Poor constantly changing management, and too much senior leadership. - Program Manager Nordstrom Employee Review

2.0
18 Jul 2018
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Nordstrom cares deeply about its customers and community and is a trustworthy company.

Cons

I was hired in 2016 into Nordstrom Technology, Data and Services. With my first several managers and roles, I was able to drive positive change across the org, replace manual processes with automation, create collaborative tools for teams to work together, drive hygiene, best practices, and accountability, help my team run efficiently while building the right product, and generally deliver great value as a TPM. I got great reviews and received very flattering public recommendations from my initial managers. My prior major Seattle area employer for 5 years valued me as well. Unfortunately, there is a constant change in management and executive direction here meaning your ongoing employment is much like playing the lottery. I’m now on my 5th manager in two years, and with my current manager have had nothing but intensely negative reviews starting even with our very first meeting. I’ll likely be on probation soon, and will likely be let go sometime after that, and there is nothing I can do about it other than proactively finding a new role. It's a very frustrating circumstance. In addition to frequent change in management and relatively high turnover, Nordstrom Technology generally has a hard time attracting quality leaders, so they tend to accept/tolerate people who are strong in one or two areas but are deeply flawed in others, which if you lose the lottery regarding your manager can put you in a very difficult situation. There are lots of positive things which can be said about Nordstrom and Nordstrom Technology, unfortunately with too much upper management, and given a terrible manager, those positives only matter to make it more tragic when forced to change jobs. Due to the risk of getting a bad manager, and due to the other reasons I've listed, and those listed in other people’s reviews, I do not recommend taking a job here.

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Nordstrom Response
7y
Hello, Thank you for your candid feedback. My name is Patrick Welch, and I’m the Vice President of Technology at Nordstrom. I appreciate your sharing this issue with us, especially as we continue our work streamlining our processes across teams, especially as it relates to communication. This begins with the way our managers uphold Nordstrom’s commitment to giving employees ownership over their work at all levels of the organization, and I apologize if we’ve missed the mark so far during your time with us. As we work to improve, it would be very helpful to hear more details about your experience so that we can resolve this issue and learn where we can go from here. If you have the time, please send me a personal message at NordTechFeedback@nordstrom.com with any further input you can provide. Sincerely, Patrick Welch VP Technology Nordstrom

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Decent base pay, somewhat autonomous, great tip potential.

Cons

The company has changed for the worse since COVID. When I came back the mood of the entire store had shifted. Gone were the days of comradery, customer focus, and taking pride in a job well done. In its place there is a new culture of cutthroat sales, a severe decline in customer focus, and worst of all a new focus on profit over customer satisfaction. When I was told that the amount the store charged for a shoe shine was not enough to do the best job I could for a customer I knew things had gone downhill for the company. Not to mention I watch a manager prey on a mentally disabled person in order to secure a sale, when the person could not understand what was being offered. Sad that such a once great company is now just another greed ridden corporation.

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