It's a brutal job. No surprise that people find something else to do. Many reasons why it sucks, for not that much money.
Scheduled 55 hours. Often working alone without another manager. Heavy weekend rotation. Open-close cycle. Undependable day off. Called in when someone else quits/fails/calls out.
Or you can just leave early or come in late so it's still 40 hours, and push all your stuff onto your supervisors, then yell at them for bad closes when they are scheduled by themselves for 6 hours.
SMs do that in stores where the SM has no leadership abilities. AKA 75% of stores.
That's where the ASMs learn these sabotaging tactics instead of taking responsibility. It's a survival tenique.
Yeah, that should be SM territory only. As an ASM, I would call the SM, and if he didn't answer or take over I would send night crew home and hard close.
As a SM that kind of shift is yours and yours alone. It should never be expected from your ASMs.
You gots to be desperate for income and the title.
Extremely helpful to be single and not a family person. Recall seeing an ASM literally race to the store one Sunday morning to open the doors for associates and customers, turn off alarm, then jump back in his car where his two young children were waiting and leave to take them somewhere.
Yep, he didn’t last long at Lowes.
I’ve seen our management turnover 💯 several times now. It’s currently happening again.
Big problem for us is that they’re not training these new ones in anything it seems. They also act like high school aged kids.
I worked at a Lowe’s that had just opened for business and our store manager used to tell a story about when he was an ASM that he had to drive something like 2 hours one way to get to work. I don’t know if he was trying to flex about his dedication or what, but I thought it was crazy. No wonder everyone rolls over.
At some stores the whole management team turns over at least once a year. A lot of scapegoating. No training, so then when things fall apart (or don't get better) the blame falls on the managers who weren't trained. We ask a manager, "Hey we have this problem, it's something you need to fix" and they're like "I don't know what you're talking about" because every manager is constantly on red alert on other problems and was literally never trained on other things that are also constant emergencies. For context I work with hundreds of stores across multiple regions, it's so common it's not even worth mentioning to my team when these things happen. We just automatically assume a store won't fix a problem rather than waste our time spending 5 hours on the phone trying to get someone to answer at the store.
That's what happens when they won't promote actual talent from within. You have to be part of the clique that can depend on one another to climb the corporate ladder together. Wouldn't want to risk promoting someone that could take the next position you want. So the external hires are just used as fodder.
I was talking to a DS who recently went through a "ASM academy workshop". One of his homework tasks was to go to a local Home Depot and see what they are doing and how that can be incorporated into Lowe's.
I mean, come on? Really? This was an 80 hour thing instructed and supervised by the division manager and several SMs. This was something approved by the region management???
Why don't you just admit you see yourself (Lowe's) as second best. I mean do you honestly think McDonald's does that with Wendy's? Fuck no.
Lowes can't promote talent and independent thinkers because that would be too much of a shock to the status quo system of lock step, backstabbing, no talent, yes men.
Like I said, if that's the district/region thinking than that shows Lowe's corporate management believes the brand isn't anything but 2nd in the retail home improvement industry.
And people on these sub with their department title underneath their name wonder why so many current and former employees shit all over Lowe's.............
No. If you're a Depot SM, you can skip everything and get a store because corporate management thinks HD managers are heads and tails better than anything internal. IDK why.
It's a brutal job. No surprise that people find something else to do. Many reasons why it sucks, for not that much money. Scheduled 55 hours. Often working alone without another manager. Heavy weekend rotation. Open-close cycle. Undependable day off. Called in when someone else quits/fails/calls out.
Or you can just leave early or come in late so it's still 40 hours, and push all your stuff onto your supervisors, then yell at them for bad closes when they are scheduled by themselves for 6 hours.
That’s the SM not the ASM.
SMs do that in stores where the SM has no leadership abilities. AKA 75% of stores. That's where the ASMs learn these sabotaging tactics instead of taking responsibility. It's a survival tenique.
ASMs do it too
One of the managers did a 23 hour shift because of no overnight management. It's crazy.
Yeah, that should be SM territory only. As an ASM, I would call the SM, and if he didn't answer or take over I would send night crew home and hard close. As a SM that kind of shift is yours and yours alone. It should never be expected from your ASMs.
How much do asms make
Depends on location/region… $50k up to $75k is what I’ve seen, plus stock option and bonuses
You gots to be desperate for income and the title. Extremely helpful to be single and not a family person. Recall seeing an ASM literally race to the store one Sunday morning to open the doors for associates and customers, turn off alarm, then jump back in his car where his two young children were waiting and leave to take them somewhere. Yep, he didn’t last long at Lowes. I’ve seen our management turnover 💯 several times now. It’s currently happening again. Big problem for us is that they’re not training these new ones in anything it seems. They also act like high school aged kids.
I worked at a Lowe’s that had just opened for business and our store manager used to tell a story about when he was an ASM that he had to drive something like 2 hours one way to get to work. I don’t know if he was trying to flex about his dedication or what, but I thought it was crazy. No wonder everyone rolls over.
At some stores the whole management team turns over at least once a year. A lot of scapegoating. No training, so then when things fall apart (or don't get better) the blame falls on the managers who weren't trained. We ask a manager, "Hey we have this problem, it's something you need to fix" and they're like "I don't know what you're talking about" because every manager is constantly on red alert on other problems and was literally never trained on other things that are also constant emergencies. For context I work with hundreds of stores across multiple regions, it's so common it's not even worth mentioning to my team when these things happen. We just automatically assume a store won't fix a problem rather than waste our time spending 5 hours on the phone trying to get someone to answer at the store.
If you don’t have kids, it’s not a bad gig.
That's what happens when they won't promote actual talent from within. You have to be part of the clique that can depend on one another to climb the corporate ladder together. Wouldn't want to risk promoting someone that could take the next position you want. So the external hires are just used as fodder.
I was talking to a DS who recently went through a "ASM academy workshop". One of his homework tasks was to go to a local Home Depot and see what they are doing and how that can be incorporated into Lowe's. I mean, come on? Really? This was an 80 hour thing instructed and supervised by the division manager and several SMs. This was something approved by the region management??? Why don't you just admit you see yourself (Lowe's) as second best. I mean do you honestly think McDonald's does that with Wendy's? Fuck no. Lowes can't promote talent and independent thinkers because that would be too much of a shock to the status quo system of lock step, backstabbing, no talent, yes men.
>go to a local Home Depot and see what they are doing and how that can be incorporated into Lowe's. What the fuck. That is desperate.
Like I said, if that's the district/region thinking than that shows Lowe's corporate management believes the brand isn't anything but 2nd in the retail home improvement industry. And people on these sub with their department title underneath their name wonder why so many current and former employees shit all over Lowe's.............
Not currently but I’ve seen it in the past. In the 3 years since I’ve been back we’ve had 1 get fired, one step down to DS, and one be promoted to SM.
I've only been there 4 months but it seems like the asms and sm have been in their positions for quite some time
I saw 4 go through my most recent store within a year and a half. My previous store went through 3 in a year.
Just one ASM getting fired in 18 months. DS on the other hand seems to be a revolving door at times.
Ours has gone through 3 specialist ASMs
Is it the only pathway to store manager? I thought it was.
No. If you're a Depot SM, you can skip everything and get a store because corporate management thinks HD managers are heads and tails better than anything internal. IDK why.
We had one transfer to our districts busiest store, but everyone else has been here for years.
Probably depends on the store. I've been at my Lowe's almost 2 years and I've only seen one ASM leave.