And you wonder why they call Wal-Mart Orwellian? [Updated]
Yesterday’s story on Wal-Mart’s computerized scheduling from Marketplace introduced us to Celia Swanson, Wal-Mart’s Senior Vice-President for Change Management. If that title alone wasn’t enough for you to believe that Wal-Mart is Orwellian, try this:
She says Wal-Mart designed the system with employees’ needs in mind. First, the company asks them when they prefer to work, then when they’re available.
CELIA SWANSON: And then the system builds that schedule, to first take into consideration their preference, then their tenure and then their work status.
If the new computerized system is so great, why can’t they let employees talk to reporters about it by themselves? A little later from Marketplace:
La Toya Machado is a full-time cashier at a Wal-Mart in Grapevine, Texas. She spoke by phone from the store, with a Wal-Mart executive on the line.
[Emphasis added].
That’s Orwellian. [And while we're at it, La Toya Machado certainly talks to the media a lot, doesn't she?]
The voice of reason in this story is the still incomparable BBCAmerican (who, in case you’re worried for him, assures me that he isn’t really named Michael):
Michael works weekends at a Wal-Mart in Florida. He has a blog called “behind the counter”. He doesn’t use his real name, fearing dismissal. He says at his store, the new scheduling system isn’t working well for part-timers like him who hold more than one job, and so have more limited availability…
MICHAEL: A lot of people were really unhappy with the number of hours that they were given. Instead of giving me an eight-hour shift on Saturday and an eight-hour shift on Sunday, it gave me one four-hour shift on Sunday.
He says the system tends to assign fewer hours than part-timers are used to working.
Who’s right? Remember, the scheduling computer works like a reverse auction, the more hours you bid, the more you get back. Part-timers have fewer hours to bid, so of course they’re going to be unhappy about it.
Things have worked out well for BBCAmerican though (so far at least):
Michael says his manager tinkered with the schedule to bump his hours back up. He was relieved because otherwise he’d have lost three quarters of his regular pay. According to Michael, store managers say this month they’ll stop amending the schedule by hand and accept whatever shifts the computer churns out, even if that means fewer hours for some. But Wal-Mart’s Celia Swanson says that’s not company policy…
SWANSON: This system is an evolutionary process as I said. They will continue to have that ability to make those modifications.
That’s great Celia, but have you folks at Wal-Mart ever thought of this: If everyone gets their schedule modified there’s no point in having the computer system at all.
When it’s worker against workers, somebody’s gonna lose. You can make a pretty good case that one of those losers will be Wal-Mart, as our pal Charles Fishman suggests at the end of the Marketplace report:
What about using the old-fashioned American incentive of money? Why don’t you set up a system where people who are willing and able to have flexibility in their work hours get paid a little bit more money for being willing to come and go as the stores need you to?
Silly Charles, don’t you know that Wal-Mart has always been at war with Target?
Update: Welcome visitors from Wal-Mart Watch and Behind the Counter. There’s more to read on this story here.
What large publicly traded company *wouldn’t* require a corporate communications person on the line when an employee spoke to the media? That’s not Orwellian, that’s a consequence of the litigiousness of American society.
And “change management” is also quite standard–I’m familiar with it in a network service provider context, but it is a more general field. Check out the Wikipedia entry on the subject.
Jim:
$5 says Costco lets their employees talk to the media alone. Same with Wegman’s. What the heck could they be sued for, anyways, letting employees use their 1st Amendment rights?
Thanks for the “change management” tip. I actually thought that Wal-Mart pulled the term out of thin air. However, after the reading the Wikipedia entry it seems like they’ve once again demonstrated their expertise at making the simple very complicated.
I highly doubt that Southwest Airlines, a very large publicly traded company would never even THINK of having a executive listening in on a conversation that an employee would have with a reporter. Why? Because Southwest hires excellent people, treats its employees fairly and has trust that the employee will tell the truth – and that truth is that Southwest is a good employer.
I highly doubt a regular Walmart worker would have positive things to say about Walmart. Thus the executive has to listen in…
Alex: Ginger Hardage is vice president of corporate communications at Southwest Airlines. I suggest you contact her and ask her what SWA’s corporate policy is regarding employees doing interviews with the media representing the company. I suspect that they require at least that corporate communications reviews and approves the interview, if not actually monitor it. This isn’t just a matter of how good a company is–having another person on the line can help identify misconstruals of what’s being said, translate tech-speak into English, and act as an independent check on the reporter so that they don’t report inaccurately. In the case of a badly run company, it’s also a case of damage control, but that’s certainly not the only reason to monitor and it’s not necessarily Orwellian.
In my experience–and I’ve done media interviews for multiple companies and organizations–it’s usually good practice to have somebody from corporate communications on the line for a telephone interview, though there have been a few cases where I’ve been given permission to talk directly to a reporter without corporate communications involvement.
Jonathan: I won’t take your bet as stated–I suspect there are cases where most companies will allow employees to talk to the media without corporate communications involvement, but I bet you that the companies you mentioned all have policies which require advance corporate communications approval of any interviews and that they strongly recommend that someone from corporate communications be on the line for a telephone interview. We can ask Bev Akada, AVP of Corporate Communications for Costco, Michael A. Martin, VP of Corporate Communications for Wegman’s, and Ginger Hardage, VP of Corporate Communications for Southwest Airlines. I’m willing to go $5 on each of those, payable as a donation to http://www.azrescue.org if I’m right.
BTW, I agree that Southwest, Costco, and Wegman’s (I’ve never actually shopped in one, but I know many people in Rochester) are all examples of well-run companies that treat their employees well (and Wal-Mart is not). I also greatly enjoy the BBCAmerican blog…
Correction to the previous: Michael A. Martin isn’t the Wegmans corporate communications VP. I got that from looking at Google search result before clicking on the link, which connected two separate pieces of information on a directory page. Wegmans has a “communications specialist” listed on its press releases who would be the best contact to find out about their policy.
Jim:
This sounds like an interesting experiment so I’m game. I don’t mean to be lazy about this but since you seem to have the contact info at hand would you do the inquiries and report back?
You have to understand though that if it turns out I’m wrong about Wal-Mart being unique in this respect it will actually make the world in general more Orwellian than I suspected.
I suggest you contact her and ask her what SWA’s corporate policy is regarding employees doing interviews with the media representing the company.
Ah, so you do agree that it’s in the case of representing the company in an official capacity that they would interview an employee under corporate supervision. So we should just be clear that, even though her statement is about her satisfaction with her job, it’s also one that passes muster with the official view of the company and may very well not be representative of the companies employees as a whole, meaning it’s of limited utility to us in assessing how well Wal-Mart’s new scheduling system is working for the employees.
Shalom Y’all,
As a journalist with more than 20 years of experience writing about business, I can tell you that companies don’t typically allow employees to go on the record; it would just be stupid to do so since you can’t control the message.
On the other hand if I were to have an interview set up with a manager or other employee and then be told that the corporate communications VP was on the line listening in, that would be the end of the interview because I would know that absolutely nothing of value could come from such an interview.
If I wanted sound bites on the company line, I’d reprint the news release.
B’shalom,
Jeff
[...] 0627 And you wonder why they call Wal-Mart Orwellian? [...]
Jeff:
I think the point me and Alex were trying to make was that the companies we named have good enough labor policies that they wouldn’t have to do message control. Besides, the VP on the line was noteworthy enough for Ashley Milne-Tyte to note it her in her report. I think that says something too.
[...] Hopefuelly then, the post I put up Friday morning about Wal-Mart and George Orwell (based on the Marketplace report with the BBCAmerican interview) will be the start of a trend. Jim Lippard got it going by suggesting that having an executive on the line while an employee talks to the media is not just common, but good business practice. I still hope he checks with the other companies we mentioned to see if that’s true, but I’m beginning to think that wasn’t the most Orwellian part of the story anyway. Now, I’m thinking the most Orwellian part of the story would be this: Celia Swanson is Wal-Mart’s senior vice president for change management. She says Wal-Mart designed the system with employees’ needs in mind. [...]
[...] On Friday, I noted that Grapevine, TX Wal-Mart cashier sure talks to the media a lot about Wal-Mart’s computerized scheduling system. Little did I know. Wal-Mart Watch has done what I’m assuming is an exhaustive count: Most recently she appeared in a Marketplace interview on March 17, 2007. [...]
[...] doing something to make Wal-Mart money every moment of your shift you are a time criminal. [As I’ve said before, they don’t call Wal-Mart Orwellian for nothing. Or were time criminals in Brave New World? I [...]