sales representative

sales associate

appliance technician

retail sales associate

hvac technician

Sears

I was turned onto the job by a friend of mine to help me escape from my previous bad work situation because he had almost nothing but positive things to say about the job.  The week after I started working there however things went on the downhill slope very quickly when the ASM for the department I worked in lost his job wrongfully for reasons I can't disclose.

For starters, Sears does have an actually halfway decent training program to them, for the first few weeks or so I was in front of a computer being barraged by tons of information and while not a whole lot of it stuck and some of the information was outdated it definitely did help starting off.  You learn more out on the sales floor than in the training room but for what it's worth it was helpful.

Also, for what negativity that might come out of this review I am at least thankful for having this as a starting point because if weren't for here I wouldn't have a lick of experience with customer service and now I'm not as deathly afraid of it as I was when I first came across the idea.  The mostly pleasant and friendly to work with crew certainly helped with that.  I really don't have any complaints about my coworkers on a crew level.

That being said this job is super flawed.  For starters, breaks are a required thing in the computer system, which while it sounds good in theory (and it is generally speaking) if you have any days like today for example where you're running a whole department by yourself and cant actually take a break if you have a shift longer than five hours, you'll get reprimanded for not taking a break.  So on days like today where I was stuck helping members the entire shift, I now have to deal with someone yelling at me for not taking a break because I couldn't step away and do anything which is really not fair.  The break's not long enough either, at 30 minutes.  Unless you prepare lunch ahead of time (and I understand some people can't) that's going to be an issue more often than not, and if you aren't back they will start looking for you or reprimand you.

This job requires you to, at least in consultative sales, use an iPod Touch or iPad to do transactions with.  The technology isn't a bad concept, when the devices are working property they help out a lot with information and ringing things up in some situations.  The problem is, the devices don't often like to work, whether or not it's bad battery life, the card SLEDs and scanners don't work, or heaven forbid the internet speed is slower than dial up.  I like the concept but the devices are half reliable at best so you'll have to ring a lot of transactions up on the registers.  The problem is, they track how much you use the devices and if you're not using it at least 50% of the time like they'd want you do, you're going to get reprimanded for it.  It's frustrating, but not a deal breaker.

I'm not going to get too heavily into detail about it, but you are required to push extended warranties and things like that.  It's alright when you get members that are willing to buy.  However, I personally am deathly afraid of selling the bigger TVs themselves because the warranties on the TVs are expensive and hard to sell, and they are going to absolutely destroy your metrics on a bad day, which means getting yelled at, and possibly hour cuts.  Both TVs that I've sold the last four months that were over $1000 both didn't want to get the warranty on it no matter what tactic I tried, and I try to do my job correctly.  Sold three TVs today without a warranty.  I'm afraid to go into work tomorrow morning.

The hours here are absolutely atrocious and that's probably the biggest issue of the whole job.  Unless you are management or some type of elite maverick of your department, you won't get full time hours.  Period.  When the full time position was vacated in my department, they opted to hire two new part timers to avoid giving benefits.  That's bad business!  I left my last job to avoid jobs like that.  And, because of the rampant part timers and often lack of hours and sales floor coverage, there's very often days like today where I'm working the entire department (TVs, vacuums, cell phones) entirely by myself and I have members leave in frustration because I'm not helping them, and "that's why we're going out of business."  Also, expect to work a lot of closing shifts (9:00 PM) and opening shifts (9:30 AM roughly) frequently.  I have to at least once a week.  Sometimes they'll throw in a random overnight in there too or overnight split shift, without asking you, and without reasonable accommodation.  I had a shift two weeks ago where I had to work 6-11 PM and then work 6-11 AM.  I live 40 minutes from work.  My manager's response was "Grow up and deal with it, x and y have to do this twice this week and z has to do this the entire week."  I'm sorry, there's way better ways you could have handled my situation like calling and asking or two shifts in the same time slot, or the 9-8.  Anything that can save me gas money and let me get a good night's sleep.

And that links me to my last point, management.  Oh how the management has declined so rapidly, so fast.  Since I started there, one ASM was wrongfully fired, two have left, had a store manager replacement, the managers that were hired are either super stressed and lacking or not empathetic or understanding in the slightest.  Plus if your ASM has the day off and you have an issue, good luck with that.  If you need a manager's approval or need cash for your register, good luck with that.  There's been times where I've waited over a half hour for a simple card swipe or as many as two hours for change for drawers.

My recommendation (TL:DR):  If you have no sales experience at all whatsoever and want to work here for a little while just to get your toes wet so you can move on to bigger better things, go for it.  Don't stay here longer than 3-6 months though unless the store you apply at is really, really good.  They are out there, this one was before I started working here from what I heard.  But if you've had experience anywhere else, please just keep it there; anywhere else.

I worked at Sears for a little over a year and a half.  I loved my co-workers dearly and my store was very good at scheduling you in regards to what you wrote down as your available days and times you can work. I can’t speak for other stores but where I worked the managers and leads were great about helping you overcome any problems you encountered with having people sign up for credit or the rewards program they have there. Overall the managers and leads were very helpful and supportive in getting you to meet your goals. The drawbacks were very understaffed, if you were a consultant who got paid a lower hourly wage because you received commission you could be pulled to cashier and still only get paid that lower hourly wage. However I think after I left that had been fixed so you were paid for the hours of working in that particular area.  And they are big on pushing you to get people to sign up for credit which can be stressful at times when you can’t provide the result they want but they will go the extra mile to try to help you achieve your goals. It is difficult to schedule doctor appointments etc. due to the change of policy in requesting days off. I believe you have to request the day or days you want off at least 3 weeks in advance and your schedule comes out weekly or bi weekly so you never know what days you are going to have off but if you can schedule outside of your available hours then you should have no problem.  Even if you request those days off there is no guarantee that you will get those days off. It is at the managers discretion and also depends on if it is a blackout period which in that case you won’t be able to request that day off without going to your manager and speaking with them due to holidays etc.  You are expected to work Thanksgiving and sometimes Easter.  The Management looks highly on associates who come there to work, do not have to be told what to do on a constant basis, have good time management skills meaning if you have no members you are helping  go around and straighten the sales floor around your area and keep things looking decent. Keeping yourself busy with things that need to be accomplished and be able to work well with a team. They do not look highly on associates who stand around or get on their phones etc during slow times when there are no customers. They do not appreciate associates who do not make the most of their time while there and not making yourself available to help in other areas of the store if you have nothing to do.  The one thing that I always disliked was due to the understaffing problem when we had to put out our ads on Sunday we were expected to stay as long as it took to get all ads out.  In my position if I was working alone that particular day it could be very difficult as sometimes almost every item we had in cases had to be changed over as well as all items on the sales floor and during store hours it would be difficult to manage while taking care of members and also helping out when other cashiers were swamped with members ready to check out which you are expected to help out your fellow associates when they are swamped. However when I voiced this as being a difficult situation in getting everything done my concern was heard and whenever possible there were two of us to change ads that day so we could get it all accomplished by the time we closed. And regardless of if there were two associates or one associate working our area on the day we did ads the manager had us come in earlier so we had more time without members (customers) to get it done before we opened up for the day. If you can work independently and work well with others as well as make yourself available during down times to clean up the sales floor, clean out dressing rooms or just help putting out freight without having to be asked every time then you should have no problem working at this particular location. They are supportive and help any way they can most of the time to help you reach your sales, credit and reward goals. You do have to be understanding regarding break times in regards to meals etc. due to the problem of being understaffed you may have to wait 6 or more hours to take your lunch break but that doesn’t happen all the time and most of the leads and managers are sticklers about you taking your lunch before you hit 5 hours and get upset when you do not take your lunch when you are supposed to. Overall I loved working there and hated to leave. I have found the leads and managers are supportive and will do what they can to help you reach the goals you need to. If you are hard working and don’t waste time when it gets slow and use your free time to help others or clean up the sales floor or work on freight etc. the leads and managers will appreciate you more and will tell you they appreciate your efforts and you will be respected more then the associates that do not use their free time wisely. It is mainly part time but with the understaffing issues a lot of weeks you can get up to almost 40 hrs. at times. It is retail so the turnover rate can be high which is frustrating but if you can deal with the times it gets busy and not get upset when a customer yells at you or takes out their frustration on you for whatever reason you should be fine. Holidays especially Thanksgiving through New Years is extremely stressful and fast paced.

Sears has prospective plans for expedience route to bankruptcy. They have authorized all technicians to endow their customers with however unreasonable wishes. This economic suicide is accomplished by creation of a grade system under which, the arbitrary, illogical, capricious, subjective and very often bias opinion of their customers has profound effect on technician ranking place. Nationwide, Sears technicians, to protect themselves from low grade survey status -which by the way compromises their job security, are heartwarming their customers with cornucopia of free stuff. The survey ensue -make as much sense as to ask a cow about its experience right after it has been milked to the very last drop (Sears modest fees for service) To add salt to the wound, the cow has to answer if it wants to do it again and if it would recommend it to other cows in the herd- Sears wonderful milking scheme .
Do those dissidents on top really can’t see the conflict of interest there?
Distribution of work load based on technician skill level is quite a good idea, for we know that not all men are being created equal. However, grading them solely based on the number of calls completed per day, and comparing them with the low pay, preventive maintenance “specialists”, is a semi -legal way to purge the work force of the most salaried, long term employees. Such measures just beg for a class actions lawsuit. Replacement of the experienced technicians with low compensated workers will not solve Sears financial problems.
Profusion of never short in supply ridiculous  polices  that Sears implements almost on biweekly basis have rather dreadful consequences-mostly resulting in loss of revenue and an absolute desolation of their employees. Rigid enforcement of those polices simply imply that on Sears road to glory lays unmotivated, lazy and mentally challenged  service technician.
Further reliance on Stack, either due to the lack of training or the creation of a new low pay work force of employees only capable of dialing 800# and follow fairly simple over the phone instructions, places Sears in ever more greater economic trouble.  Achieving such a milestone of social-techno engineering, Sears CEO s  can now safely put another down payment for a humble, unpretentious and modest house in the suburbs.
Ever more ridicules ways to squeeze a penny out of the working man is justified in the form of childlike plays that are downright insulting to human intelligence e.g. (competing against other districts, Wednesdays really days etc).Perhaps the most “brilliant” idea comes from “metallurgy expert” who divided technicians into three different categories of quality: bronze, silver, and gold. Most- non PM technicians (me included) belong to the fourth category. “to be wiped out category” that wasn't even enumerated in this declaration of dependence. This is a prime example how little knowledge could be dangerous. This sick brainwave is nothing new, for is directly transplanted from 400 BC Plato’s Utopian idea of the “Republic” The “genius” who plagiarized this design, either didn't know its historical consequences or simply out of ignorance was completely unaware of it. I will be inclined to trust the later. Sears CEO  by authorizing these infantile ideas in his rapacious quest for profit is so detached from reality that he loses a healthy perspective on human nature. What motivates a five year old is quite different, from what motivates an adult who has a family to feed. The make-believe, we pay you -incentive for your sales, reaches preposterous magnitude. Candidly I would be quite content if in lieu of the monthly statement from WASP & PA sells they would send me the diminutive equivalent value of the paper they waste. If that wouldn't place me in a different tax bracket it would at least save some trees in the process.  Forcing employees to long working hours is nothing short of revisiting the feudal system of peasantry that toiled the soil from dusk till dawn. Certainly the decadents at Sears know how to change the American dream into living nightmare. This giant profit grinding machine based on force and Machiavellian philosophy, with its militia of managers –some incompetent and deficient in even basic social skills is quite revolting. No companies have happy customers without first having happy workforce.  Perhaps the Holy Grail to improve customer satisfaction lays in better treatment of their employees. Implementations of fundamental guidelines from ISO are indispensable to fruitful and productive employees. The later has always been, really is, and always will be the true asset of any company. 
Highly motivated, exceptionally devoted, frequently decorated employee of an hour. Yours thoroughly humble servant- Service Technician-  R.G.

As an associate paid by commission in a generally quiet business, my main task each day was to meet certain sales goals which, with the schedules that were assigned to me, was nearly impossible. My hours were typically opening, which meant I would often start one hour before the store opened. As a part-time associate, I was only able to work up to 4 hours on most days, so 1/4 of my day was already finished by the time the store has even opened. I took inventory of what we had in stock every day. The computers were so out-dated and the warehouse staff never updated what was sold or received, so it was crucial to us that we get a physical list ourselves. This usually also took about 30 minutes to an hour to do, no big deal if it could be done in the early morning, but one associate had to be on the floor at all times even before the doors opened (for "security" reasons), and there was usually only one associate in each department in the mornings. Plus, every day started with a little pep rally that always went on much longer than planned, and I believe was a much greater security issue than taking inventory, as it was mandatory for all associates (including LP) within the building to attend. Anyway, back to the quotas. With every sale you make, you were required to sell "Protection Agreements," Sears' in-house warranty which cost nearly as much as the products themselves. Your only chance at selling them was to hope you meet Richie Rich himself (who knows why he's shopping at Sears?), or get some confused elderly person who thought you were their grandchild to believe that Sears would actually fulfill their contractual obligation to service their appliances annually. Needless to say, experienced associates did a little thing called "cherry picking." Cherry picking was banned in the department's policies to ensure all customers would be greeted and treated equally, but it was obvious to us who was still doing it when you looked at who was making all the money. Cherry picking is simply the act of hiding in wait until the "right customer" appeared for the hopeful big sale. Another thing which was common was the act of "stacking" customers. Also banned, was strictly enforced by the associates themselves, not management, yet there was still always at least one "snake in the grass" as they would say. I personally counted three of them on a daily basis. It was almost a "kill or be killed" type of environment, especially on busy days, with each day getting worse as they continued overflowing the departments with new associates, hoping to squeeze out the old ones. They did this sort of "cycling" process to weed out employees they no longer wanted and forced them out to bring in newer employees who were inexperienced, and therefore easier to manipulate, but also didn't sell more than Sears wanted to pay them. Though illegal, associates were replaced with new people when they regularly couldn't meet unreasonable sales quotas. Their workaround for this was to find any and as many other reasons to possibly terminate an employee which didn't suit their needs. If you don't give them a reason beyond that, they have to keep you, but they will try to give you reasons to quit and will wait for you to make a mistake and exploit you as if you were a criminal. This was true of all employees, including all management staff, I've worked under four different managers and five leads in my two years with this company, but it typically came down on the smallest dogs in greater numbers. I was one of those unfortunate people. I was often asked to work off of the sales floor so that I wouldn't be able to assist any customers, therefore ensuring I'm not making any sales. The only thing I learned from working here is the way people changed over time after being stricken with greed and undeserved self-gratification is sickening, yet in this business, they are the people who thrive. Do not recommend working here unless you need a reason to take up drinking/smoking, it's basically required. If you like working in stressful environments, this is the place for you.

I have worked for Sears for 1 year today. I will say that this company is an absolutely terrible place to work for the reasons listed below.

1. No pay raises. I was told by my boss in a quarterly evaluation that "if" they do pay raises this year, I will get one. I am not too sure what the "if" factor is, but upon further investigation found out that a woman I work with who has been employed by Sears for 15 years has never gotten a pay raise. This does not seem right to me. Minimum wage is what you will get paid for as long as you work with this company, aside from major holidays. Time and a half! <-- A pro!
2. The associate discount can only be used if you are paying with cash, debit, or a Sears card. Any other credit cards are excluded. They do this because the company feels that since they are providing you with a discount, they should be able to make money off of you while they are doing it. If they aren't, then the discount they allow you is just not worth it. This does not seem right to me either, because the discount is not to show appreciation for the employees that keep the company afloat, it's there to make them more money hidden behind that pretty mirage of a thank you for being our employee.
3. There is virtually no chance of moving up in the company. I started as a seasonal employee. I was then moved to part time. From there, I was moved to full time. From there, I was moved to team lead. I am still making minimum wage with so much more responsibility. This is as far as you may get, team lead with the same pay as your fellow cashiers.
4. Getting customers to apply for credit cards. Now, this is not as hard as many of the cashiers make it out to be. I not only meet, but exceed my credit quota every month. The terrible part about it is how it is done. Customers are lead to believe that if they are approved, they are receiving 15 dollars off of their purchase today. Several customers go for it to save that extra money without realizing that it is being charged to the card they just got approved for. Now, this wouldn't be a big deal because they can just pay it off before the 30 day billing cycle is up and there will be no interest... but they do not allow payments with debit cards... which is what the world has come to! Cash or check only!
5. The loyalty program. Since Sears is no longer printing out catalogs, they have turned to electronic advertisement. To join the loyalty program (which is actually a really good one!) you must provide an email address and be opted in to receive emails. This doesn't seem like a big deal in the technology based world we live in now, but a huge part of Sears' clientele is older women who do not know how to operate a computer, much less create an email address. I have had several customers get angry with not only me, but Sears as well because they were not allowed to sign up for the loyalty program with their cell phone number alone. Women that have been loyal customers of Sears since they were crawling are discriminated against and forced into the world of technology that they do not want to be apart of if they want to be appreciated customers of Sears. Not right!
6. The medical insurance requires you to fill your prescriptions at Kmart. There are virtually no Kmart's around anymore... the closest one to me is about 5 hours away. What then?
7. Hours are hard to come about if you are a part time employee.

If you decide that you do want to become a part of the Sears team, be prepared to work a second job as well or keep looking for a better one while you are at Sears. It's a terrible company that does not appreciate it's employees at all. We are all dispensable.

Although I will add that the people I work with are absolutely amazing. I love my team as a family, and they are probably the sole reason I have stayed with this company for as long as I have.

I am going to be honest, this actually a review of two times I worked for Sears.  One in Alabama, and the other in San Diego.  I will try to clarify of which i refer to during different sections.  Over all the company was fun to work for, but only as a part time job while i was in school.   I never worked for sears as a full time representative.  

PAY:  The pay for sears at any location is bad.  They pay at or near minimum wage.  
Hoover: I made $6.10 when I started (a pay cut from my previous employer).  I got a raise to $6.25 after 1 year and new hires got hired on to my new pay (6.25).  That was agitating.  
San Diego: I was making $8.00/hr and threaten to leave the company for a competitor, so they gave me a raise to about $9/hr.  That matched the assistant manager to the hard lines department.  She didn't like that.

Over Time:  I didn't really get over time at each location but I did work holidays and even during my Sr. Prom.  I know i missed out.  But it was nice to see a few checks where i made like 100 extra bucks.  I only worked about 3 days a week because of school so i didn't see much over time.  

BENEFITS:  I didn't see much of the benefits, but all employees get an employee discount (a card) and it basically takes away the sale tax.  For full time i admit i didn't look into the full time benefits since i wasn't trying to be full time.  With me not knowing for certain how thier benefits are, i'm giving it a neutral rating of 3 stars. 

ADVANCEMENT:  This company did show that employees can advance, at both locations.  I saw several cashiers and MCA's (Merchandise and Customer Assistance) get promoted to supervisors and one to a manager.  a sales rep got promoted to Manager at the San Diego location.  He was actually a good manager.  I give 3 stars for advancement because i never actually tried to go for a higher position, they seem like they were fair but since i can't say how they went about promotions i am keeping it neutral.  

MANAGEMENT:  For this one, i'm breaking it down by location. 

Hoover:  The store manager was easy to talk to, i can't remember his name, but he was nice.  I believe he ended up leaving the store around the time i left.  The HR manager was a female employee and she did not like some of the cashiers or sales reps, especially if they were white.  I hate to make it sound like she's racist, but she is.  The supervisors for sales, cashiers and MCA's are separate but they were nice and fair to their staff.  They worked around employee schedules, needs, wants, medical issues, etc.  So they were actually good.

San Diego:  The Store manager wasn't as interactive with his stores staff as the Hoover Store.  In San Diego, he stayed around his office or by other managers.  The store was broken down between hard lines and soft lines.  Hard lines would be appliances, tools, lawn and garden, toys, sporting goods, electronics, to name a few.  Soft lines is clothes and shoes.  
There were assistant managers for the departments and when i got my raise it turned out i got paid the same as the assistant manager for Hard lines and she got jealous.  Which i never understood fully why, because i worked only three days a week so i made less per check than she did.  
She did try to get me fired based on me making the same per hour as her.  Thus is why i give management a 1 star rating. 

Job Culture:  This is where i give Sears the most credit.  This job by most people would say it sucks.  I however had fun.  As a cashier i got the the phone numbers to shoppers and female employees (They just gave it to me), and i was able to have great communication with my fellow employees and shoppers alike.  As an MCA i had more freedoms, built displays which was fun, organised the stock rooms, and could go practically anywhere in the store.  Shoppers made the job fun and some would buy me food from restaurants, or give nice tips (your not allowed to take tips, but if you don't say anything they won't know).  Its the culture of the interactions with the two that makes this job bearable.  I think i enjoyed it because of the two.  Thus i gave it a 4 star rating.

I first worked at Sears in Lakewood, CO as a seasonal cashier in 2005. It was my third job ever and I liked it well enough except as a cashier you have to push the Sears credit card which I don't believe in because it's a rip off. I was professional and still said my script to every customer. The head cashier really pushed the credit card; she'd even trick people into getting it. Even though the customers liked me and I got recognition, I was passed over to stay on as a regular after the holidays. The girl who got chosen over me was rude and even cursed at management, but she was chosen because she got more credit cards. One day a customer was saying how great I was and she would look for me every time she came in. I told her I didn't think I would be here any more because I wasn't on the schedule so I thought I was being let go. This lady went straight to management and berated them for firing me. Management ended up keeping me on, but put me on in a different department. I know they only did it because of that lady because the manager of the department I was moved to had gone on vacation that week and was gone until after I started my new position. My schedule was changed to 6am, a time I already told them was not possible for me. I pulled strings to make it to work only to find no one else there. I called and called until the first morning bus came and then I went home. One day the girl who got the cashier position over me was very late so I was asked to cover for her. When she finally showed up, forty-five minutes after I was suppose to be off work, she wouldn't take over the register and kept trying to make me ring up customers while I was trying to close down the register. She even closed the drawer on me while I was counting out the money and kept saying numbers to try to mess me up. Right in front of customers. Then she stood there chatting with a manager and cursing at him. I was so late getting off work that my ride left me and I had to call someone else to get me. That was the last day I worked at that store. There was a snow storm the next day so I couldn't make it to work, and after that I just gave up.
I applied to another Sears (Littleton, CO) later that year (2006). I applied for cashier, but got hired in shoes because I had experience. I liked my manager and pretty much had free range to work without anyone bothering me. My manager ended up quitting because her manager (softlines manager) made her stay late and come in early. I ran the department until the softlines manager sent in another girl to be manager. I trained her and after a month or so she also quit because the softlines manager had us doing fifty unnecessary things a day that we'd never had to do before and was trying to make us pick up her slack doing things in other softline departments. I trained another new guy who became manager after I rejected the position. I did not take the manager position for the same reason the last managers left. I ended up needing to move and requested to transfer stores because I would be too far to make it to work at the Littleton store. The softlines manager refused to let me transfer and was trying to get me to move in with her instead. I put in a two week notice and after I moved I tried to get to work, but it wasn't happening. I called in to say I couldn't make it that day and my coworker said he was told I quit.

Firstly, let me say I was recruited to Sears. I didn't seek the Assistant Manager position out that I was recruited for. The first problem began at my interview when I went over compensation with the Store Manager. I was told I that Assistant Managers starting out received a minimum amount. When my papers were drawn up by the recruiter, the salary on them was $5000 less than what the Store Manager told me. The recruiter said she needed the papers back right away, and though she was normally able to answer my emails within minutes, when I told her I had questions, she told me she would get back to me after I she received the papers back with my electronic signature. I waited for her to respond. She never did. I sent a reminder email the following week and she said she had responded- even though she didn't. My salary was never resolved, and the sad part is that another Assistant Manager who started two weeks after me received the amount I was told I would get. The salary I received is not competitive with Walmart, Target, or any other big box retailers- the salaries of which I have knowledge of.
Less than three weeks after I started my Store Manager was fired by a District Manager who seemed hell-bent on shaking things up. The turnover in Management in our district was really overwhelming which should have been my first clue. 
We had an hourly Loss Prevention worker in my store who was constantly sexually harassing the female employees and using ridiculously vulgar language. I asked HR to address the issue and was told it would be handled. A few weeks later, I found out the LP was performing investigations on associates that he didn't like. By this time, one of our female employees had quit because of his sexual harassment and was working with the EEOC to file a complaint. Another female associate was thinking of filing a complaint. I brought these issues to the attention of my manager and told him that District HR needed to get involved right away. He did not allow me to contact them. I instead brought the issues to the attention of my District Manager who assured me they would be investigated. Unfortunately, the issues were never investigated. Not a single employee was questioned. Nothing was done, and to this day, the guy still works there. I ended up quitting because it was unlike any quagmire I had ever seen, not to mention that Corporate HQ announced that no employees would be hired for fourth quarter and stores were going to be taking an across the board 35% payroll cut (or they could manage the cut themselves but would still be held to the 35% cut numbers). Overall, the people that worked at the store were great. The Store Manager that replaced the initial Store Manage was inept and old school. The District Manager was far too young an inexperienced and was only putting so much pressure on the stores in his district because he wanted to be relocated back East from where he originally came. The management had no people skills whatsoever and showed very little value for their employees. Having 11 years in retail experience, I've never seen the mess that is Sears, and I'm sorry I ever got involved with them. I will not be including them on my resume.

•	Expertise in installation of apache, IHS, IIS and good knowledge in working with configuration files like httpd.conf
•	Excellent Communication skills working with other team members, DEV, QA, Environments for problem determination, solving, troubleshooting capabilities. 
•	Experience in Installing and Configuration, administration of Websphere Application servers5.0/6.0, IBM Http server.
•	Install, configure and maintain Internet, Intranet, Application and Database Servers like WebSphere, HTTP Server, DB2 on diverse UNIX flavors that includes AIX and Windows Platforms (NT/2000) in a multi clustered high availability environments.
•	Responsible for websphere portal installation, configuring with web server hardware and software clustering.
•	Responsible for New environment setup creating cluster, cluster members Application servers for.
•	Involved in Federating nodes with DMGR, Created new profiles like base, default, managed,   and federated with DMGR.
•	Responsible for Administration of websphere application server creating websphere variables, configuration objects, JDBC resources, data source.
•	Involved in environment setup cluster services like hardware and software clustering.
•	Creating JDBC, data source resources creation for websphere application server.
•	Involved in integrating websphere application server with databases, oracle, db2, MySql.
•	Involved in JAAS authentication user creation, Websphere group creation for authenticating from databases, and user to configuration settings.
•	Developed UNIX shell scripts, JACL scripts to automate the WebSphere Administration (recycling the application server, deploying customer applications, logs rotation, monitor applications state, etc).
•	Package, build, Integrate and deploy enterprise J2EE applications on WebSphere 5.1/6.0 that involves EAR (Enterprise Archives) and WAR (Web Archives).
•	Involved in trouble shooting and performance tuning using Resource Analyzer and Log Analyzer. 
•	Managed the security and performance optimizations for EJB containers and web applications in IBM WebSphere, IBM HTTP Server and Apache web server.
•	Involved in infrastructure design for implementing SSO, with site minder policy server.
•	Installed and configured site minder policy server.
•	Configured websphere process server with the heterogeneous database.
•	Involved in configuring websphere process server according to the business flow in the organization.
•	Responsible for application changes across different platforms- development, testing and production.
•	Involved in monitoring, shutdown and boot up, Network Support and Trouble Shooting.
•	Worked closely with Project manager, development, testing and production team to align project deliverables, dates and report issues/concerns.
•	Involved in Load balancing/Tuning/Clustering for JBOSS Server using mod_jk module
•	Responsible for setup, Installation and Administration of JBOSS Application server.
•	Experienced in Installing and Configuration of JBOSS Application Server.
•	Expertise in working with NETWORK TEAM to setup load balancer, firewalls between 
•	Designed and developed scripts for MQ objects like Remote queue, MQ Cluster, Channels, Queues etc.

PROCESSES AND METRICS MATTER HERE - PEOPLE DO NOT.

This company will always be an also-ran as long as the culture of holding people accountable for things they cannot control exists. Slapped on us is the idea that we have complete responsibility for people and processes over which we have no authority. Managers are not allowed to manage. Initiative is squelched. There are frustrated employees at every level. This company epitomizes the slogan: the beatings shall continue until morale improves.

First of all, my work group is misbranded as a call center. We are salaried professionals stationed at corporate headquarters. Each of us has at the very least a bachelors degree and many years of genuine hr experience, yet we're treated like hourly minimum wage associates.

The newer vp tried to make things better in my group, and she has provided a modest success. But secondly, her source of information is the mid level managers. The flaw here is that her source of information, the mid level managers, grew up in this company on the retail side and are clueless about real life hr knowledge or other business cultures, even though they are all called hr managers.

Third, we support at least 12 businesses and they each have their own rules and cultures and hierarchies. 14 of us support the complaints, manager concerns, terminations, etc. for about 250,000 employees - 14 of us! (and 14 is a massive improvement over the original 8, but don't get me started on the "this unit designed to fail" concept).

And the mid-level managers could never understand the high turnover, chalking it up to nature of the business. We had four employees who were their familes's sole support quit without another job to go to due to the unrealistic demands in this job.

My coworkers are great as we all have the foxhole mentality. Its bad enough to have to listen to the dreck from minimum wage employees complaining about their work conditions, but we also have our managers who think that every case is the crime or the complaint of the century and expect us to treat each case in an unmanageable workload like its the only case we have.

ALL REAL HRS KNOW: sometimes people make complaints that should not be responded to! Don't give the whiners fodder! Allow the on site managers to manage! But here, at corporate, its all hands on deck all the time and you must "call 20 people and get everyone involved because there's an accusation that maybe someone said something to someone that could be construed to be something else and a manager in the store (1000 miles away from corporate) failed to follow up and now we should flog that manager." I mean the hamster wheel cycle of insanity never ends and I can get 100 cases that include this and other hr complexities each week. My managers look to the managing of "cases that aren't" as their own job security.

Many days I feel like I'm in a parallel universe, that this job is really happening as a bad sitcom. The enjoyable part? Leaving at the end of ten hours.

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