Continuing from the previous entry one submitter sent us a copy of an actual email from a DM. It hurts my eyes just to read it. Submitter, you have our sympathies."HEY EVERYONE JUST A LITTLE NOTE TO ALL OF YOU. SO FAR THIS WEEK WE ARE LAST IN THE TERRITORY. AS ALL OF YOU KNOW I HAVE SENT OUT A LIST OF GOALS. THEY ARE VERY REALISTIC AND REACHABLE. I DO EXPECT YOU TO GIVE IT 100%. WE HAVE TO GET THESE SITS UP AND THE CURRENT PRS IS TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE. I WANT THE COLLECTIONS PRINTED AND USED AND OUT ON SALES TABLES. DO NOT EMAIL ME EXCUSES, OR YOUR OWN IDEAS, BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT WORKING! ITS TIME WE GET CONTROL OF PAYROLL AND OUR STUDIOS WHERE THEY SHOULD BE. ITS A TEAM EFFORT. I DO HAVE A COUPLE OF STUDIOS THAT GIVE ME 100% THAT RUN THE PRS, THAT GET THOSE SITS IN. PULL UP THE DAILY SALES REPORT AND COMPARE. WE HAVE 4 DAYS TO PULL US UP, AND I EXPECT GREAT THINGS. PRINT OUT THE GOALS I SENT EACH OF YOU, SHARE THEM, AND ACCOMPLISH THEM. AT THE CLOSE OF EVERY DAY I WANT AN E-MAIL OF WHERE YOU ARE WITH ALL THESE GOALS. DON'T MAKE ME HUNT YOU DOWN FOR THESE STATS. ITS YOUR JOB! NOW LETS ROCK THE REST OF THIS WEEK. DON'T GO OVER HRS I GAVE YOU, UNLESS YOU DO MORE SITS THAN I GAVE YOU...... THANK YOU"
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6 comments:
Sounds like the desperation is starting to kick in, as it should. While out Christmas shopping today, I walked past my old studio and it was DEAD. And this is supposed to be the busy season. There was one family in the reception area and about 6 employees(including the manager) standing around socializing with each other. So much for saving on payroll,huh?
Ick. My DM writes to us like this all the time, except the e-mails are much shorter and include lots of EXCLAMATION POINTS!!!!!
Sad to see we arent the only ones with this happening. He "yells" at us in e-mails, but face to face tells us we are the "Rock of the District"
I worked for JCP Portraits and got emails like that from my DM too. Must be in our manager's training book too lol.
Devils Advocate...
I actually agree with 100% of the complaints I see on this site. But, I would also like you guys to see what we see in DM land.Contrary to popular belief - I do not manage by using caps..although I found that absolutely hilarious.And it does'nt surprise me that it's true.
I was a DM for 5 years,and recently lost my job this fall due to performance.(we were way in the red)Before we jump on managements back and make them out to be the bad guy...I think we need to look at ourselves. I had 15-19 studios at any given time. Part of my job was to look at your no show/cancellation rates.And investigate the issues.I would simply pretend to call the customer and confirm the appointments.In every single location I would find fake appointments being made.In the studio.That's frusterating.I realize that is was most lkely not the management - but it was still happening.In every location.
Outreach - we also would have to investigate the validity of these appointments - I'd say 40% of my districts and the other districts that I looked after due to DM maternity leave..medical leave ..etc.. were also false.The amount of energy that went into making false appointments astounds me. Why not just book the real one ? But here's the thing.. I hated trying to sell to you guys that outreach was not telemarketing.Because no matter how you slice it, it was.
I hated telling you guys you had to go down to single coverage during the*off* season.So I would discuss it with you all on conference calls and then during one on ones -I would end up giving you extra coverage anyhow.Believing that you would hold up your end of the bargain and get those extra appointments- be it smile searching..via phone or acquistions.That never happened.You still ended up with the extra labor though.I was such a sucker,and this is why I no longer hold my position and have gone back to being a studio associate.
My point is - there are good DM's. They know what it is like being from the field and do their best to work with you from that point of view.We have families to take care of,too.And DM's do not make alot of money.Contrary to popular belief. We work 7 days a week. But we sign up for that.We don't sit on a couch eating bon bons taking calls while watching all my children. We have check ins from studios and forms that need to be filled out showing what we worked on with you guys,etc. Our office days are usually are longest days of the week.Usually not getting done until 9 or 10 at night..and trust me..those TM's expect us to start our day by 630/7am.
We also get yelled at,screamed at,told we are failures and that our people are failures.We keep all of that from you guys.That's no way to motivate a team. Studio-Field has no idea what our calls and our visits are like.We protect you guys from all of that.You really and truly have no idea. V.P.'s and CFO's look at your numbers on a report..and ask why we still a studio manager who is doing so poorly. Without knowing anything about you or what you do in your studio.We try to explain what hard workers,go-getters,PRS drivers,photography gurus you all are. They just wave all that off.All that matters is the end result.If it were your business - would you write them a check from an overdrawn account week after week?We get asked that alot.
Ever wonder how you have more outreach done on some weeks than you thought ? Well some DM's get so tired of getting yelled at over a studio shooting 25 customers in a week and booking one outreach appointment..we just do some for you.you use 100 hours to do that..let's say I even give you fifty hours to handle the 25 customers. What did you do with the other fifty hours? Someone has to do it,right? Why not the DM ..not like we have anything else to do.
Spending your own money - I have never told someone they had to spend their own money to hold an event. I lay out the ideas/options.But also gave them plenty of ideas for events that cost 0 dollars. I spent thousands on event kits to be passed around the district.( that i dont get reimbursed for.) in hopes it will drive business.For what ? For some studios not to book a single appointment .. or for other studios not to even bother picking up the kit on their scheduled day.(and i always paid mileage and drive time and if you couldnt get the kit I made sure I brought it to you.) Or my favorite - the only sittings shot with the event kit were associates family.Why? It was very frusterating. And for those of you who are going to tell me that DM's get reimbursed.. I'll just tell you only sometimes and at certain times of year.So when I spent hundreds of dollars per event kit..I could submit a pro forma and it didn't always get approved if I did it on my own accord.And then to get the kits back.. with half of the props missing or damaged.Well that was the straw that broke my camels back. I stopped buying new things. I expect wear and tear from kids. Most of the damage was not being stored or transferred properly.Just not taking care of things. It was always very disheartening.
My people. I loved my team.I bragged aobut them,shared their work with everyone including the higher ups at corporate.We were so photography driven.I taught my people how to shoot lke a private studio in the high end of town would shoot.None of this cookie cutter malarchy you see on passouts or coupons.My people were bad ass. We usually got yelled at for thinking outside of the box and we never were five star. I would look at all the five star studios work outside of my district every round. I would pull up hundreds of their sittings and it would never even compare.It's easy to get a five star by using mechanics.Five Star studios rarely ever have WOW photography.It's all mechanics.How boring.I found our work far more inspiring and our customer retention rate was huge because of it.But we were never given any credit. We got bitched at instead.I'd be more than happy to share with any of ytou the model released work we shot if anyone wants to leave an email address.
PRS. Pre photography really does work. I could go into studios and only one or two in the district would actually do ( sitting card review) pre photo.Why? If you know it works - why just blatantly ignore instructions? And im not talking toing pre photo in the thick of it. I'm talking in January.. blank session cards.Same thing goes for session planning. I always got alot of lip service from my people. But when I inspected things, it didn't happen.This is probably where I failed.If i performance managed everyone who wasnt doing what they were supposed to be. I'd be running 18 studios by myself.Even though my team didn't do what they were supposed too, I still loved them and went out on a limb for them all the time.If they only knew how many times I had to go to bat for them to keep them from getting fired becaues of performance their heads would spin.I put my name on the line time after time because I kept expecting them to just listen to what I was saying. I guess they just didn't want too. And I didn't want to fire people over small things like I was directed,so I lost my job. I blame myself,yes.As you can see though,I'm not 100% at fault.
Corporate stopped letting us buy gift cards and contest prizes,etc. any of you that have got them in the past year.. that's money out of your DM's pocket.Not reimbursed. TM'S stopped approving those things a year ago. I was always buying gift cards.. i even offered up cold hard cash for contests. The sad thing is, half the time the associates didn't know about the contests.And only half the studios would ever particiapte.I'm sorry if you think fifty dollars isn't enough.But that's all I got.If I didn't take the money out of my own pocket-there wouldve been nothing offered.No contests.Then you'd be complaining about that.I never once told my people how they were supposed to spend their winnings.Some chose to use it on their studio for a morale booster - some would keep it.My philosophy was that you do what you want with it.
I read this entire website today. I think one thing that is lost in translation is that DM's are not corporate.They are also field management.We don't make rules. We have to enforce what's brought to us. We think the 4.99 sucks too.We think your abused by customers all the time. We think that you guys having to always go against LY..instead of just focusing on this years profit also sucks.We also thinnk the bonus programs are ridiculous.Going against LY with a bad economy is a joke.We also think the apopintment scheduler is a joke.We fight your fight with corporate all the time over it.but then when they investigate and find you have fake appointments in there ..we're the ones made out to be the idiots.But we still take it.We think the single coverage in a high volume studio is insane.But we also know some of you schedule how we expect you to in the browser..then carry a paper schedule of what you actually do in the studio. We are on that.
Not all DM's are idiots.There's so many that do go the extra mile.Before you judge, I'm just saying walk a mile in their shoes.It's really hard to give a fair opinion on something unless you've been on both sides of the fence.I have been. I love what I do,and will never leave the industry.
You guys work very hard for ltitle glory.And there are a handful of you out there who do everything 100%. But seriously.Not everyone does.Trainers out there knoiw what I'm talking about.You see it in studios when you visit.
I believe in the plight of the studio manager. I'm one of you.But I won't judge anothers position without knowing all that it entails. I could go on for hours about this...and some of you would have your minds blown at the abuse we take/took as DM's. ( I still have a hard time saying Im not anymore.)
Sorry for the typo's -it's time for me to start supper and I just want to post this.
I hope some of you take what I have to say to heart.That's all.
I feel sorry for my DM. She is no longer able to be a friend because of the Regional Mgr. So I got my last write up before discharge for something stupid. I guess she is being threatened by the Regional and therefore can't be a friend at all to me anymore. My DM is all business at the moment no hellos or anything. She just hands out the write ups and expects me to sign it and she leaves. Sad.
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