working with them in measuring the efficiency of the software they were using they were getting significantly higher throughput at significantly lower hardware cost than the average large customer that uses this software. All of it because just a few well learned employees understand how the all systems work together in this workflow and optimize the process.

4star3star• 2 years ago

Walmart is a well oiled machine. Not saying there's nothing to improve, but in the context of the overall system in which it operates, it's crushing it.

ldjkfkdsjnv2• 2 years ago

Unpopular opinion, more people are capable of doing well at higher level jobs than they are at low level grunt working jobs.

doytch4• 2 years ago

Time-management is probably the single most important skill in these higher-paying jobs and...well...given the amount of self-help books there are on this topic, I'm not so sure I'd agree.

People who do well in higher-level jobs know /exactly/ what they're best at or uniquely positioned to do, and do that. Meanwhile, you need to delegate the rest to whoever's in the best position to do so (growing people if there aren't enough) which is itself a tricky calculus.

switch0074• 2 years ago

I'd say it's people skills and marketing/PR.

Everyone I've seen rise through the ranks has absolutely nailed communication, self-promotion, parroting the party-line, moderating their words, adapting to their audience, improving their speech techniques, giving excellent presentations etc.

CPLX• 2 years ago

Disagree. The most important skill as you go up higher in the ranks is emotional regulation.

Many, many people simply aren’t able to do that. You can’t manage complex organizations that include people without that ability.

bigyikes• 2 years ago

Wouldn’t you expect higher level jobs to pay less then “grunt” jobs then?

Rury• 2 years ago

Only if you assume that pay is a matter solely determined by how difficult a job is (which it isn't).

paulddraper• 2 years ago

Depends on the standards for "well"

The stakes are different

zeroonetwothree5• 2 years ago

Even in software engineering it’s “easier” to be higher level (staff, principal) because your output is more fluid, you delegate more, and command more respect. Yet the vast majority of engineers are incapable of reaching those levels because they don’t seem to have the mindset for it. So I’m not sure I agree with this, it seems to just be selection bias.

ldjkfkdsjnv2• 2 years ago

They are incapable of reaching those levels because they are never given the chance to develop those skills, or to even exhibit them. There just arent that many opportunities

zhivota2• 2 years ago

Spoken like someone who has never had to do it. I've been up and down the ladder and I can tell you that it's much harder up than down, even though from afar it doesn't look like it.

If it's easy for someone it's because they are special, and usually in my experience they're special in a sociopathic tendency kind of way, where the things that make being in leadership hard (having responsibility over so many careers, feeling social and professional pressure from all directions, fending off middle management politics) come much more naturally to them.

doytch4• 2 years ago

She runs a shop that employs 300 people; needs to worry about short-term and long-term logistics and planning; works cross-functionally with the trades; probably frequently needs to manage upwards; interacts directly with customers; etc etc...

Damn, she deserves that $240k more than a lot of us software developers. This is a hard job.

varispeed3• 2 years ago

Damn, she deserves that $240k more than a lot of us software developers. This is a hard job.

Wow, this is such a nonsense view. Software development may seem easy to you, because you know how to do it and probably have been doing it for a long time. But I can assure you, software development is a hard job. If it was easy, everyone and their dog could do it. Have some respect to your profession!

heisenbit• 2 years ago

Yes SW development is a hard job but she is doing a lot more than one job and the skill set required (not just knowledge but also behavior) to cover so many roles is a lot broader than most developers and also many managers in the software industry require to do their job.

prh8• 2 years ago

If both options paid you 240k a year, would you rather be a software engineer or do the exact job the Walmart manager does? I'm guessing you'd rather do SWE

unclebucknasty2• 2 years ago

No doubt she earns it.

But, we're probably all doing some form of the above in one way or another. A few minor edits may make the list a little more familiar to more software folks:

worry about short-term and long-term [...] planning; works cross-functionally...;... manage upwards; interacts directly with customers

amelius• 2 years ago

Salaries are awkward. I personally believe someone who collects the municipal garbage should make more than someone who sits in an office all day and solves logic puzzles. Because I wouldn't want to do it.

switch0074• 2 years ago

Not to detract from her performance (I've made a top comment about how she's giving CEO vibes), but we software engineers worry about short-term and long-term, do planning, work cross-functionally, manage upwards, focus on the customer's requirements. And way more.

newsclues4• 2 years ago

I think there are lots of hard jobs that go under appreciated in our society.

I think about people playing pro sports for millions and then minimum wage labourers, drivers clerks, cleaners and cooks who make minimum wages. One group are celebrated and the other are essential to society continuing to function.

lawgimenez• 2 years ago

My parents currently works at Walmart, they’re the one restocking supplies in the shelves. They are in their 60s and 70s, immigrants that became US citizens just last year. Also, they work night shifts.

Based on their feedback, Walmart is a very kind and good employer.

listenallyall4• 2 years ago

Right, this was made pretty clear during the first few months of the pandemic in 2020.

conductr• 2 years ago

I think about this frequently. I hire day laborers occasionally and it’s actually quite astonishing at how much physical labor most those folks can perform and rather quickly and cheap. Yet when I get to know them the reality is most of them exist in an unfamiliar and invisible to society type way.

stefan_• 2 years ago

It's hard work keeping the staff below the full time limit where they get benefits, squeeze suppliers and ensure the reliable flow of inane corporate directives downwards. Has everyone completed their mandatory union training yet?

I don't know man, I'd rather make new stuff, ya know.

breck5• 2 years ago

more than a lot of us software developers.

A big question I've tried to answer in my life is whether the high pay in the software world has an intelligent economic explanation, or maybe a more sinister explanation involving false models encoded in the law.

rhelz2• 2 years ago

Its just supply and demand, like anything else.

michaelt• 2 years ago

A delivery driver who makes 30 deliveries per hour, with senders who pay the business $2 per parcel, is bringing in $60/hour of revenue. That revenue gets split with other workers who collected and sorted the parcels, the fuel bill and van insurance, and the investors who own the parcel-sorting machines and vans.

A software developer that saves $0.001 per delivery across 5,000 delivery drivers who make 30 deliveries per hour saves the company $1500 per hour. That gets split with the folks who maintain the CI servers, the Kubernetes cluster, the pen testers and so on. But it's still 25x as much.

blinkingled2• 2 years ago

I don't about others but based on past experience if one really attempts to do their $240k software / IT job well they ought to encounter similar if not in some ways worse challenges - some just realities of the tech industry/stack/complexity and some injected by bureaucracy, incompetence, mismanagement and not to mention the ever hanging sword of change in technology and possibility of layoff for no fault of yours. It adds up.

When you are signing up for a job it's not just the money and the physical things you do - it's also the intangibles, the time spent in unproductive meetings, time spent afterwards feeling unproductive and worried, the resulting stress you have to manage etc, it all adds up and takes away something more than the money. I would argue that well managed jobs with some semblance of stability, human connection and predictability/routine are quite pleasant and easier to do compared to Software/IT.

doytch4• 2 years ago

Oh for sure, the intangibles kind of /are/ the job once you're past a mid-level position. But think about her job in the context of your description.

You think she doesn't have useless meetings she's invited to that every manager in the region needs to attend even though it could've just been an email from the regional director? The stress from the lights busted in the parking lot brought on by worries that a darkened parking lot and a random crime that night might trigger a spurious lawsuit? Doomscrolling about physical retail being replaced by online? That she's falling behind in understanding where robotics might move? That if that particular store was shut down in a strategic shift, she's wedded her entire marketability as an employee to a single company on a single ladder and that she can't really just easily grab a job from a company across the country?

We're not so unique!

listenallyall4• 2 years ago

No. Your job as a software developer may be stressful (as every job is) but her everyday challenges are way worse than yours. She has hundreds of actual people to manage, mentor and motivate, many with little education and lacking resources. Which means lots of absences, low-effort work, health issues, high turnover, and sometimes even theft. Plenty of issues dealing with customers as well. And then the managerial issues related to meeting revenue targets, implementing health care plans, managing inventory, putting on a good face for the bosses, as well as intense competition to be elevated to regional manager against a bunch of other colleagues in the exact same role. And her salary is only $120, there's a whole lot of stress when half your annual comp is bonus-driven.

threatofrain• 2 years ago

It's easier to find revenue streams that scale horizontally by the number of programmers and servers. It's hard to open new Walmarts. This won't always be true for either case, so make well of your situation regardless of whether you think there's some kind of difficulty or effort moat.

paulpauper2• 2 years ago

Devs are paid so much because the skills they posses are precise, not fluid. managing a store is more fluid not precise. Coding, like surgery, requires precision, like the syntax. Get one character wrong and the whole thing fails. This entails having a high IQ. Being a store manager is hard work, no doubt ,but the skill set is less IQ dependent, so it can be done by more people. A dev is paid so much because when you need a product to ship, the syntax has to work, and finding someone who can do it is hard.

beej71• 2 years ago

The best devs I know possess the skills to be both fluid and precise in the proper circumstances.

listenallyall4• 2 years ago

Lol, as if no software developer has ever released code with one character wrong.

Does your "syntax" ever call in sick? Steal from the loading dock? Get punched in the face by an angry customer?

cscurmudgeon• 2 years ago

If salaries are based on effort and not on what *relative* value they produce, people can just move rocks up and down a hill all day and become billionaires.

zeroonetwothree5• 2 years ago

Pay isn’t really based on how “hard” a job is (and I don’t think we would want it to be!)

It does factor in to the demand side but clearly it’s not the primary factor or else there wouldn’t be any high-paying “easy” jobs.

VS19993• 2 years ago

I consider pay more like a caste system in the US. It's a way to separate people who "deserve" to be highly paid and people who don't. Working in software, it always felt odd that I make 3x as much as the guy making my food and have 10x the expendable income, even though they work harder at much more miserable work. The first degree of separation is whether you can afford to do a 4-6 year take home test that's getting more and more expensive each year.

havaloc• 2 years ago

"Walking every aisle is a new practice for store bosses in her area, implemented by their regional manager. It helps managers “see what your customers see,” says Hart, and pay attention to details. It also keeps her employees on their toes."

I can't believe this wasn't policy already. Seems like good practice.

newsclues4• 2 years ago

I had a great manager that did similar things. His education was the navy and he ran a store like a ship, and everyone loved it.

damidekronik• 2 years ago

Would honestly love to know more. What activities which are not common for a store did he bring from the navy?

icedchai3• 2 years ago

This would be like asking the average corporate "software development manager" to actually look at the code/product developed by his reports. Except for early stage startups where the person is truly in a player/coach role, it rarely happens.

outime• 2 years ago

Or making developers run the app/website on average laptops/phones that users commonly use, rather than on the most expensive MacBooks/iPhones.

TimPC2• 2 years ago

I'm at a director level and I routinely look at code and even more frequently look at product in a late stage start-up.

uxp100• 2 years ago

I have absolutely had managers (and managers managers) contribute code. I think the typical team lead manager lite position was supposed to be like 20% of time on development and my managers manager who oversaw like 30 people contributed some when our team was behind. Probably didn’t read much code outside of what they contributed though.

At one of the largest tech companies.

mitthrowaway24• 2 years ago

That's exactly what they should be doing though.

Toyota calls it a "gemba walk" -- managers and even executives need to walk the factory floor and see problems with their own eyes, not through hearing reports.

With software, the codebase is the gemba, not the office. Managers don't need to be writing code, but they should be reading it. Otherwise it's like a production manager who has never seen the inside of their own factory.

loceng• 2 years ago

Akin to the golden rule of "use your own product."

bookofjoe• 2 years ago

Eat your own dog food.

wmoser• 2 years ago

You would think so. I was working on an oil rig and they made a big deal about ‘management by walking about.’ So the heads of each of the departments were supposed to go and check ONE job their charges were working on that day. They were supposed to write a short report about what they observed. This was too much for them so they quickly got in trouble from shore-based management for not filling out their reports. So they promptly delegated to the next-in-line management They promptly delegated it to the people doing the work so once a week besides all the other paper work I had to fill out a report about how I was observing myself working safety while management still had no clue what was happening.

bee_rider7• 2 years ago

That’s sort of different stakes, right? In your case your direct managers decided to prioritize not doing their jobs over some pretty important stuff—your personal safety and the damage the oil rig could do to the environment if something went wrong. In the case of walking the floor in a store it is just aesthetics mostly.

shoo• 2 years ago

I had to fill out a report about how I was observing myself working safety while management still had no clue what was happening.

see also https://eddiots.com/2301

  > How do you know what's going on if you're not there?
  > Ask a restaurant manager. Or a bartender. Or the manager of a retail shop. Or a call center or an office. Or the supervisor of a factory or warehouse floor. What do you think they'd say? [...]
  > Ask anyone responsible for something, "How do you know what's going on if you're not there?" and you'll always get the same answer: "You won't."
  > Unless they were an I.T. manager.

bee_rider7• 2 years ago

I don’t really understand what this looks like. I mean, when I worked in retail, I was at a place smaller than Walmart, so, maybe Walmart managers tend to be more hands off and need to make a show of actually knowing what’s going on in the store.

But I’d typically get some instructions and then be left to clean up or stock things. Tidying up isn’t that complicated or high stakes. Normal people know what messy and clean look like.

My favorite managers were aware of what the store looked like and could say “tidy up the pillows” or whatever if something needed particular attention. But the manager that came by with attention to detail and an intention to keep me on my toes? Nah, that’s annoying. And even in a pretty small store, there are a lot of aisles to tidy up. If a manager is known to be annoying they’ll also have to waste time looking for me.

simantel• 2 years ago

A Walmart Supercenter can have 500 employees and dozens of deliveries per day. I can totally see why they'd get wrapped up working mostly in the office and talking to department heads vs. walking the store.

throwaway20377• 2 years ago

    > My favorite managers were aware of what the store looked like and could say “tidy up the pillows” or whatever if something needed particular attention. But the manager that came by with attention to detail and an intention to keep me on my toes? Nah, that’s annoying.

I'm confused. What is the difference? It sounds like "eye of the beholder" kind of stuff, like micro-management vs high touch.

throwaway598• 2 years ago

Management by wandering around

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Management_by_wandering_arou...

nitwit005• 2 years ago

This is one of those things everyone will agree is extremely important, and which they then won't do when assigned the job.

riffic• 2 years ago

walking the gemba

dclowd99012• 2 years ago

I think it probably has good efficacy if the walks are infrequent. Familiarity tends to have a negative effect on observability.

switch0074• 2 years ago

She's giving CEO/COO vibes. I bet she would crush it in either of those roles. It would be amazing if this article catapulted her towards running her own business.

Loved this:

Hart gets to the front of the store, a product-display area in between banks of registers known as the horseshoe. “So what are you thinking here?” she asks Wright. “Easter or summer toys?”
Wright suggests summer toys and T-shirts.
“I think we should go after the eclipse,” says Hart, filling the section with eclipse-themed gear, as well as outdoor chairs and coolers.

Micro teaching opportunity and giving the employee an opportunity to have input, rather than just "put eclipse-themed gear here"

notdang• 2 years ago

That was a trap, she, as a boss gave 2 options for the answer: "easter or summer toys" then she proceeded with the 3rd option: eclipse.

That gives bad vibes.

zeroonetwothree5• 2 years ago

In some contexts yes but I think the idea is to teach the employee that they can answer with a different option. But it does depend on their relationship and personality.

bee_rider7• 2 years ago

CEO/COO instincts, just needs to refine the trap to be more subtle.

flappyeagle• 2 years ago

Nah

horns4lyfe• 2 years ago

Impossible, she doesn’t have an Ivy League MBA! She janky worked at MBB!

ryandrake2• 2 years ago

You are not allowed to be a CEO unless you use "summer" as a verb.

listenallyall4• 2 years ago

Quite a difference from all of those "my day as a <cool tech company> employee" TikTok videos, such as

https://www.tiktok.com/@iamitzelromero/video/717157277625860...

https://www.tiktok.com/@miss_alexabel/video/7068404845325143...

https://www.tiktok.com/@suppgorjess/video/708395834045538641...

KennyBlanken• 2 years ago

Do any of these social media department idiots actually do any work?

dewey3• 2 years ago

You can only put so much "person staring at screen" clips into a 15 second short video.

devdiary3• 2 years ago

How come a paywalled content gets to the top of the HN front-page?

switch0074• 2 years ago

90% of the time someone posts an archive URL. I wish they would get pinned to the top (@dang :)

bee_rider7• 2 years ago

That the archive URL is some generally accepted thing here seems bizarre to me. I mean, taking the text and hosting it elsewhere—that’s just an unauthorized copy, just like if somebody had posted a torrent of a new popular movie so we could discuss it. Or links to cracked software (how else could those of us who don’t want to pay for it discuss it, right?)

I respond to the headline/other discussion in the thread if it is interesting. IMO, the publisher’s decision of how they want their work distributed and discussed should be respected. That includes not making unauthorized copies, and also the fact that that constrains conversation about their work.

I’m surprised that we seem to understand this for software but not written word. And we mostly act accordingly: lots of discussion of open source works, not so much on “paywalled” proprietary software.

ergonaught• 2 years ago

It happens nearly daily, and so do variations of this question.

The “This doesn't align with my expectations so it must be wrong” response is fascinating.

devdiary3• 2 years ago

Do not understand your comment. What are you trying to say?

nfriedly• 2 years ago

Presumably because the paywall is very porus.

And, I suppose, there are a few HN people who have subscriptions.

And probably a few who just upvote based on the title.

(I think it only takes 4 up votes to hit the front page if they happen quickly enough.)

jeroenhd• 2 years ago

Probably because a significant portion of HN readership already subscribes to the websites that commonly make it to the front page, and others know how to bypass the pay wall (i.e. https://archive.is/lk15F if you want to read this without a subscription).

I can't remember seeing any pay walled article on HN that wasn't bypassable using popular free services online. Usually, someone will also link one of the bypass websites pretty soon after a post starts gaining traction.

devdiary3• 2 years ago

thank you for sharing the archive link. Didn't know it is possible to archive a non-public/paywalled content.

BeetleB5• 2 years ago

The way everything else does. People upvote it.

dang• 2 years ago

If there's a workaround, it's ok. Users usually post workarounds in the thread.

This is in the FAQ at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html and there's more explanation here:

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10178989

karaterobot2• 2 years ago

“I love my job,” says Hart, but “it doesn’t turn off. That is one of the hard things about it.”

I'm lucky that in my industry I can make a good living as an individual contributor, because having to actually think about my job when I'm not at my job sounds like a living nightmare.

applied_heat• 2 years ago

There are a lot of jobs that are 24/7/365 without proper coverage from coworkers so people are always available and can’t turn off.

Other jobs won’t call you off shift but if you just had to deal with something traumatic like a car wreck it’s hard to leave that at work as well.

throwaway20377• 2 years ago

    > There are a lot of jobs that are 24/7/365 without proper coverage from coworkers so people are always available and can’t turn off.

This comment is oddly specific. It reads like you are writing from personal experience. Besides emergency medicine, what else qualifies?

BeetleB5• 2 years ago

If you're in SW, you probably will need to think about your job off work: They usually don't work in shifts, and will have deliverables in a timeline of months. They need to plan the work, and always adjust to hit the deadlines.

If you're a doctor, then you probably don't have to think about your job off work.

TimPC2• 2 years ago

True but the number of hours I work in SW + the number of hours I think about my job outside of work is still probably less than a typical doctor's working hours so I feel like we come out ahead anyways.

_dark_matter_• 2 years ago

That is not true about doctors at _all_, especially inpatient. They have so many hours in a day to spend on patients. They are checking on them after hours, fielding calls, looking at lab results, responding to messages, preparing for the next day, filling out notes, reading new notes. So not only do they think about the job off work, there is lots of job to do off work as well.

karaterobot2• 2 years ago

Negative. Almost twenty years in the software industry, and I clock in at 9 and clock out at 5. Let's be honest, earlier on Fridays. It wasn't always that way, but now I prioritize time over more money, and for me it's worth the trade.

giantg28• 2 years ago

And there's on-call responsibility

alwa• 2 years ago

Doesn’t a doctor tend to have deliverables in a timeline of minutes or hours, on the order of dozens such deliverables a day, often with health- or life-critical stakes attached?

It seems like only yesterday that this counterpoint made the rounds here:

“The darker side of being a doctor” https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40025261

mvkel11• 2 years ago

Credit to Walmart for creating an environment where a person can still love their job after years of service.

That stuff can't be faked, even with a high salary. Before you say, "it's easy to say when you're getting paid $240K a year." Nah. A person needs challenge; a purpose. Lots of FANG ICs making $500K+ who hate their job. Why? No challenge or palpable purpose.

To create a scaled corp structure where a person can ascend from the bottom is also tough to do.

bicx• 2 years ago

Yeah, after a certain amount (like enough to cover expenses, have a little fun, and build savings) and a certain amount of time, your income stops being something that makes you excited. This is especially true if you’re around other people who make the same as you do. If becomes normalized in your mind. Everyone needs a challenge and some goals. Something to look forward to.

giantg28• 2 years ago

I'm looking forward to retirement. I'm not interested in professional challenges anymore. In my experience they're usually BS and you don't get rewarded.

BLanen3• 2 years ago

That stuff can't be faked, even with a high salary. Before you say, "it's easy to say when you're getting paid $240K a year." Nah. A person needs challenge; a purpose. Lots of FANG ICs making $500K+ who hate their job. Why? No challenge or palpable purpose.

Something only someone with a high income would say. Contrary to all data and research and evidence.

xenospn• 2 years ago

I have a close friend who was making about 1M in TC and hated every moment of it.

traviswingo• 2 years ago

Not sure if you’re discrediting the parent comment or pointing out the reality of it.

But yes this is something only someone with a high income would say. And yes, it’s true.

Beyond a certain income, the wrong job can be soul sucking and depressing. And it takes achieving that level of income to fully appreciate that reality.

nexus2045• 2 years ago

Making 500-700k at a FAANG right now.

Money certainly makes me worry less, not complaining.

I still feel like a cog in a machine.

If anything, it further isolated all the problems in my life that money could never really solve.

Meaningful friendships, dating, self-control and discipline, self-esteem.

Before, I could go by telling myself the story that "if only I had X amount of income, I'd be happy".

Now, I don't have that excuse any more.

I stare at the mirror, still see the same person, and realize that no amount of money will help.

A nice problem to have I guess, but problems that have plagued me my entire life.

Ekaros• 2 years ago

Also these people can make personal impact that is visible for them. They might be wrong, but still they can affect things and see them changing... It might not be possible in many other jobs specially in big corporations.

mvkel11• 2 years ago

Yes! Very well said. Autonomy/agency, however small in the grand scheme, is so important.

vunderba• 2 years ago

Doesn't Walmart have a disproportionately high number of employees taking advantage of food stamps due to suppressed wages?

https://www.jwj.org/walmarts-food-stamp-scam-explained-in-on...

SilasX• 2 years ago

Not the $240k/year store managers, no.

mvkel11• 2 years ago

That article is from 2014. The average Walmart employee rate today is $17.06.

And a non-zero amount of those employees can someday make a lot more.

How many other companies of that size can say the same?

I'm not saying it's not a problem, and not saying we shouldn't be trying so solve it. But are we talking about wage reform, or Walmart uniquely being a shithead?

I read the article you linked and it feels like it's got an agenda. Conjecture 1 is that Walmart doesn't pay employees enough, then Conjecture 2 is that it pays its executives "too much," but conveniently defines "executive" as just the CEO, when in reality executives include the very people that OP's article is about - store managers!

I admittedly stopped reading after that because one can always find a convenient fact to backup their view. If I'm misinterpreting, let me know.

It's also complicated. When Walmart announced wage increases in 2015, their stock fell 5%. Who owns Walmart stock? Us.

giantg28• 2 years ago

It's also possible they're saying it because they're in a national article and would almost certainly lose their job if they represented the company poorly. I would also guess PR got involved to approve or even pick which manager would show their image the best.

mvkel11• 2 years ago

Certainly a possibility, but that's everywhere. You trot out the Blue Angels to get people to sign up to the Navy.

Seanambers• 2 years ago

There is a trap in there.

If you work a lot like this lady does you do not really have much time to reason about how you spend your life and whats important. It just happens to you. But it becomes all encompassing and consumes the person. For some thats the right way to live their life, for most not so much.

FANG has a problem in that they have a lot of highly paid individuals doing nothing or very little, so they have a lot of time to sit around and get depressed about it.

chasd00• 2 years ago

Another issue is we’re a couple generations in where kids were told over and over swe is what their passion is without it being a real reality. Eventually they get old enough to realize the lie but not young enough to take the risk of doing something about it.

paulcole• 2 years ago

Why? No challenge or palpable purpose.

A healthy dash of entitlement as well.

VincentEvans• 2 years ago

If there companies paying 500K who’d like a software engineer to just professionally do the job, not complain, not have an agenda, not worry about promotions - drop me a reply. You pay, I work. That’s the all there’s to it.

steele• 2 years ago

p_l• 2 years ago

Same here.

Unfortunately I know why there would be no answer for me :D

kotaKat• 2 years ago

The other interesting effect I notice is that in rural communities especially, you find a lot more long-term employees that have just stayed because it was the solidest employer of the time.

Between jobs and before I launched into my current IT position I had a small stint at my local Walmart just to make ends meet -- MANY of the staff had 5, 10, 15, and even 20+ year service badges. Many of those 20+ year employees were there as the concrete was being poured and have been here since that store first opened in the community.

tennisflyi• 2 years ago

Thread reeks of intellectualism.

Me SWE/work at FAANG, so smart

More realistically, you’ll seem very, very surprised that someone not at corporate would be CEO level “smart” or even smart

bandyaboot• 2 years ago

To end the meeting, Michael Cole, 66, a maintenance worker, leads the group in the Walmart Cheer, a chant workers throughout the company do to start and end meetings.

This can’t be real.

tombert2• 2 years ago

The chant is absolutely real. I don’t know how frequently they do it in retail, but it was pretty infrequent in the software engineer positions.

Source: I was a software engineer for Jet.com for two years after the Walmart acquisition, and then another year separately.

zhivota2• 2 years ago

Wait, so you're saying you had to do a chant as a SWE? That's wild. I'm really glad I never took up the recruiters for Walmart Labs now, that would have been a disaster for me.

mech4222• 2 years ago

Ross Perot/EDS and I think IBM used to do the cheers..

EDS would also interview you wife (if you had one) to make sure she fit in with the EDS family.

troad3• 2 years ago

It's a very effective manipulation technique - get the person to commit slightly past their comfort zone.

For instance, the Nxivm corporate training scam / sex cult [0] operated this way. At your very first meeting they'd ask you to wear a coloured sash and bow to the seminar giver. "It's just like judo!," you'd be told. "We're bringing a bit of fun to corporate training! Don't be such a grouch!" But of course the function was to (a) make you say yes once, which means you're now slightly committed, (b) make you look slightly ridiculous, which naturally makes you defensive and feel closer to your fellow ridiculous people (the ones in sashes), (c) make you give up a bit of your 'face', to make you more vulnerable and open, (d) weed out people strong enough to say no.

And once you're sitting in a sash, letting your guard down, comes the next thing. And the next thing. And the next thing. And after a thousand and one little pushes, you're so committed that you know you look absolutely insane from the outside, and it feels like the only future you have is within the organisation. You've committed so hard, bit by bit, that you no longer see a way out. And that's how you wind up with people getting branded for their slave master. [1]

Now I'm not saying Walmart brands women (though I'm not saying they don't - I have no evidence either way!), but it's worth noting that the only purpose of a tool like a 'corporate cheer' is to short-circuit your rationality and force an emotional commitment and loyalty that the business has no right to, and is unlikely to get from a purely rational employee. It's not just a fun little thing that may be inadvertently somewhat manipulative, it's a textbook manipulation technique.

So my 2c for anyone being asked to give a corporate cheer is to politely say no, and then think very hard about what kind of employer uses manipulation techniques to ensure obedience.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NXIVM

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/17/nyregion/nxivm-women-bran... (https://archive.is/Wv4Qc)

thebrain• 2 years ago

It most certainly is.

I worked at Wal-Mart in Canada for seven years when I was younger and during the summer, when I worked more hours, I would see the department managers and the upper level store managers do it every morning during the week. Wal-mart really pushes the idea of winning. Everything is about being the best at generating profit and beating the local competition into submission. The location I worked at completely destroyed a Zellers, Eatons, Bi-Way and possibly others that I'm forgetting.

I worked in the electronics department and my manager had the discretion to price big new movie releases below the competition (he would actually check out the competition himself). We had a line that snaked through the entire store for days when Titanic came out since we had the best price for a large radius. Having the best price on an item would be something that would be mentioned during the morning meeting and would be something everyone in attendance would get excited about.

sandspar4• 2 years ago

It's always interesting that people will wait in line for an hour to save $2.

pizzafeelsright• 2 years ago

Word usage is mirrored by the hierarchy.

Whoever can introduce a word into a group is a leader.

A chant is a formula and intentional. To do so requires authority.

Giving a nickname and having it stick requires respect and shows who is the leader in practical terms.

mech4222• 2 years ago

ross perot - EDS and I think IBM did the same...

kevstev• 2 years ago

oh bud I worked in e-commerce for Walmart Labs and we did the cheer at every large meeting (think townhall, not every stand up).

Give me a squiggly!

bunabhucan• 2 years ago

I bumped into their manager AGM (well, quarter of it, they did 4 separate ones consecutively) in Kansas City one year. My employer had booked the hotel months previously. I think I was the only non walmart person.

They had four lines at check in, men smoking, women smoking, men non-smoking, women non-smoking. You shared a room with whoever you got in line with.

Lots of shop talk, no juicy secrets, silence when they found out I was not one of them.

alsetmusic• 2 years ago

She passes a prominent display of Lume Whole Body Deodorant, a new product for the store priced at $14.97. “It’s interesting, but it’s too pricey for my customer,” says Hart. It isn’t selling that quickly.

The whole thing reads as a horrible dystopia.

A day in the life of a Walmart manager

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