Wal-Mart surprises 25,000 with new jobs

Carol Johnston (left), Wal-Mart senior vice president of operations, listens to Phil Keene, who was one of more than 25,000 Wal-Mart employees promoted Tuesday.
Carol Johnston (left), Wal-Mart senior vice president of operations, listens to Phil Keene, who was one of more than 25,000 Wal-Mart employees promoted Tuesday.

BENTONVILLE - Phil Keene was surprised with news Tuesday that he will be the new store manager at a Wal-Mart in Chesterfield, Mo. The average pay for a Wal-Mart store manager is $170,000 per year.

Keene had worked four years in corporate affairs at the home office of Wal-Mart Stores Inc., followed by 18 months at the supercenter across the street.

“I just caught fire for the business,” Keene said. He talked openly and with passion about his reasons for wanting to work in a store.

“If I was going to do my job in corporate affairs well and be able to talk about what we do as a company, I need to be out in the field,” he said.

Members of the media and employees, called Wal-Mart “associates,” gathered in the lawn-and-garden section of Wal-Mart store No. 100 in Bentonville where four employees, including Keene, were surprised with announcements about their new jobs.

Elsewhere across the country, executives and other members of management popped in on more than 25,000 Wal-Mart employees and promoted them on the spot to higher-ranking positions that have better pay, more consistent schedules and more responsibility.

Wal-Mart said it will promote some 160,000 of its 1.4 million employees this year. The number is roughly the same as last year. The promotions, including those on Tuesday, ran the gamut of jobs and job levels.

“While it seems significant, this number of promotions only constitutes about 2 percent of [Wal-Mart’s] total U.S. workforce. So, it doesn’t seem particularly noteworthy just in terms of magnitude,” said Lisa Dragoni, assistant professor in the human resource studies department at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y.

Carol Johnston, senior vice president for the central plains division of Wal-Mart, said the company promotes an average of 430 workers per day. With Christmas shopping around the corner, “it was as good a time as any” to publicize this latest round of promotions, she said.

Wal-Mart self-reported its turnover rate among U.S. employees to be 37.26 percent in 2011, which is below the industry average of 43.6 percent, a figure provided by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Barbara Gertz, a vocal Our Walmart member and overnight stocker at a Wal-Mart Supercenter in Aurora, Colo., complained Tuesday about what she considered a high turnover rate. Our Walmart is a nonunion group affiliated with the United Food & Commercial Workers International Union. Past attempts to unionize Wal-Mart workers have failed.

“What is the number of associates they let go before they promoted these people?” she asked.

“I used to know every single person who worked on the overnight crew, and I couldn’t tell you half the names of the people I work with now,” said Gertz, who has worked for Wal-Mart for 10 years.

Wal-Mart spokesman Kory Lundberg took exception to the statistics. Turnover rates for any of Wal-Mart’s competitors, such as Target or Kroger, were not readily available. Last year, 40 percent of Wal-Mart’s employee promotions went to people who were in their first year on the job, he said.

“Our success from day one is a direct result of our associates and the hard work they do in taking care of our customers. We are proud to provide our people with additional opportunities for career growth and greater economic security for their families,” Wal-Mart U.S. President and CEO Bill Simon said in a release Tuesday. “Like most Americans, our associates want good jobs and access to a better life. Whether you are a cashier in Charlotte, or a stocker in Dallas, or an assistant manager in Los Angeles, Wal-Mart wants to see you succeed.”

At any given time there are between 15,000 and 50,000 job openings at Wal-Mart in the United States, the release said.

Business, Pages 25 on 10/30/2013

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