Rant by a shift supervisor

[dfkjghdfjghfdjh]

I'm 20, female, from Melbourne, Australia and I've worked for McDonald's for 9 months.
I started in the kitchen. My interview was terrible, the store manager asked personal questions about my past/religion etc and acted like I didn't have the job. He called up the next day and asked me to start in 2 days. I had no orientation, no SOCs completed on me, wasn't shown around the entire store, just plonked in the kitchen. They told me I'd be working 8 - 4/monday to friday but forgot to mention that rosters are posted on the wall and that they'd change my shifts whenever they felt like it. If I didn't know something, I was blamed. If I wasn't super fast at something, I was blamed.
I worked at this store for 3 weeks and was then told by another crew person that my name was on a list in the breakroom (no managers told me anything about it) to be transfered to a new store that was being built by the same owner. I moved to this store and within 2 months, I was completing the integ book for the managers every day, responsible for transition without any supervision and sometimes I was left in the kitchen for 8 hours by myself and our store may have not been very high volume being new, but $400 breakfast hours + having to make smoothies/yoghurts/salads/tand oori/turkey presets/stockup/frozen is a lot for ONE fairly new crew person to handle.
I begged to learn front counter because I was going insane in the kitchen but they said they need me too much in kitchen. I persisted for 3 months until one day they let me out there for half an hour. A week later, I was told that I'd be ordertaking PLUS be the only person in kitchen for 3 hours every morning because "we just don't have enough people" and I was screamed at by this 2nd assistant if there was a wait on any food, even though I was stuck ordertaking! I also did the full cleaning every 2 weeks on the shake/sundae machine.
Two store managers then swapped stores and the new one made me a crew trainer and asked if I had any desire to be a supervisor. I told her I wanted to, so she immediately ordered me a Cert 3 book and I quickly did the bridging module to skip cert 2. Well! This was a wonderful experience. I had about one month to complete my entire shift supervisor book which is about 6 inches thick. They had me opening the store by myself and working for 4 hours as the only "manager" when I had only done about one module of my book and was still in the old crew uniform. I did this for about 3 weeks and then off I went to course. Everyone there was so ahead of me, being there for years. I got a "quality" shirt pin for getting a 100% exam and off I went back to work.
I was taught how to do cash for about 2 minutes and then was expected to make no mistakes. The other managers usually got irritated if I didn't run an excellent shift or have perfect control over crew members that had worked there years longer than me.
I've been a manager for about 2 months now and my favourite part is *I* get blamed for not being as fast as other managers/crew backing up front counter. I somehow remember begging to learn front counter and only being put on it 2 months before becoming a manager. I have STILL not been trained in mccafe and the other managers feel it's way more important to train more crew, and that I should just pick it up as I go. They put me in bad positions, like 4 trainees all starting at 11 AM on a particular day with NO crew trainers without telling me they were even coming. I had no uniforms to give these people, it's ridiculous. Oh, and I got put on salary without any discussion and earn the same amount as I did when I was crew for more hours.

[JLM]

My advice? Shut up and get a different job. One thing your employer can never take away from you -your right to CHOOSE. Don't like it? CHOOSE elsewhere....

[LHJ]

A word of advice to you, young lady. Take full advantage of Mcdonald's educational benefits and further advance your career. After you've earned a degree or 2 and you feel ready to conquer the world, do so. Become certified and then take your experience and education elsewhere that has more to offer someone so deserving as yourself.
I read your entire post and I just want to say that I'm in love with you. I hope you become manager over me someday. Take Care sweetie.

[Stan]

OMG i cant believe it!!!! you only clean your shake machine every two weeks!!!! its one week in UK! filthy beggers!

[Unknown27]

Go find another job. You're obviously not good enough to serve in the McDonald's production area.

[stackz n all]

i have only two months to complete my sse im scared but my maccas luv me....

[Some Person]

LHJ wrote:

A word of advice to you, young lady. Take full advantage of Mcdonald's educational benefits and further advance your career. After you've earned a degree or 2 and you feel ready to conquer the world, do so. Become certified and then take your experience and education elsewhere that has more to offer someone so deserving as yourself.
I read your entire post and I just want to say that I'm in love with you. I hope you become manager over me someday. Take Care sweetie.

Corny....

[a girl]

gross you only clean the shake machine once every 2 weeks...and ince a week in the uk....i am so glad that i live in the usa we clean our shake machine everynight

[Unknown27]

You CLEAN the shake machine every night? As in all of your syrup injectors are taken apart, cleaning, then re-calibrated? All of your mix is dumped every night, the vats of ice milk scrubbed clean, sanitized, then re-filled?

I don't believe you. It takes about four hours to do and not many stores (if any) can afford that. It's not worth it when standard procedure is once every two weeks.

[sad2ndasst]

i think when stuff like that happens it's because the store manager isn't investing enough time in training it's managers. it's bad enough we have to figure most things out for ourselves--those amoung us that actually care to learn, store managers need to take lots of time to guide new managers....i don't think anyone should be rush-promoted....especially when they're only a teenager.

[Unknown27]

It's not the Store Manager's job to train people. It's their job to run the store. Training managers and crew falls to the First Assistant and/or the Training Manager.

[Liberal Leaning]

Unknown27 wrote:

It's not the Store Manager's job to train people. It's their job to run the store. Training managers and crew falls to the First Assistant and/or the Training Manager.

The company that I work for has it structered so that either the 1st asst or store manager is your coach when you begin the verification proccess to become a shift manager..They are to work with you thru out your book...My "coaching" was being told to ask another manager for their old book and copy the answers...I did not do that and in the end I got paid for none of the time I worked on my book and I was running shift the day I got the promotion although that was a full 9 months before I was scheduled to take the certification test...Mcdonalds training can be very effective if the rules set up by the corporation are followed but sadly they are not...

[Unknown27]

Their structuring is the problem. Your coach has so many lessons that it needs to go through over so many hours to ensure you have all of the required knowledge memorized. Writing someone else's answers isn't effective, and only created ineffective managers.

[Liberal Leaning]

I agree with you 100%..I had no coach and yet I learned so much from the book because I took the time to look up the answers in the O&T manual...It made me aware of how much our store was suffering from improper training and nothing was being done by the RM to address it...

[none]

Stan wrote:

OMG i cant believe it!!!! you only clean your shake machine every two weeks!!!! its one week in UK! filthy beggers!

illinois every night during over night shift,
calibrate clean, inside reivoirs, syrup hoses inside and out dip tray sanitized

[Unknown27]

Liberal Leaning wrote:

I agree with you 100%..I had no coach and yet I learned so much from the book because I took the time to look up the answers in the O&T manual...It made me aware of how much our store was suffering from improper training and nothing was being done by the RM to address it...

Unfortunately that seems to be the common theme in a lot of stores. Some Store Managers are so bogged down (or yes, just lazy in some cases) that they don't focus on what they should be doing. The store then suffers until someone is able to revive the programs that should be in place.

[Unknown27]

none wrote:

<quoted text>
illinois every night during over night shift,
calibrate clean, inside reivoirs, syrup hoses inside and out dip tray sanitized

That is specific to your store then because of the overnight maintenance. It's not standard or required every day.