Retail Management Industrial Placement Review

When I was in store I worked my way up from a store assistant to assistant store manager position. As an assistant store manager I was responsible for the day to day running of the store and personnel management. This role was particularly focused around driving store KPIs and sales. Head office work has involved group work on projects related to logistics and store operations. We had to present our findings to the directors with recommendations.

During store time, I became more responsible as I progressed from a deputy to assistant store manager. With the assistant store manager role I was responsible for the day to day running of the store; however, the store manager would often take the lead. When shadowing, I had little responsibility as my mentor would expect me to observe and note take. I was also set trivial tasks which didn't provide much insight into the area manager role.

I have developed my confidence across the course of the year through interacting with people at different levels across the business hierarchy. I developed my management and leadership skills in store as I was responsible for a team around 30 people. I also developed resilience through the many early mornings and late finishes. I have continued to develop my presentation and data analysing skills through the head office project work as well as use of company specific software.

The store managers had had IPS in their stores previously so they were very keen to teach me new things and were generally supportive in my development. However, especially over the busy periods I did feel like my management development was forgotten about as I was simply used to stock the shelves or sit on a till. Overall, feedback has been sporadic and I would have preferred more regular feedback as I often left guessing how well I was progressing. I feel there is a contradiction between your mentor being the manager of the stores you are training in and I think the mentor role was often confused due to the conflict of interest.

You are not really encouraged to socialise outside of work and during the course of my placement there were only 2 social events for area managers and IPS. The company culture is very confusing. In stores, you feel like you are cogs in a chain; as when the line manager would visit they would not interact with the store assistants and merely speak to the store manager. I was also surprised at the lack of empathy demonstrated by the area managers in general and their approach to management which can be overwhelmingly negative.
The area managers often gossip about personal matters which I deemed to be unprofessional. In addition, the atmosphere is very cliquey as the generic feeling is that area managers have a disinclination towards IPS.
The company structure overall is very old fashioned and hierarchal and I do feel like the value of their people is often not prioritised.

On the one hand, the year has been challenging which has made me more resilient. I have definitely developed personally and professionally which will serve me well in other jobs and I have a wealth of examples to demonstrate key skills. Working over 50 hours is excessive compared to other placements but I do feel like this pushed me to develop more.
I did enjoy the atmosphere in stores as it was getting to know people more on a personal level and we were shared in our goal of giving the customer a good experience. The stores were very receptive towards having an IP and I enjoyed working as a team. There is often the culture of breaking IPS by the stores and area managers which I disagree with.
At head office, I enjoyed the data analysis and presentation skills. I found I enjoyed this experience more than in stores. Also there was a better work life balance as we got the weekends off which made it easier for me to see my friends outside of work.
Overall, the company culture has put me off coming back to work for Aldi. I was shocked that they value negativity and harshness in an area manager more than empathy and people skills. I also feel like I didn't fit into the culture as it was overwhelmingly negative and the area managers are unprofessional in discussing personal issues. Another issue I found was that there is a disinclination to give our bank holidays as detailed in our contract; this is something IPS should be aware of as I was told I couldn't take off my days in lieu.

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