In this last year, we bled for you, some faced far worse. Listening to you all, I hear empty words backed by empty policies. In the end what I hear is ‘YOU failed US’ and your policies reinforce that. Labor is your enemy. It represents a threat to your bottom line. RIP Soda? Making things ‘easier’ for the store means ‘less store personnel, but we have a new toy, and more can be accomplished by fewer. We are all ‘suddenly stupid’ in the face of tone-deaf leadership that shirks responsibility while holding to account those belittled and demeaned in a million different ways outside the C-suite, when was the last time any of you worked alongside the cleaning staff? The temps at Rush? The specialists in finance? So many names, so many faces in all those positions are gone, IDs on a spreadsheet because a 65% margin on a Tee-shirt just was not enough. We put our faith in you, our health in your hands, and YOU failed -US-. You cannot even keep our infrastructure operational when we are at our lightest load.
You leave contracts in the air, and the hubris you exude as though you are the smartest people in the room is noticed. Certainly, anyone with a brain is looking forward to our regional calls with HR next week; no doubt this was a ‘difficult but necessary’ decision they will be executing. Execute is such a good word for what it is that they do. Nationwide, it is noticed as campus after campus decides that Follett is no longer a partner worth having. We are hated! You cannot see the shift, but we can. Every year post Rush, we wait to be punished for failure, every back to school we ready for systems to fail, for our vendors to hold orders because we cannot even pay our bills.
Big -loss- for the small store where so much is expected, of so few. The silence and inaction with the world moving as quickly as it is, is breathtaking. You are not making life easier for people; you are making a calculated business decision to chase after the one thing you have always hated; labor dollars. As for Follett Access? You are beating a dead horse with the expectation that the twitching of the corpse might be misinterpreted as life. You place all expectations of sales and supports upon field operations with no power nor informational database to close the sale. Campuses do not want additional burdens; they do not want a process added to their workload and cannot afford to wait and work at your glacial pace.
My God! The hubris you show in demanding that everything in store operations must halt for two hours just for a group pat on the back because you all worked so, so, hard. We appear unprepared, and ill-educated while you pour millions into what? Your own compensation packages? How many have now fallen behind because you believe that the good will felt in working for Follett made up for non-competitive pay? How many must work a second job? A third? With the poverty line where it is, why do we expect someone to accept that as a starting rate?
How many of you presenting must decide between eating and staying housed? When a potential employer sees the company name on our resumes, they laugh. Apparently, that name means so truly little. In a just world all of you would be stripped of your assets and made to feel what it means to try and survive in the gig economy, but that will never happen. You have already decided the fate of thousands, and just in time for the weekend, too. But there is blood on your hands for what you have done. You may never face judgement for your arrogance but know that we will remember. We saw the iceberg before you did, now we watch on the deck as you are lowered first in the only life rafts left. I am no one. But I speak for everyone gone, and those that will be shown the door soon.