Assistant Store Manager - never boring, but no work-life balance
Pros
Upward mobility - I began as a temp and was able to work my way up to assistant store manager in a relatively short period of time. Nearly all store and district level managers began their careers as hourly associates. Training - most of what you will learn is on-the-job training. You will work alongside associates who have been in the trades and pick up valuable home improvement knowledge. Benefits - health insurance, dental, and optical are very good for full time associates. The 401k plan matches dollar for dollar for the first 1% and .50 on the dollar up to 5% of your salary. Employee stock purchase plan offers a 15% discount and The Home Depot is a Wall Street favorite.
Cons
Work-life Balance - As an assistant store manager, you are always on the clock. On your best week you can expect to work 50 hours and during your worst (inventory time) you may work up to 70 hours. 55 is probably average. The hours are not the worst part, though. Managers are scheduled as early as 5am and as late as midnight. This includes the weekends. Compensation - the overall take-home with bonus looks good, until you consider how many hours you worked to get that paycheck. I did the math and I was only making about $16/hour without bonus and $20/hour with bonus. Not what you would expect as a manager personally responsible for $20 million in business in a $55 million store. Upper-level management - this might be the most frustrating aspect of working for The Home Depot. Far too many regional, divisional, and corporate leaders feel the need to announce their impending arrival at your store with the expectation that you roll out the red carpet for them. Our core business is building relationships with our customers and contractors in order to grow the average ticket, but we had to put that process on hold every time a "walk" was possible. Instead of adding value to the business through increasing sales, we would attempt to make a dusty warehouse look presentable. Upper-level management has no idea how stores look when they aren't polished prior to their arrival, and this leads to unrealistic expectations. Nobody is willing to challenge this waste of time and resources. Unreasonable expectations of hourly associates - Walmart pays $10 an hour for associates to provide poor customer service with little accountability. The Home Depot also starts hourly associates at $10 per hour and specialists at $11 per hour. It was very difficult finding quality talent at that rate. A Pro Account Sales Associate, for example, was expected to sell $1 million per year for $11 an hour. Why would someone agree to be held to these expectations when he could work for Walmart with no expectations at the same rate? You get what you pay for.
