The work isn't bad, but the management is awful. - Produce Clerk Hy-Vee Employee Review

2.0
Aug 10, 2012
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Make a minimum of $8.50 per hour, have scheduled breaks, nice coworkers, can accommodate the amount of hours that you want.

Cons

I worked in the produce department. I didn't mind the actual job at all, although you wouldn't want this job if you aren't okay with lifting heavy boxes. The reason I hated this job was the management. There were two bosses directly above me, the produce manager and assistant produce manager. They typically wouldn't work at the same time. I would constantly be told to do things a certain way by one, only to be told to do things a different way by the other the next day. The managers barely trained me or the other two people hired at the same time at all, but they constantly criticized the way we did everything anyway. The formal training all employees go through is completely inadequate. I couldn't even tell customers where the milk, eggs, and bread were on my first day working. One of the other new people quit a couple months in. The other broke down crying one day from being criticized but stuck it out. The last day I worked there before heading back to college, the produce manager told me I did a great job and he would recommend me to the Hy-Vee in my college town if I decided to transfer. I was surprised by his praise, considering he never told me that I did a good job on anything all summer. Additionally, Hy-Vee has the attitude that any manager can tell any worker of a lower level what to do. Many days four or five managers from other departments would wander through and tell me to work on something. Most of the time I didn't even know their name or what their position was in the company.

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Pros

Work life balance Flexible schedule

Cons

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CEO approval
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Pros

You get to constantly move around the store thru the different departments. Depending on the hours you work you can potentially learn how to do little things within each department, for example the deli or meat counters, which in turn opens an opportunity to get additional hours if needed when AOL doesn't have the business to keep all the shoppers shopping. Hyvee was always very good about giving you the opportunity to help in other areas of the store if your department was lacking hours or business to give you the full 40 for your work week.

Cons

The management/ chain of command often gets a little confusing as you have department managers, assiant managers, general mangers and a director. Often times I felt as if assiant managers sometimes gave different directions then the department manager would give almost condescending what you were told from your direct manager, but would fail to communicate with the department manager this info, causing conflict with employees being told to do it one way and then also getting asked why things were done that way after being trained to do it another way. Basically no communication by your assiant to the department manager causing internal conflict.

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