What to make of this? I’ve never seen Follett send out a survey to employees to see who is interested in advancement. Are they expecting a mass exodus sometime soon? I hate to feel this way but I feel like job positions are going to be restructured. They won’t keep paying people, namely store managers of smaller stores, the same rates. I hope I’m wrong.
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I heard that one of the store managers in our region filled out the survey and home office called them to discuss jobs at the home office. While I was surprised they called back about it, it does make me a little more suspicious about them restructuring stores. The survey wasn't about whether or not you like Follett, but if you wanted to relocate to another state, if you had a college degree, where you see yourself in five years.
Follett has had other surveys in the past. The last one several years back, they said it was anonymous and that they would share the results. Everyone I know, including myself were honest about how much they suck... Follett never shared the results.
This one didn't involve McKensy which has been paid several million to conduct internal surveys before. They were rolled out with the same fanfare you saw for the 'kick off' and were utilized to justify restructuring as the previous poster mentioned. My guess? We can't afford them anymore, so JH just put together a googled 'what are survey!?' to justify their actions. Saves capital and it clearly it cannot be too hard to do, right?
A board member, or a VP hired a consulting firm to address corporate structure (this is conjecture, but it's happened more than once). The consulting company will collect data, interview a few folks, write a report that will suggest a number of changes. The deck chairs will be rearranged, new cards with new titles will be printed, new letter head will be designed. Nothing will change.
Surveys like this rarely get honest feedback. They are not anonymous. Who wants to risk their job, no matter how much they hate? It is simply "makeup". Look what a great company we are. We seek out feedback from our employees. Yeah, no thanks I'll be sitting this one out
It boils down to the old adage, often said on this site: “The beatings will continue until morale improves.”
What will happen with this survey is people will give their honest feedback, tell corporate how they feel, real suggestions on how to improve morale, functionality, etc. Then there will be people at the Home Office that will look at the results, show real concern for them and say we need to make changes. After that, someone who has never actually worked in one of our stores will be put in charge of figuring out how to fix it, maybe they do a good job on the report, maybe they give it 50% and the report will circulate and get pushed across many desks and then get filed away with no action. Soon after someone else who has no idea what it takes to run a store will be put in charge of a new efficiency project which will result in more cuts to either payroll, headcount, or other things that will hinder a stores ability to operate properly. And finally, we’ll all see a summary report of the survey that will cherry pick positive comments about how great the company is and those will be shared with all of us.
What will happen with this survey is people will give their honest feedback, tell corporate how they feel, real suggestions on how to improve morale, functionality, etc. Then there will be people at the Home Office that will look at the results, show real concern for them and say we need to make changes. After that, someone who has never actually worked in one of our stores will be put in charge of figuring out how to fix it, maybe they do a good job on the report, maybe they give it 50% and the report will circulate and get pushed across many desks and then get filed away with no action. Soon after someone else who has no idea what it takes to run a store will be put in charge of a new efficiency project which will result in more cuts to either payroll, headcount, or other things that will hinder a stores ability to operate properly. And finally, we’ll all see a summary report of the survey that will cherry pick positive comments about how great the company is and those will be shared with all of us.
I had some fun with the responses that were left.
Having said that, I think the best response is silence. They love that.
I agree that its just a way to look like they care. Either they are expecting a lot of store managers to leave or they will redesign jobs so that ASMS, Ops managers, etc are going to be the ones leaving and they'll be less likely to leave if they think they have a chance at a promotion. I think the only way that this company will promote people is if they come cheaper than a new person. Loyalty and experience mean nothing to this company.
It's likely that the survey means nothing and no one is really even going to be looking at the submissions. It's just so they can say "See, we care about our employees!"