store manager

Sports Direct

In a typical days work I am usually placed on a till where I am commanded to sell bags for life and magazines (I get warnings if I don't) - but if I am not on a till I usually hang items up around the store and try to help customers out as much as I can so that they have a good experience of the store and can be in and out as quickly as possible (Due to the large mass of rails and compact space, it can be very frustrating for customers to use the store efficiently)
    Although my overall rating of the store is quite poor I have learnt quite a few good things which can help an individual to work well, such as carrying tasks well as this keeps the managers from becoming annoyed with the staff. To be respectful to everyone who enters the store (Believe me, I've served all kinds of people, and under any circumstance it is best to stay polite)
   On the management side of things, the managers are alright at Sports Direct.They try to give clear instructions and will try to motivate you where they can. Problems only arise when you aren't selling bags for life (We do not gain any bonus from selling bags for life) As it seems as though the only reason you are being employed is to get the managers extra money (They get bonuses when a bag for life is sold) 
   Overall the Co-workers are really good to get a long with and I can't give any criticism as it is really easy to get along with co workers at sportsdirect.
   The hardest part of the job must be serving rowdy customers, and as I wrote earlier on. The best way to deal with all obstacles in this kind of job is to stay polite. Even if the customer in question leaves all of their departed shopping on the till, stands and waits for over an hour for a manager or making obscene comments. The best thing to always do is to stay cool and keep polite.
   The most enjoyable part of the job is knowing a customer has come in and out of the shop with what they want, without their time being wasted - making the customers visit to the store as compact and easy as possible is the most enjoyable part of the job as you usually receive thanks which is quite good after being consistently told to sell bags for life "Or we may consider firing you".

I usually help and advise customers when they query or have interest in the companies products and services. This allowed me to see how customers have more trust in someone who is knowledgeable about the companies products and services. I also found that the customers tend have a higher sense of trust in me as an advisor.

The most difficult part of the job was when i started to see that the retail industry wasn't where i saw myself in the near future. This made me realise that i could do and explore so much more in life and open doors to other career paths.

During work typically, an average day involves tidying up products that may have been misplaced such as clothes, accessories, sports equipment and garments. During peak hours at work, we are required to attend terminal tills where each advisor has face to face contact with purchasing customers. I learned that during this particular time, an advisor has the opportunity to up-sell the customer by mentioning uses and functional information about small, handy items that are displayed around the cash terminals. 

The most enjoyable part of working in Sports Direct was working in a team. I believe that when working in a team, each and every member of the team should be happy. My co-workers, i must say are an incredible team to be working with, the communications between one another is spot on which allows the daily tasks and obstacles to be completed at ease.

Mornings on a footwear depart started off with delivery. Normally 10-15 cages to unpack sort out into new lines and replenishment. Experience of the products we already had in stock helps with this. Then I would start to put stock away numerical order. Leaving out a right foot for display. Once that was done we would security tag the stock to go out on the floors. Organise the team so that this was getting done effectively on all floors. Then there would be a team brief to tell everyone about the new products before the shop opened. By the time the shop opened all teams would be ready to serve. I would then check the rota see who the assent manger had in for today and create a floor plan so each cast member of staff performed to the best. As a department we had certain products the company wanted pushed and some staff needed encouragement to push them.

The shop a worked for had over 100 staff there was only 10 staff including mangers that were full time. So full timers were there to supervise the staff that were on 0 hour contracts. 
I lot of the staff to work for sport direct were taking on at 16, just left school some of them lacked confidence to talk to customers. 
I learned how to lead a team, be productive, motivate and encourage struggling staff. Spending time with them to help them out and seeing them gain confidence it was probably the best part of my job

What is the best part of working at the company?
Good people if you get lucky which I did, fun and interesting customers that definitely make you laugh

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
The job itself is boring and repetitive and still hard work. Working on tills and clothing things do get boring when doing the same things repeatedly like closing down the two. Serving customers is good and always the good part.

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
Some of the people are easy to get along with others are not, which can make things stressful. Even worse when some employees are lazy and don’t even do the bare minimum.

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
I do closing shifts on weekdays and that is serving the last few people and closing down the tills and the queue area. Closing down just means making things look neat and tidy for the next day and emptying out tubs for employees tomorrow.

A weekend shift is over lunch at peak times. I am on tills the whole time serving lots of customers whilst still having to empty tubs behind tills if they get too full with things like security tags or size cubes.

Very helpful and great managers to work with. This job is a sales job so its be the best, and this is a real challenge and it has brought the best out of me; very competitive and the winner gets more hours and makes more money on commission. This job has boosted my job confidence and has molded me with taking on responsibility and pushing me to the best of my ability. I have extended my communication skills. Really fun, challenging and comfortable place to work. 
Sports Direct - Ipswich town centre

What is the best part of working at the company?
Great team atmosphere. Always happy and welcoming.

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Nothing that springs to mind. Good teaching from the off makes working stresses.

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
Very good. Everyone I encountered from the company was very pleasant.

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
Stocking shelves. Assisting customers with knowledge of products and service and manning the tills.

This company gets portrayed very poorly by the media, however I found this a great place to work. It is my favourite job that I have had so far. If you put in the time and effort required you can progress very quickly into management. I thoroughly enjoyed it here and made great friends.
Zero hour contract worked really well for me, it meant I could work more hours and earn more money, or if I had commitments (I was studying at the time) I could work around those.

when I first started the job it was fun enjoyable I wanted to come in everyday and do overtime but the management changed which has caused the staff to not want to work here anymore because they pick up on every single piece of detailed blame you for other peoples mistakes and make you fix it till days on end and that's not right. the people  do work that are in the same shoes as me are fun to work with but the management does not allow us to speak so we are stuck the there for hours being unsociable

Work is similar to a lot of different shops dealing with a wide variety of customers which can ensure that no two days are the same. Though the negative reviews of the zero hour contracts can hurt the image of the company competent workers are almost always guaranteed hours also as prove yourself as a worker willing to put in the effort.

The job is great to earn experience but unfortunately if your under 21 you will earn no money. They will give you terrible hours, the shifts are a mess, even if you are working well they wont give you more hours like they say they will because they will give all of the managers hours and than the seniors even if they work worse than you do.

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