Made an account to post this. On Reddit all the time without one but needed to complain, and can’t complain to coworkers. Will be long, tl;dr at end.
As title says, I feel like I am being targeted (discipline-wise) at my job. Have felt like this for awhile but today was the last straw and I am going to be looking for new opportunities starting tomorrow.
I feel like the management at my job has been purposely/unfairly targeting me the past few months. Meaning they have been trying to discipline me, and only me, for things that everyone else I work with also does. Today my district manager was at the store, I’m assuming just to have this conversation with me that I will explain.
DM asked to talk to me. Said ok, have before about other things. Turns out it was just to try to discipline me about stuff that my manager(s) have been complaining to her about that they didn’t bother to bring up with me personally.
I’m assuming the main thing was two days I was sick last week, since she said “I missed a few days last week.” I explained to her that I was sick, so therefore didn’t come to work. The second day (actually third day being sick) I woke up still sick and texted another employee who said they’d cover my shift if I wasn’t going in. So I texted them and since I was half awake and felt like shit went back to bed. I also was talking to another employee who was at the store and told my manager I was sick and not coming in. The big offense was that I forgot to ALSO text the manager and tell him, even though it was communicated to him. The person covering the shift answered me later and went in, tho said that they would be checking before we opened and apparently didn’t. But them showing up late to cover my shift wasn’t my problem, so didn’t care. But manager texted me when I was asleep and was mad I didn’t text him saying I wasn’t coming in. Keep in mind, he had already been told this. DM today told me they could have fired me for (accidentally) not telling manager I wasn’t coming in. I was bewildered bc people who work at this store do the same thing all the time. One guy does it really frequently, as far as I know management says nothing to him. Several other employees call out sick it’s seems like once a week or more, literally all the time. Management doesn’t care. I rarely miss work, way less than everyone else I work with, but apparently when I do it it is a problem.
Part 2 was that DM says I am late too often. I’ll admit, I am late sometimes, but I don’t prioritize my life around my work like American work culture teaches us to do. Showing up a few minutes late doesn’t actually effect anyone else at the store, also, OTHER EMPLOYEES ARE ALSO LATE ALL THE TIME, yet as far as I know management has not brought it up to them. The reason I am sometimes late is because I deal with depression and have an extremely hard time getting myself motivated to get up and leave. It was so bad about a year ago (before job) that sometimes I just couldn’t get out of bed almost all day. I haven’t brought this up with DM or management bc I don’t talk about stuff like that at work, but might now that they seem to have a personal problem with me. It’s not like I like it either. Also, before manager got promoted to that position (read: started getting paid a lot more) he was frequently an hour or more late to work bc he “missed his alarm.” He lives down the road from the store.
Third thing DM wanted to discuss was that I complain about our shitty working conditions. A few months ago a store similar to ours opened in our town, it’s a national chain and well known and took lots of our business. All us full time depart managers were getting 37hrs/week. A couple months ago management cut down our hours to 35, said hours might be different for awhile. Soon after our hours got cut to 30. This is all while I haven’t gotten a raise or promotion over the past year while multiple other people have, including people who have worked at the store for a shorter amount of time than me.
Anyway, management is apparently annoyed I complain about us getting less pay. Thing is, other people do too. And it’s not that I don’t mind having more time not working, but I’m at work because I NEED THE MONEY. And for some reason one of the employees got her 37 hours back and no one else did. DM was explaining the hours thing to me then said, apparently unironically a few sentences later, ‘we do have the money to pay you guys more.’ That really made me mad: you want me to put in more effort, but won’t offer more money, which is what I’m at work to put in effort for? No extra pay = no extra effort. Meanwhile most of these other people already get paid more than me. One guy got a raise randomly recently for really no reason. Just him, no one else. The reason I don’t put in as much effort as I used to is bc the other people don’t either but get paid more than me. DM said “in 60-90 days we could discuss a raise.” So they want me to work more for no extra.
Last, DM was not happy that I don’t work on weekends. I told manager to not schedule me weekends months ago bc 1) my position doesn’t really have anything to do on weekends and 2) I needed a more consistent schedule so I could have breaks from work. DM went on to say that at the other stores they don’t do that or the department manager switches every weekend with their assistant. Well, I don’t have an assistant. Also, right before telling me that I should be scheduled weekends because they’re our “busiest days” she told me I shouldn’t get mad at other employees (specifically the employee who got their hours back) redoes stuff in my department when I’m not there without asking me or telling me. Said that “they’ll be doing stuff like that on weekends because there’s nothing to do.” So ‘busier days’ apparently = ‘nothing to do.’
That’s what happened today. I’ve been not too happy at this job for awhile now and have thought about looking for something different but that is 100% starting tomorrow. One more thing here and that is going to be it. It’s not the first time management has gotten mad at only me about stuff, but now he doesn’t have the balls to talk to me about, even give a warning, and has DM come to complain about me instead. I’m try to figure out if I should even try to talk about this with them further or just start looking for another job.
Also, manager at the store is now in a relationship with another employee, the one who got hours back (coincidence?) which is technically not allowed at the store since his position has authority over hers. So I think DM may learn about that soon.
Anyway, I decided to post a rant here bc I apparently can’t tell anyone I work with bc it makes its way to management to get me in trouble.
TL;DR: District manager came to store to try to discipline me specifically at work about things all other employees get away with. First time with DM but not first time over past several months this has happened.