retail sales associate

merchandise manager

department supervisor

front end manager

customer experience supervisor

Sierra

Sierra Trading Post as it was told to me is a "solid working environment where the work is easy, the people decent & the hours reasonable". This is a lie & you're stupid for believing it. I work in a Fulfillment Center as a Dock Hand or "Receiver" so let me tell you how I see things. 

My duties include: Refreshing supplies for the Actual Receivers at their stations, cleaning up trash, moving pallets to their designated drop-off location, breaking apart damaged pallets, maintaining the  the entire area to ensure not only freight is being moved but also organized correctly, unloading truck & basically whatever else might be required to keep the area functioning at tip-top efficiency.

The problem I am facing as an Employee is that the management is entirely inept & completely insufferable as I have actually had Good Managers so I see their flaws glaringly. I was recently brought on board after what seemed like a massive changing of the guard and as such, I have been left to deal with a horrific power vacuum of bruised egos & a terrible Lack of direction.

 My first day I was barely given any kind of direction and left to just sort of "figure it out" getting no more direction than a quick five minute tour and no actual explanation of how things work. They also moved my shift, messed up my pay, tried to deny me a day of work they miscalculated (like they did to a few other employees, quaint) & in general failed to perform in a professional manner time and time again. Mind you I am no Saint of Professionalism, but everything feels like a ego trip with them.

 Over the course of the following weeks I saw the managers harass employees over conveniently enforced safety guidelines that only sometimes apply (when they feel like giving people trouble), give no direction to new trainees (myself and a few others included we just sort of floundered and figured it out), one openly told a female staff that they "Aren't doing as good of a job as a man would", give one employee a write-up because they saw a write-up because he was getting hand sanitizer, - The list is notorious, cruel and insane to be frank.

 The gaggle of managers I have to attend to are uninspiring, generic, pressure-mongers who have no actual skill in leadership so they go with the most common strategy of "let's make our workers miserable to get what we want and if they fail, tough". There is one good manager, surprisingly, and he constantly gets forced to do the things they can't be bothered to do like the cowards they are because he's "newer" than them.

 I have seen good people, bad people & average people get stomped in the face (metaphorically of course) by them because the managers are being ground down to snubs by the people in the top. The entire structure of management feels like everyone is looking for a quick way out, like a writhing mass of snakes too knotted to free themselves and escape this factorial nightmare.

 I have been here only a little while but I have seen everyone drop like flies including people who have apparently been here since October and some who were here even longer. They expect people to want to work at this charade, for low pay, with this kind of indecency thrown at their feet? Preposterous. 

The only reason I am still here is by what I can only imagine is an act of miracles or otherworldly causation. I have came here with no expectations, even telling my friends & family "This is a job you go into to make fast, dirty cash, turn heel and walk right out on" and they know this, the company. That's why they have weekly hirings. They will grind you, buckle you and treat you like the dirt they walk on. They know this because they are a failure of a corporation but life must go one, so people do in fact have to work here.

Many of the people here are nice, but that isn't because of the corporation, that is because they are good, decent people who need to eek out a life.
Do not come here. If you do, get a stable position as a Proper Receiver and not what I was thrown into. You're worth more than that, I assure you.

Things to note that you will need to or learn if you end up in my position: Pilot a fork lift, a slider & a device I had described to me as a Lift . You will stand around doing nothing at points because you will complete your tasks, so you will have to perform the astounding illusion of "looking busy" more often than not. On top of that, because of some nonsense reason, we have been placed on mandatory overtime, and for some people it has been mandatory since they started (yes, even the fellow who quit who lasted from October) even though every other position has been barred from requiring it. It seems like a punishment to be frank, like they want to grind us into dust then will end it once this batch of people (myself included) are gone, they will hire new people who will Never speak of what they did ever again.

The most Toxic Employer in Wyoming.  Complete lack of any Management skills or warehouse operations.  No automation or investment in an automated pick system.

Sierra advertises daily to replenish the employees that last 30 days or less.  Folks, there is a reason they are unable to keep help.  Extremely toxic work environment.  You are a number and that is all you are.  Start at $11.74 and that is as high as you will get.

Our on-boarding class is 31.  As of today there are two (2) of us at Sierra.  Listen to me, 2 of 31 employees in less than three months.  Atrocious rate of turnover.  The average new hire lasts less than 30 days.

First, the multitude of advertising for open interviews.  Everyone is hired so don’t worry about felony convictions at Sierra.  Sierra now advertises in Greeley Colorado to obtain employees from the meat packing plants they are that desperate for help.

The on-boarding is done by HR folks that know absolutely nothing about the production floor and the requirements for the jobs.  Here is your first RED Alert, Sierra spends an hour talking smack about Unions.  Why?  Because they should have a Union to protect the abuse of employees and increase the wages and benefits.

Secondly, there is no tour of the production floor.  Why?  Because Sierra does not want you to view the horrific work conditions and talk to current employees.

Your first day of work you are provided no, none training.  In fact, during your entire employment with Sierra you will not be provided with training.  Sierra invests no time in training because the average employee last less than 30 days.

The rules change on a daily basis depending on the direction of the wind. A lack of basic fairness is a good way to fuel a mutiny at work. When person A gets scolded for the same behavior that gets person B promoted, it feels like there’s no clear rubric for advancement, and it creates a sense of favoritism among employees.

Very disorganized management. If you request a day off several weeks in advanced for something such as court they schedule you anyways. Has happened multiple times for court and child’s doctors appointments. Have confronted managers about it was told they would fix it but they forgot to do it and was written up as no call no show. Conveniently no one remembers me telling them. Scheduled very little despite being on time and working twice as hard as others but constantly new people are hired giving away hours many need. Because I wasn’t informed on a policy that Im allowed to approve certain discounts and because I called in twice once when there was a shooter threatening schools closing down my childs school and another time my child had a fever and unfortunately being a single parent my childs school will not allow my child to come in when sick I was not eligible for a raise in the yearly review. It doesn’t matter how long or how hard I work. Very undervalued there. But the manager who has a child taken care of by family not a single parent he can completely relate after all he also makes considerably more and has family support. I struggle to survive, beg for more hours know others trying to pay for school also needing more hours but instead of giving the hard working dedicated employees more hours they just hire more people. Have been told by management that my lunch break was optional but I don’t think that’s even legal. They send out weekly 20% off to customers at least we get that discount every few months. Was getting paid almost $1 more for my years of experience. Then minimum wage increased, now I make 20 cents more. But no one cares.

When I first started working here, I genuinely enjoyed my job. Retail has never been fun or fulfilling for me, but this job actually was. Management seemed to care, the job itself was easy peasy, and pay was decent. Part timers were getting upwards of 30-35 hours the first month that the store was open. Then as the holidays creeped closer, things went downhill so fast. Corporate started pushing the TJX credit card harder and management was giving us impossible quotas, cutting hours, and taking their frustration out on us. Loyal, hardworking employees were quitting left and right. Coordinators were allowed to aimlessly wander the store without helping with recovery and go over on their breaks by 10-20 minutes with no repercussions, but regular employees were pulled aside and lectured if they chatted with another coworker while working or were 1 minute late back from their breaks. The only thing that mattered was cards, cards, cards. We were told employees who got more cards got more hours, despite some getting way more hours on registers, and thus more card opportunities than other employees. Management was a complete mess, they were always having disagreements and talking behind each other's backs. They preached the "open door policy" but many of my coworkers put in complaints about a specific coordinator and nothing was done, because the coordinator would get more card signups than anyone else. Because of this, they are continuing to lose employees, even brand new hires are quitting after their first or second day. Customers hate being bombarded by every employee in the store asking them if they want to sign up for a credit card but corporate couldn't care less. Sierra sadly won't last much longer if this keeps up.

Throughout my time at sierra the position I was in deteriorated due to many factors. The main one being completely understaffed and the other the lack of decent pay. The store manager is a phenomenal person who cares greatly for all her associates. But other managers were not the same and caused a toxic work environment and led me to feel like I was in a lesser role. The work life balance is disgustingly bad and they expect 8.5 hour shifts at a minimum and 9.5 hour shifts once you are an ASM. There are many great associates who cared deeply about getting the job done but to the same extent there were many who were deplorable and consistently came into work late, hid in the bathroom, did not complete any tasks. Unfortunately due to the stance the TJX companies take on termination, there was quite literally no possible way to fire these people and the company continues to allow these people to work their scheduled hours without doing any work. The pay is also something to be desired. At my height I made $17.50 hourly which was after a 50 cent raise. Whereas all associates who previously made $11 hour were bumped to $15. This gave coordinator positions a bump of $1000 yearly and associates (including part time high schoolers with no previous experience) a bump of $8000 yearly. So those who were carrying the store all felt pettied. The company direction was also no longer desirable as they cared far too much about saving face than boosting associate morale and making their stores a good place to work. This might be good for a part time role but do NOT rely on this to be a career. 

I worked in the warehouse, order filling department, and the receiving department. I loved working in the receiving department, that was fun. For order filling I worked my tail off to get the most orders filled acuratly in the least amount of time and received compensation up to $13.50 (highest paying job I received in my life so far). Until I turned a corner too fast and twisted my knee. I was put on light duty and given a task with little tools to do the job. I did an excellent job with the tools that I had, but was told it was taking too long, I seeked help from maintenance for better supplies to do my job faster and then was told it wasn't good enough. Then my supervisor asked if I took the job seriously and I was furious! He knew from the time I began there till the time I ended that I was constantly improving my work. Going faster, working harder, becoming relied on for various warehouse duties, thinking smarter. I even came up with ideas that he implemented to make the order filling to other store departments faster. He took all the credit for my idea however and did not acknowledge it to his boss. In the beginning of this job we received free benefits! By the end they have taken our free benefits away and charged us for our chosen benefits, making it the least paying warehouse job in Cheyenne. Lowes and Walmart distribution make more money starting. Typical day, repetitive! Pick up order, grab order items, put in cart, send cart to shipping. repeat. I moved to receiving for a while and I loved it! At least I got to use my brain more in receiving and even improved my receiving scores! However the economy hit and I had to take my job back in order filling (which also explains the lost benefits).

The pay is typical of retail these days but is not up to what is expected of you.  Payroll is consistently cut every week to a point where you can not even get the basics of your job done.  No sales floor employees is pretty typical now.  Only one cashier and a supervisor on weekdays to run a store.  In the evening you will have two employees and one supervisor.  On weekends there are a few more employees but not nearly enough to keep up with demands of the business.  The store gets deliveries every other day but there are too few employees to process or put it out so it just sits in the warehouse.  This is not due to the inability to find employees but due to the store having no payroll to actually hire or to give to their few current employees.  Too much is put on the store management to keep the store running due to the payroll cuts.  They also find it very hard to keep up with the workload that constantly grows as more demands are put on the store to preform with less.

Promotions are rare.  They mainly hire from outside.  This is due to the lack of mentorship and training company wide.  The main focus is on expansion rather then  giving the current stores a solid base to grow from.

Overall the employees are solid and fun to work with but the morale overall is low.  I would love to recommend working for Sierra overall due to it being a TJX company.  The benefits are very good and inexpensive.  It has huge potential.  Unfortunately, I just can not recommend taking a job here until the company loosens their payroll belt that is strangling the stores.  They also need to invest in proper training and mentorship to grow current employees into new positions. 

2nd shift was from 3:40 p.m. to 12:20 a.m. Every packer had their own station to wok in. As a singles packer, a large majority of what I packed were shoes. I had an area where the order pullers would drop off 3 or 4 shelved carts with product. I packed one cart at a time, which consisted of scanning the pick ticket with an RF scanner to bring up order and customer information on my work computer. Then verify that the order pulled matched the information on the computer. Print out an invoice address and return label. While those things were printing I had to package the order. If it was shoes/boots then they were put into thier respective bags. If it was other types of items, they were put into the right size box. I had to do this job quickly and accurately. To complete the order, the invoice, return label and any possible inserts had to be in the box or bag with the item and the address label affixed to the outside of the package. I stayed at a level 6 pay rate for 2 years, my items out per hour had to stay at 96 or above per hour. I recieved many accuracy awards, my highest was for 52 weeks error free. I enjoyed this job because the pay was excellant and the benefits package was one of the best offered in that town at the time. I would often agree to be there for volunmtary overtime but during the holiday seasons overtime would be mandatory. The only part I didn't like about this job was the amount of time I couldn't be home with my son. My work hours vs his school hours meant we spent time together on the weekends but it was nice that I did have every Friday and Saturday off.

The company continues to hire new employees while slashing hours to the point some of their full timers can’t even afford housing and have struggled to find accommodations. Leadership above management fails to provide ample support and acknowledge the efforts of the team while they are visiting knowing that everyone is working extremely hard with far less than they ever had before. There is also an associate there that works and often dips into overtime which is a slap in the face to other associates that have had their hours cut and in addition to that they belittle other associates over the walkie for asking simple questions that aren’t asked to them answering for others that were asked in a very hostile (aggressive) way. I would not recommend working here unless you want to work extremely hard without acknowledgment from leadership(above actual store management) as all they do is visit without gathering the team up for a minute to provide so much as a thank you for continuing to work so hard and become increasingly demoralized and belittled by an associate that thinks they’re a manger and spends almost all their time in the store even complaining when they come to shop on their days off about how things are a “mess” and in the case if you are a male being told “you boys don’t know anything”

couple quick pulls then off to warehousing, then I would take my breaks and get back to the task at hand. they didn't expect too much and was willing to work with you. the management could use a little more work, but over all they did get work accomplished. they didn't judge and would put anyone to work and would reward extra work being done. I would say the hardest part of the job was that I got pawned off on warehousing way too much, and had to cover slack from my coworkers or a lazy lead. the higher ups were understanding down to earth good people that noticed all the hard work I was doing. they would give me praise that would motivate me to do more and more and try to push myself even harder. there was always a goal that I would try and set for the day to achieve and exceed. while working there I learned to work by myself without having to be watched, how to hold myself accountable, and take action even if there is not much work to be done. they trained me to be good on a hyster forklift and can operate it very well. I was always way above standard time and completed each task in little to no time. what I enjoyed most is that I didn't need direction and could accomplish a lot all by myself. I knew how to do almost everything the forklift department had to offer and working there was very easy for me. I liked this job very much and enjoyed almost all of it

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Retail sales associate 6 salaries reported	$13.18 per hour
Merchandise manager 5 salaries reported	$18.00 per hour
Department supervisor 1 salary reported	$17.00 per hour
Front end manager 3 salaries reported	$16.92 per hour
Customer experience supervisor 23 salaries reported	$18.52 per hour

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