futurefed
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All Praise Raptor Jesus
Posts: 29
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Post by futurefed on Feb 5, 2009 19:37:14 GMT -6
I am a manager for the largest movie theater company in North America. Recently the management team of my theater had a meeting with our district manager. It was really boring. We just talked about what had happened in 2008 and new policies for 2009.
Towards the end of the meeting Vicky (the DM) announced that, according to some research, male concessionaires consistently score higher ratings on our "secret shopper" audits. As a result, we are to schedule males over females in concessions.
Our management team looked around and as a united front replied, "No." Our theater is in Portland, Oregon, which is one of the most liberal cities in the US and the thought of placing males over females in ANY circumstance is somewhat absurd.
After some debate it was revealed that this would actually have a more negative effect on males. If females are not allowed in concessions, they will be trained for other positions. Soon females will know all positions, while men will be restricted to concessions. because we can't promote someone who knows only concessions, there will be a large burst of female managers.
Either way, whether it's males or females who feel the burn, there is discrimination taking place. At the end of the meeting our entire management team was given write-ups for insubordination and told that we had a week to comply, or we will be replaced.
Do we stick to our guns or what?
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Post by Shyft Trakia-Vorga VahtiDahl on Feb 6, 2009 11:42:42 GMT -6
Leave it to the people who sit behind a desk far far away from the action to make all of the wrong decisions. When I worked I Best Buy, I could have sworn that corporate was just experimenting with our policies for fun. They'd pick out one small statistic and decide to run a whole new game plan based on it. Wal-Mart doesn't have any of their product locked up and their customers like that? Well, we should do it too! ...Even though Wal-Mart doesn't sell any thing that is nearly as expensive (worth locking up) as Best Buy, doesn't have employees who could be put in charge of unlocking lock up, and has a much larger budget for theft. That's too many details for corporate, though. One at a time is just fine.
Any way, the management never argued because of what's happening to you. They were always too afraid of losing their jobs. I'd say that you still have two fairly reasonable options there. If you care more about keeping your job than you do about keeping the place fair, then you should back down. If you want to fight them, though, you're probably going to have to take it up a notch. Right? You can't just refuse their terms and then get fired silently. You'd have to make a big commotion, draw attention, make the conflict known. Get on tee vee! 'Major American Movie Theater is Sexist,' they'd say. 'Sacrificing Their Morals to a Statistic.' That route would probably be a lot more work, though}=<\
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Post by kaian on Feb 7, 2009 11:08:32 GMT -6
I think the only time that sexual discrimination is okay in the workplace is when the job revolves around physical labor. With males tending to have greater muscle mass and height than females, it's obvious that they would be more effective at lifting heavy things or breaking shit and carrying people to safety (as in fire fighters). Not saying that women should be barred from the job just because they're female, but I think that training and requirements should be equal - if you can't physically handle the work, you're not fit for the job. On the other side, if you're physically capable but have a poor work ethic, you shouldn't be allowed to have that job, either.
Maybe the guys the theater hired for concessions were just friendlier or faster at cashiering or getting the food and drinks for customers. Maybe they remembered those little nitpicky verbal checkpoints that those shoppers look for (at Barnes & Noble Cafe, if we don't try to upsell, try to sell a specific food item to go with a drink, or ask if the customer has a Barnes & Noble membership to save 10% on their purchase, we get marked down 25% for each. That's a lot). Maybe the girls they hired for concessions just happent to suck at their job or had a bad day when the shop happened. Either way, it's stupid to jump to the conclusion that males are simply better at selling concessions than females, end of story. I can't believe that they didn't think about any of the other options - oh wait, yes I can.
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futurefed
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All Praise Raptor Jesus
Posts: 29
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Post by futurefed on Feb 7, 2009 23:45:09 GMT -6
As far as the validity of the study... Every theater is checked once a month. There are over 2000 theaters in the US alone, but lets just say it's 2000. Over the last ten years males have ALWAYS (she said there was literally less than 50 exceptions in the entire ten year period) had better scores. So 12 * 10 * 2000 = 240000. I don't think you can really attribute it to girls having a rough morning the day the checker came.
Today at work I took some time and did some number crunching of my own. I tried to find out what employees had the best per cap at our theater. (Per cap being the amount of money we make at concessions per customer who buys a ticket.) The goal here was to show that our top sellers were a mix of both male and female. I was VERY surprised to find that the top 5 were males. I do however feel much more comfortable sitting my employees down at our next meeting and saying, "look guys, we are going to start giving shifts to those of you who preform better." And then look only at their per cap and ignore their sex.
Still... it doesn't feel right.
And at this point I really can't afford to get fired over it. Plus, even if I brought a lot of attention to it, it wouldn't change anything. Wal-Mart doesn't exactly treat it's employees with any more dignity and people hate them to the point of boycotts and protests... So a little stab from a news team (assuming I could even set that up) wouldn't touch us.
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Post by Shyft Trakia-Vorga VahtiDahl on Feb 8, 2009 10:56:39 GMT -6
But the district manager was talking about putting more males in to those positions despite how well they worked at them. Right? Hiring males over females and stuff like that?
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futurefed
Human
All Praise Raptor Jesus
Posts: 29
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Post by futurefed on Feb 10, 2009 18:57:06 GMT -6
Yes and no. It does not concern hiring. Males and females are to be hired with equal opportunity. However if males are confined to working concessions, then females will have a much greater opportunity to advance into management. Blarg.
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Post by kaian on Feb 10, 2009 21:59:43 GMT -6
Hmm, all right - with those numbers it looks pretty convincing. Have at it, men!
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futurefed
Human
All Praise Raptor Jesus
Posts: 29
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Post by futurefed on Feb 12, 2009 19:46:58 GMT -6
Well that's the problem! This is actually BAD for our male employees. They are going to be forced to be trained in ONLY concessions, to make up for all the females who "can't work there." Females, on the other hand, will be trained in all areas, therefore advance faster.
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Post by Shyft Trakia-Vorga VahtiDahl on Feb 14, 2009 1:05:56 GMT -6
Would this be some thing that would be kept under wraps, or will this be explained to the employees? Will new hires know, or will they have to just figure it out on their own?
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futurefed
Human
All Praise Raptor Jesus
Posts: 29
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Post by futurefed on Feb 17, 2009 23:30:43 GMT -6
Under wraps and if it is questioned it will be denied.
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Post by Shyft Trakia-Vorga VahtiDahl on Feb 18, 2009 9:30:57 GMT -6
So they know that it is wrong! Ass holes. So I'm assuming so far that you are going to just try to roll with this whole thing?
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