What cultural, environmental, strategic, etc. issues have always been there, and what are the more recent developments that have put Target in this increasingly unwinnable position?
Are there any positive any changes you have noticed that should make us hopeful?
@ctv I can confirm that good qualified and talented people are disposed of, and the mediocre ones (due to popularity/favoritism/nepotism) stick around even though they aren't the most qualified. You have to be around TGT long enough to witness it.
Let's put it this way: On the PDD side, TGT is a retailer that depends on talented designers to produce concepts/ideas/innovate. BUT there are "designers" within PDD who can't sketch, can't render or do any 3D, can't do anything but collect "inspiration" to send off to a vendor who does all of the designing/modeling/3D; etc. No doubt; some Target designers have backgrounds in actual product design with a background in the field of developing hard product (or soft) but the others are promoted from other areas with no background in design whatsoever. All you need to be a "designer" at TGT is a good eye for curating concepts coming from outside and developing a good pitch to leadership. It's no wonder we are floundering as a company despite Design "Leaders" pushing us to "innovate, innovate; never follow".
Absolutely toxic leadership that protects their favorites and manages out anyone that speaks up or has been with the company for too many years.
@3jn huh. That doesn't sound familiar at all. 🙄
@3dt Yep. Let's do more with less people; just tack on the responsibilities of the last person we "laid off" and/or fired or PIP'd out without increasing salaries of those taking on the extra responsibilities AND let them languish in their level for years on end. Target has a long ways to go in being competitive in how people are rewarded for their work or move up in rank. Favoritism also is rampant. Slackers or TMs with less experience stick around; those that put in extra hours (including weekends) get let go. Go figure.
Adding more work and responsibility on already stressed teams.
Anything tied to team member support should remain on site, not farmed out to TII. But decisions that make zero sense is a Target specialty.
Moving jobs to TII isn't unique to Prat's org. It's happening everywhere.
@1sq+1jzatdfzp Assume you’re referring to Prat?
The CPO is a fraud. His primary "talent" is moving jobs to India at the expense of Target's future. Him and his ethnic clique.
Lack of any strategy or roadmap. Constantly changing upper leadership, then said leader takes 6-12 months to “get to know the area”, then they finally start to make a strategy but now there’s suddenly a re-org.
Now you’re under a new leader and they want to take 6-12 months to get to know the area before developing a roadmap. Oops now they have a new leader who wants to take 6-12 months to develop a strategy for the area. And so on.
DEI
Adding unnecessary roles in distribution. There are support teams, that while necessary, have twice as many people than they need. Looking at you, ICQA. And roles that duplicate what other teams are doing. They will interview, and not wanting to hurt anyone’s feelings, offer two to replace one and then find busy work to try to justify promoting that second one. And all the backups….why? If a team is overstaffed, do you really need two backups for every person? Distribution spending is out of control. Stores aren’t making money, but their cost center sure knows how to spend it.
Leaders blaming subordinates for lack of execution, when the strategy is flawed and teams aren't resourced appropriately.