Shift leader role

[Jennyboo152]

I am a shift leader on nights in an extra and I am left by myself at least twice a week from 10pm till 7am, with no manager in the store or another shift leader, surely this isn't ok? I am held accountable if the rotas aren't complete or if exceptions are not signed off, I am also held accountable to adjusting people hours on frog even when the manager is in. Does anyone have an advice or knows if I'm being treated unfairly.

I've been doing this job for 3/4 months now and I've never been so miserable or felt so under appreciated in my life.

[Teddybonkers]

I'd step down - the job isn't worth the hassle. Tesco didn't want to pay managers decent money, so they expanded the Shift Leader role to more or less cover the same job. Its a p**s take and you've clearly fallen victim    

[Beanny]

You should always, as far as possible, have 2 managers/shift leaders on at any one time. In my store we have all agreed that 2 will be a minimum on each night. When there are holidays we might have to work for 7nights on the trot, but it is better than being on yourself which can be extremely stressful. Speak to your fellow colleagues and come up with an agreement to have a minimum of 2 on each night. Good luck!

[Sherwoodforest]

@jennyboo is that a two manager,2 shift leader setup?if it is,theres no reason to be on your own ,id ask for shift leader role pack and read up .shift leaders are to run shift while managers do rotas and run dept

[Bobmay]

My advise for people on here is that unless you want to become manager one day I dont advise you to become shift leader.You are basically a manager with less money.

[NightAndDay]

What an absolute week in my store I work in an express and the hrs have been cut drastically. Shift leaders one on one in a store that takes 100 grand a week. Nothing on the shelves for actual customers that make the effort to come to the store to shop because it's all in the warehouse and no one to work it. Then to top it off we get a visit from a chief lizard to ask us why our whoosh results are shocking.   

Sounds to me like your Store Manager isn't resourcing staff properly, as a shift leader you've got to learn to give extraordinarily short shrift to anyone above your store manager, if they're asking why Whoosh results are so bad ask them "Why are you coming to me, managing whoosh is above my pay grade."

[whatajoke2019]

@Jennyboo - I imagine it's a big fat 'no'  but do you even have any 'step ups' at all in your store?

Surely if something happened and you had to leave the premises when you're by yourself there'd have to be someone competent enough to take over?

[Rumblerumble]

It is literally the worst job going. One on One working, where nothing gets done, then your Area Manager comes in, gives you a kicking because this is not done or thats not done.

Awful job

[NightAndDay]

The area manager should be managing your store manager, if you're under resourced that's down to your store manager, not you, sounds like the Area Manager is quite naive to the world of managing.

[Rumblerumble]

The area manager should be managing your store manager, if you're under resourced that's down to your store manager, not you, sounds like the Area Manager is quite naive to the world of managing.

He really is.

[Happyguy]

For entry level managers/Shift Leaders in Retail, it's par the course for the industry. Not saying it's a great salary, but it is what it is.  It's reasonable for the stage of development most would be at for that much. The competition most likely won't be paying much more than that, if at all.

Experienced Retail Team Managers should be on no more than £40k a year in my honest opinion and £50k a year for Express Store Managers (£55k for London and Fuelsite)

Personally if I was a shop floor worker at Tesco today and I was unhappy in my role and/or with my pay I would simply leave the company, wait a few months, and come back to head office and earn £179k/year.

It's simple.

I thought that's what everyone did ?

[NightAndDay]

Usually people not working as a manager on the shop floor aren't looking at working at Tesco as a career, the majority of people that are working at Tesco in a non-managerial capacity are either students, people in a stop gap or a supplementary income earner and because of that, they only really care that it pays enough for them to get on.

If people are qualified enough for other roles that pay more, then logically they should be doing that, that's what I did, graduated from uni, stuck it out at Tesco for 2 years as a shift leader and got a graduate position elsewhere, developed from that, jumped ship for better pay, experience and exposure and ended up where I am 3-4 years after leaving Tesco.

[whatajoke2019]

Just wondering something re: the role of Shift Leader.

If you had 'x' amount of SLs in on one night e.g. three (for theoretical purposes) and a TM as well, would all three be expected to take it in turns as to who is running the shift or would all 3 just work 'together' instead of 1 running and the other 2 filling as normal e.g. meat, grocery?

[NightAndDay]

The above hypothetical is exactly the sort of inefficiency Tesco is attempting to get rid of in the business, the idea as far as I'm aware is that the TM role is now meant to be more admin heavy and office based and the 1 Shift Leader per department is supposed to manage the operational side of things.

There may be brief overlaps where you have 2 SLs working together, but typically, as in Express, there's a sort of psedo-hierarchy where 1 shift leader would informally be regarded as higher up than another (though with no added pay and the "perk" being more  preferential treatment by managers). In which case the matey boy SL would be expected to lead and generally do the hard yards.

[General Thorn]

My store has this happening most days.

TMs on the shop floor every day, shift leaders having to be moved into colleague shifts when holidays or sickness arise. We do have a 'head' shift leader who would run the shift but generally does not get the hardest jobs or the aggro that the others get from the SM.

[NightAndDay]

I'm guessing the above happens quite often in stores that have trouble retaining CAs, nothing unusual there to be frank.

[oldfashionedplayer]

There's information on the tesco help page (not colleague help one) that days about shift leaders, saying they are there to run the shift and delegate, which then allows managers to use their time elsewhere in the office setting etc.

Can't recall which bit, but remember reading it when searching about them. I know for us they all just have to run around anyhow

[trivi]

Has anyone found it easy to step down and still retain the majority of their hours? I want 25-30 hrs as CA but all jobs advertised are 16 or less

[NightAndDay]

Unfortunately not, CA shifts are rarely available on full time hours, if you have a good rapport with your managers and if superstore is anything like Express for staff shortages, you could reasonably suggest a 20-25 hour contract with preference for overtime to make up some of the hours.

It's a good idea to let your intention be known to your manager asap so they can accommodate you, but generally, your choices are as above, leave the company or stick it out as SL until the vacancy becomes available.

[Alvor the grear]

I wonder if anyone can help someone i know is a full time shift leader in a express store in outer London. There manager only lets them know there rota 1 week in advance which I think is ludicrous, so they only found out there xmas hours the week before. Not sure how you are supposed to make xmas plans and travel arrangements at such short notice? I work for tesco in a superstore format and we get 3 weeks notice of rotas which I thought was policy?? I wonder whether the manager thinks he is a law to himself

[penguin]

I did shift leader for a year in Express, rota was always done 4 weeks in advance. Also just to say it was the worst job I have ever done in my life, basically another shift leader and I ran the store for a year as the SM was useless and just used to sit in her office and cry all the time if anything went even slightly wrong, area manager even said he knew what she was like but she was related to someone fairly high up in the company and so basically he would not dare risk his own job by dealing with her. The crazy thing is that SM is still in her post and according to those working at the store still acting in the same way.

[Itiswhatitis40]

Anyone a shift leader in a store with twilight's?  I was wondering whether your team managers ever open or close the store, those on the twilight shift never see their manager unless they are on late and finish around 9-10pm which maybe once a week if we are lucky and usually the same day each week so if you don't work that day you don't ever see them.
The morning team tend to see their manager as apparently the management team are designed to be in the business on a day shift and the shift leaders do every open and every close.  Apparently some of the team managers have refused to do them.

[Sandman]

Yes shift leaders should be opening and closing the shop. Managers should be manning roughly 7am-10pm.