My former manager, now best friend, is currently working her first day back from her maternity leave. We used to work together, I was her assistant manager, and was made acting store manager when she left. Two weeks in to her maternity leave I quit. Because of how little I was getting paid, how much I was expected to do, the store is falling apart, a lot of things were going on that corporate (home office) didn't really seem to care enough to fix or handle.
Fast forward a little and they've replaced me with someone that is God awful at the job, leaves at random and has people come in to spy on the staff, won't divulge her previous work experience to said staff, thinks Twinkies should be renamed because it could be considered offensive to the LGBT. A real bag of fun. January is inventory season for this company and the new ASM has done absolutely NOTHING to prepare for the inventory, has been gone for two weeks because she's “sick” despite only providing a positive COVID test two days ago so she'll be out for 5 more days, and has left absolutely everything in the hands of my friend who has been gone for two months. It's worth noting that no one higher up (district manager, regional manager, whomever) had checked in on the team until yesterday. So it's been a bunch of teenagers doing their best with no one helping them.
So my friend is now being forced to work a 13 hour day to do EVERYTHING for inventory prep by herself and is being made to work 6 day weeks for the rest of January. Bear in mind she has a 2 month old and a toddler at home that she still needs to be a mother to while her husband gets settled in his new job.
This is the bullshit that lead me and, I've found out, two other managers in our district to leave. Insane expectations, bullshit pay, zero help and support, no work/life balance. Home office was comfortable letting my store go through holiday season with one working credit card reader, a broken register counter, holes in the ceiling, wall fixtures falling apart, overstocked inventory with no storage space, etc.
I dunno. I'm mostly just complaining but I desperately wish there was something I could do to help my friend.