I’ve been working for a mid sized fast food restaurant for about 8 months. I recently graduated high school so I am relatively young. The job promised easy raises, healthy relationships between staff and excellent training. “The team is your second family.” That sort of thing.
However, I make $10.25 an hour while other fast food places pay upwards of $15-$20. Most of the employees are 15-17 year olds who don’t know how to keep professional boundaries and are disrespectful to other employees and management.
I got “promoted” to drive through lead which was felt basically like a joke. I wasn’t offered higher pay and the other employees would insult my abilities and try to make the drive through position into a weird competition. There was one employee in particular who would make rude jokes about how he could do it so much better and that I shouldn’t have gotten the promotion in the first place. He would also openly comment on other employees looks which I just cracked up to be immaturity. I took time off for a vacation and then shortly came down with COVID.
After coming back from COVID, my manager called me into her office and told me that my drive through lead position is being taken away and given to the employee who had made demeaning jokes towards me. She said that I wasn’t showing enough “passion” and basically that I wasn’t doing a good enough job. It’s unfortunate because I hadn’t realized that this was even a real leadership role because everyone including management was treating it like a joke. I continued to do my best within the “promotion” but apparently it wasn’t enough.
I’m feeling disappointed in myself and embarrassed because I know that my coworkers will probably make fun of the fact that I got demoted and gossip about me behind my back. I feel disrespected and under appreciated. It’s embarrassing to the company that they allow young teenagers to treat other employees like shit with no repercussions. The manager is basically promoting these kids with no promise of a higher pay, basically leading them to believe that they might be able to get a leadership position in the future, with no actual advancement opportunities
The pay sucks, the management team is immature, the workplace gossip/cliques have gotten out of control, there’s no sense of trust between coworkers and it honestly feels like I’m working in a daycare half the time. The team doesn’t understand boundaries and takes racist and sexist “jokes” to a disgusting level. The district manager is even worse.
No amount of ice cream and “team building” can excuse this level of unprofessionalism and shitty pay but it doesn’t seem like anyone else cares. I’m led to believe that I’m the problem and that I should overwork myself in order to get any sort of recognition. I’m putting in my 2 weeks because this is bullshit.