Lack of a concrete manager training program. For a company that expects it managers to manage high volume, multiple outlet operations you would think a two month management training program would be standard fair. This was not the case. You receive a couple days of "following another manager" and then you are let go and expected to get the culture and ways of HMSHost. Then when you become overwhelmed they bring you down for a talk that has HR present so they can document for your file to give the impression they are trying to help you.
Communication is horrible as emails are received continually from upper management, hr and accounting. Each is high priority and requires immediate attention and when you can't keep up you are looked down upon. When new programs are rolled out you get the information the day of the roll out or after. There are no meetings to discuss new procedures or these roll outs. Instead you get forwarded emails with "make it happen". This is all while you are doing your daily audits and controls. It seems at this location LP is the biggest focus. The overall theme is all staff are stealing and they need to be punished. In the ten years I have been a food service manager I have fired only a handful of people and have only documented another handful. Here in three months I fired or was part of firing at least four employees and writing up at least a dozen. The atmosphere is negative and there is no support.
To make matters worse teamwork on the side of management is non existent. Every manager is so worried about losing their job they make sure to cover themselves by throwing other managers under the bus to make themselves look better. Backstabbing is encouraged by the upper management. Support from the branch manager is non existent with staff. The staff feel they can take any problem to her instead of going to the department head. She then listens to them and takes action instead of referring back to their manager to solve the issue. This promotes no support or respect for her team and leads to her managers being ineffective on the floor as every decision is challenged and taken to her.
On top of that you are ignored if you confront her on this as I did when I asked that she encourage the staff to take their issues to the department head instead of going straight to her. This would show teamwork and support in her managers. Instead she is telling her staff she has no faith in her managers and that they can do whatever they want. In my area my staff ran the restaurant and when I tried to change it I got back lash.
Of course when you are having issues they make sure to cover the butts with statements that say:
Well we told you it would be different than street operations.
We informed you that our training program is self motivated and we gave you the book.
Well you are a high performing manager that is why we hired you. We don't understand why you can't keep up with our demand. The manager you took over for has not been fully staffed on managers and he did fine. (of course he has been there for over 2 years ahead of me and totally understands the HMSHost way of doing things but they dont' look at how he has brought the operation down in standards and that was why we kept getting complaints)
Overall this company at this location doesn't focus on development at all. This is the one thing that would take care of all their LP issues as staff would be happier, managers would be amazing as they would be trained appropriately and the operation would be at a higher level than it is now.
When training consists of emails, you know something is going to happen badly. Through this I have learned to ask in interviews if there is a formal training program.
