Thread regarding Verizon Communications Inc. layoffs

Digging their Own Grave!!!!!!

Current employee with the company and tenured. I started with this company when it was THE juggernaut of the wireless industry. Here we are in extreme lows and the retail side of the business was always known as the safer side of the business. This will be the case in point come tomorrow when retail employees are let go and it not being a safe place in the business any longer. Leadership election within this company has all been based on a favortism and popularity contest. Dedicated, solid, and good performing sales reps who weren't shady or unethical in their own sales practices get constantly left in the fryer. The middle management CONTINUES to promote people who have fluffed up sales numbers based on unethical practices and non disclosure that ethical reps look like under performers. Then they turn around and promote these very people who in turn, in no better words S--- as leaders. They exhibit no leadership skills that would qualify them for the position.

The day to day operations anymore consist of the most extreme pressures to achieve numbers from what they claim as YOY numbers with some ridiculous lift added onto it. Numbers that were achieved when someone within the company had a bright idea to give free tablets away and unethical reps that STILL work within the company were lowering monthly plans to add 2+ tablets onto peoples accounts telling them their bill wouldnt increase. Never disclose any activation fees to the customer. Verizon then assumes 100% of the subsidy on the device with an expectation to increase data plan usage to help cover the cost of the device to profit on the plan after 12 months. They then paid these shady reps 4k a month commission checks for this practice. Yet all of these employees still work with the company. But yet the people who run the business on the back end are the ones who are going to suffer the wrath of bad decisions made by middle management.

On the store level it feels like the gustapo is after you all day long and you are made to feel like crap if a new line doesn't go out with EVERY single customer. We are held to such outdated metrics that are no longer attainable. We are held to accessory revenue per device still even though that was a metric that made sense when phone subsidies existed. Now that phone subsidies do not exist we are still held to this outdated metric. The poor decision makers need to be laid off and not the people underneath who actually run the business and work their asses off to try and obtain these numbers that can no longer be obtained.

Start doing a better job of actually promoting and hiring true leaders and not dictators who arent qualified to be running the business. Let reps actually work again and stop treating people like sh--. This goes for the GM's, AM's, and DM's.

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Post ID: @OP+MFsKoKA

13 replies (most recent on top)

Haven't read anything so true in a while. Verizon preaches "Integrity". We even have "Integrity Corners" every Friday in the daily huddle. But when upper management sees a rep slamming a hum a jetpack and a gizmo on the same customer. Who has a basic phone will look the other way and send a good coaching

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Post ID: @wmc+MFsKoKA

"The middle management CONTINUES to promote people who have fluffed up sales numbers based on unethical practices and non disclosure that ethical reps look like under performers. Then they turn around and promote these very people who (are) in turn, in no better words S--- as leaders. They exhibit no leadership skills that would qualify them for the position."

-THIS. Right here. The cycle continues and continues. Not only this, but these same "managers" who were reps in the fat years fail to realize that the market has become completely saturated with extra devices and the consumers are smarter, now. This also creates an un-empathetical attitude toward their sales force. I would venture that if you threw any of them back into the SS position they'd PALE in comparison to their performance from just a few years ago, not to mention their underlings' performance now. . They base present performance on past markets.

Try looking at an account with three active tablets (two of which the customer wants taken off immediately), three grayed-out jetpacks, the customer greets you with "we don't want anything but the phone today" before you can smile at them and then get your a-- chewed off for not getting pull-through on a sale with which you actually managed to SELL (!!!) them $300 in rev. I'm not an under-performer, btw - in the event you want to rationalize my comment away.

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Post ID: @out+MFsKoKA

I'm going to be lame and disagree.

There are several reps at our store that 100% ethical and still make fat checks and that's me included.

The people that whine and complain about, "always having service traffic" or say stuff like "you're lucky" are the ones that take 45 minute lunches, take smoke breaks every hour, or are texting and calling their friends on the clock.

A "poor me" attitude just hurts yourself

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Post ID: @sfx+MFsKoKA

I'm new to the company, most of the people I work with are liars. I refuse to go along with the practices you outline, so I'm constantly berated by management. Someone comes in and has their phone stolen, no insurance, so they have to buy out the old and get a new one. You're expected to slam a HUM down their throats in the process. There is no humanity in the stores as much as the new training says "be human" your managers not only ignore it but write up a coaching on you for following the training you were given from corporate. I may never be at the top but at least I know I'll be doing right by people.

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Post ID: @nyy+MFsKoKA

This company needs more people like you.

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Post ID: @ypg+MFsKoKA

THIS STATEMENT IS THE 100% ON POINT! This needs to be posted everywhere so everyone can read it. I normally don't post anything but when I read this i had to say something. Thanks for being straight forward. Higher ups need to get this message.

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Post ID: @laj+MFsKoKA

Omg nailed it!!!! 8 years there, and who knows if I have a job or not tomorrow! And god knows my customers love me! I've continued to live the org. Credio..... but is that really what we are about?

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Post ID: @poo+MFsKoKA

Truth! Wow I mean really this is so true! I wish some of the higher up people in the company new what was even going on in the stores.

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Post ID: @gla+MFsKoKA

Total props. This statement is incredibly true on so many levels. We have all seen those managers who push the "manager special" to fluff numbers and get the recognition and promotion. When you hit the level where one gets told they are ready to promote but aren't because one isn't a cattle driver on a metric; that says a lot about the company and the expectations that are set. But what you propose would be much too logical. So much so that it won't happen. The disconnect is so massive between the command and the boots on the ground it's actually sad. We shall see what tomorrow brings.

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Post ID: @kus+MFsKoKA

This is true. Except the wireless retail store was conceived as a growth tool. Now the age of growth is over, stores are expensive as heck to operate, if if growth ever returned ( which it probably won't) it would occur through email commerce and not a store.

The desperate retail leaders are doing all they can to bail water out of the sinking retail ship even at the cost of integrity. But they will fail.

One smart store costs over a million just to open. Where an AR can accomplish this for pennies on the dollar.

It's over. Soon the company owned retail store will be in the history books. The job s---s anyways do you really want to do it forever?

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Post ID: @bmh+MFsKoKA

Spot On

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Post ID: @yus+MFsKoKA

Love it and couldn't agree more!!

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Post ID: @upk+MFsKoKA

Geez you must be in my district! So sad but true. Unfortunately I have always been ethical and not a booty kisser so... I get to wait for tomorrow and see what the future holds for me. I'm not a favorite or a slammer so probably a goner....

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Post ID: @rgv+MFsKoKA

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