New day and age

My daughter; at the age of 26; has store manager experience at a major neighborhood general store.
Threw some change in events she left there and applied at a full line grocery store with stores in 5 states.

Before she ever started I warned her not to show her management skills even though she may see others doing wrong.
Let time pass and learn their way of doing things first.
She has followed this to the letter.

They started her at the bottom so while store management has knowledge of her skills the people on the floor do not.
She worked for 4 days as a cashier with little training before they promoted her to the floor and back store room.
Comes with same pay but more hours.

She has been in this position for 4 days now and this is the second day in a row where her on the floor lead man has pulled her to the side and told her to slow down.

She asked am I skipping steps by going fast.
No. You just do not need to work that fast.

After talking to her I find out store management and corporate office can track what everyone does threw micro management.
You put up a cart of groceries it gets tracked to you. They even track each cashiers items per hour. So corporate can find out how many cases or packages per hour each person touches.

So because she was raised to give you a honest days work for a honest days pay she is being criticized by lower management because she is showing them all up.

Really do not know what to tell her to do.
Slow down and be a goof off like everyone else or keep her nose to the grindstone.

tell her to fit in until she is the boss. More people get fired or laid off because they are difficult to work with of don't fit in than get fired or laid off because of lack of skills.

Difficult question. I'd say she should be herself, do what they ask but not compromise her beliefs. I believe she should work hard, set an example, and I think surely someone in higher management will notice.
I will tell you this, I had two men assigned to me, one a very hard worker and dedicated and thorough, and studious. The other, on his first day, went into the first guy's office, put his feet up on the man's desk, kicked back, leaned back on the chair, told the first guy to slow down, take it easy, no need to work so hard, let's just all relax around here!! We're gonna be here a long time, no need to go so hard. First guy now has my position, since I retired, making good money, and second guy is sitting home watching Days Of Our Lives.

This type of office politics is why I never worked well with large groups of people. I just want to work and do the best I can an go home to my family. I do not need to go out and drink/party with people from work. I do not need them to buy my kid's FFA fruit. I do not want to buy their kid's band candy.

I work as fast as I can doing a good job at what needs to be done. I do not work at one speed for x amount of dollars and another speed for y amount of dollars. I hate when people say they are not paid enough to work that hard.

I would say you daughter is in an organization that will be hard to advance in. The ability for every single thing to be tracked will make the best "bean counter" win not the best/smartest worker.

I could never work less just to fit in, I would go nuts. I only worked one factory job shortly after I learned to weld. I had several people tell me to slow down because I was making them look bad. Within a few months of starting I was doing the work that 2 people couldn't do in a day and was getting done so early I had time to play tricks on other employees. They didn't appreciate that or anything else so I only stayed about 2 years before starting my own welding business. If they don't appreciate hard work then it's likely there is not much future there anyway.

So the lead man is scared of her knowledge and ability but he can't do a dang thing about it because no one in management is going to allow her to be fired for working too hard, unless he can claim she was working unsafe or endangering others which he can't even lie about unless he is willing to weave a twisted web, that's why he whispers in her ear instead of taking any official action. I will never understand why so many people believe, as I am sure this lead man does, that having competent people on their crew is a threat to themselves when in fact it is the exact opposite, teaching people who want to learn and retaining people with ambition and gumption is the easiest path to managerial success. Good people make the boss shine, no one can do it all alone. I would advise her to not compromise her principals but never give the lead man any legitimate ammunition.

Back in the early 90's, fresh off of 8 years in the Navy, I was working for a bus company. They had 50 or so MCI's with Detroit 2 strokes in them. You would generally service 1 bus a day on the rack, including fluids, inspection, maybe a brake job and kingpins. I got a dollar raise after 3 months. I mentioned it to 1 guy. Next thing I know, everyone's upset. These guys were making 40-50% more than me, plus getting 20 hours a week overtime, while I got a straight 40. Once I figured out why everyone was mad (nobody had gotten a raise in over 2 years), I got busy on those buses like nobody had done before. After about 3 days, I worked out a system where I could service 2 buses a day. About the third day at that pace, the one guy I told about my raise came over to talk to me, said to slow down, I was making them look bad. I told him "too bad, you guys think I'm making too much money here?" He goes back, talks to the guys, then comes back and says "It's all good, they said they're sorry, can you slow down now?" So I went back to their pace. Nobody ever spoke of that again while I was there. I was only there a year, left to run my own business full time as it was taking off.

personally , I would keep working AT MY HAPPY PACE , but that's just me , I cant stand people trying to make a career out of a 3 hour job , and will do things to annoy the piz out of the pokeys,. til someone will get fired ,.. that's why I am my own boss ,. I get to tell the slow poke we we no longer need his help.. I have watched people dink around and piddle with a job and it amazes me that they stay on the ,.so wasteful with materials too,..

I had to let three talented programmers go over the years because they did not fit in. They were good, and they were fast, but their presence was disruptive.

She should be able to shine without showing up her management. If she can fit in and shine at the same time shew will eventually be promoted and can then unleash her full powers.

It is more important to be a good fit than to be fast at the work. Much, much more important. I cannot tell you how many others I have seen let go over the years because they were not a good fit for the culture of the place. The police department was death on rookies who did not fit in well. Regardless of their ability, they were let go by upper management if they did not fit in.

I work! Even when I was younger I was a "pusher". Get the job done. I always was promoted to Lead Man or Foreman quickly. Many times I was telling people twice my age what to do. It has worked for me in the construction industry but I haven't been in her situation. Also why I have been self employed for 30 years or so.

I've heard several stories like that from people from the south who went to work in union factories after WWII. Eventually they were worn down or threatened to slow down to the "acceptable" pace. I can kind of see both sides. I've hired enthusiastic employees that tried to overachieve and ended up making too many mistakes in the process. Giving your daughter's supervisor the benefit of the doubt, maybe that was his concern. However laziness and lackluster job performance is an epidemic. My son worked as a supervisor at a chain store for a while. Employees standing around talking was a problem. He approached 3 women who where goofing off and confronted them. They told him that "they be talkin they bizness". He reported them but his boss said that "under those circumstances" it was best that he forget the incident.
Unfortunately it's now the world we live in.

It's one of the reasons jobs are going overseas.

Not fer nuthin' but it's pretty easy to start a new job and be a ball of fire. After a couple weeks when the boredom creeps in people often slow down a bit. That's not necessarily laziness, it's just part of the problem of working in "Put bolt A in hole B" jobs. It's why Henry Ford had to raise his pay scale so that people would work hard at an incredibly boring job. I can not do that type of work, although I've done it before. I turn into a walking attitude when I'm bored. Nothing against your daughter, but stacking boxes or shelves is the type of thing that would drive me mad!

Common occurrence in a Union environment. Saw it many times when I was at GM and then at other OEMs as a supplier. Someone working too fast was told not only by their co-workers but by their UAW committeeman to slow down. One event sticks in my mind. At GM, we installed a bunch of automation in a shipping area, conveyors, etc that brought parts to a packing lane. A packer would then put them in the boxes/crates. Everything was computerized so the weight and volume of the boxes was known ahead of time and the packer didn't have to try and figure it out. The computer told them what to pack next and when to close out the box. Well, since this was a new job in the plant, we had to do a time study to set the rates for the packer. IE's were standing there with their stopwatches and the UAW got to pick the worker. They picked the slowest worker possible. I couldn't move that slow if I tried. It was like watching a slo-mo replay of a football play. All of the estimates for packing a crate were blown out of the water. Guess what? Plant had to add more packers. Fancy that, the UAW got their wish, add more unnecessary labor to the process. :roll:

I would say as Ted and 1948Case said, fit in, do good but don't be better than the existing best. After a while she will probably have her own department and can run it her way and make shine. Then in time, she will probably be promoted to an even more responsible position. I think it is terrible it has to be this way but I guess it is sometimes. Stealth excellence I guess, sneaking excellence into a company in spite of the company.

I worked union. Once in a while you would get some clown saying you were working too fast. I always told them I'm trying to work at a pace the contractor can make money at. Those " slow down" people should be ignored. I even had a steward tell me to slow down once. The next day I gave him a book on the function of a shop steward to straighten out his thinking. If both he and her know the amount of productivity is being monitored then the point is moot. Slowing down bad move. Everybody back to work.

Thinking more about this I will add . In union high rise construction you are largely a competitor of your co-workers. The job will end and everyone will be layed-off. So those who produce will be the ones kneeling on the last carpet and screwing on the last cover plates. Those who were late and unproductive will be in the first cut backs. You have little time or sympathy for those who made them selves go early on in the job. So this competition between co-workers is a good thing . Anyone telling you slow down is really trying to drag you into an early termination , is not a friend and should be ignored. They are her competitors .

The UAW union environment speaks for itself.

Thats the problem with SOME, not all, union jobs. The worker forgets or just doesn't care that the company has to make the max profit possible to keep the doors open. IMO this is a major problem and has caused many people to lose their jobs over time. The company isn't there to employ the worker, it's there to make money. People forget that.

(quoted from post at 16:30:48 11/07/16) Thinking more about this I will add . In union high rise construction you are largely a competitor of your co-workers. The job will end and everyone will be layed-off. So those who produce will be the ones kneeling on the last carpet and screwing on the last cover plates. Those who were late and unproductive will be in the first cut backs. You have little time or sympathy for those who made them selves go early on in the job. So this competition between co-workers is a good thing . Anyone telling you slow down is really trying to drag you into an early termination , is not a friend and should be ignored. They are her competitors .

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I worked union commercial construction for several years. What you say is exactly right. The worst slave drivers on jobs I worked were the working union officials. They understood that slow work and featherbedding meant the next big job would go non-union. Guys (and later ladies) were not only in competition with other workers but the non-union shops in town, we had to do the best work and the cheapest to keep a job over the long term.