Friends who say they "easy" jobs

[sheworkshardforthemoney]

3 separate friends have said to me this week that they want b and m/ supermarket jobs.

I have never worked in retail but do work as (low paid) manager in a position to hire staff at minimum wage positions (skills needed)

AIBU to think these friends are disrespectful to think that they could easily do these jobs/ be hired?

I think tbh they were just saying it in a half hearted way. But I've heard it before from friends with careers in management/ finance/ HR.
They think minimum wage jobs are easy work/ easy to get and stress free!

If they applied for a vacancy with me they wouldn't get hired! I look for CV's with job history where I know they've had to 'graft' turn in everyday and perform. It's bloody hard work!!

Stick to your office jobs! Minimum wage=maximum effort! Worked to the bone! No spare minutes in the day! True for my site anyway!

I don't think that what your friends said means they think those jobs in retail are easy... just that they may be easier for them specifically. We all handle work challenges differently. Someone is struggling with physical exertion and would find it easy to make 'make it or break it' decisions on a daily basis. Someone is not handling well the emotional toll of work that doesn't end when you leave the site...

Personally, I worked as a manual worker and in retail while doing post-grad. Now I'm in a senior managerial position in finance. When I compare - manual and retails jobs were more exhausting physically, but the job I have now is so much more draining emotionally. If you'd asked me what would I find easier - my answer would pretty much depend on how my day/week went.

Friends of my dil have asked her to help with the interview questions, those mutli choice what would you do.
Dil said she would get them all wrong as the answers are not company policy. You can't go further with the application if you get them wrong.
So even current staff wouldn't get a job.

I work in min wage retail (management) and have done for the last 10 years, I wish I got to just walk away when I clocked out and not think about work or have a mental load.
Sometimes I find it draining, having days off being called in to cover shifts, getting phone calls or messages about problems at work etc etc.

How does this work? Surely managers arent on same (minimum) wage as sales assistants?

I have worked in retail. Four different shops and a pub.

The money was much less, but if I fucked up it was spilling a drink, or getting really busy and missing something off a bill or something.

My job now is stressful. I want something easy to do that I don't have to think about and I can leave at the door. But I can't for financial reasons.

I think you're being deliberately disingenuous to not realise that they're experiences are not your experiences.

I forgot to add to my previous post. Office job = back pain. Manual labouring jobs, moving heavy items, standing all day = no back pain. Also, I simply can't bear sitting at a desk all day staring at a screen, so bad for you. As for those saying office jobs can be very busy, yes they can but you don't feel that bone aching weariness you get from more physical jobs (which is not actually a bad thing, and you do get used to being more active very quickly)

So you're saying that people with office jobs haven't done any hard graft, so much so that you would never even consider hiring them?

Sounds like you are just as judgemental and clueless as the friends you are complaining about.

Most jobs have easy bits and hard bits, regardless of the pay. To say that minimum wage jobs are easier or harder than salaried professional jobs is pointless. They are just different.

Supermarket staff work at a slower pace than me, can chat while working, some spend a lot of time standing idly around. Compared with me. They have no responsibility outside working hours.

I teach - in before 8 working (and I'm last in), break duty, lunch duty, cleaning due to Covid duty, teaching all day, Google training after school, quick drive home then zoom from 6.30 - 8 then marking to do ready for tomorrow when it starts all over again. Have also updated the website and done 3 performance management reviews in between times. And it's like this every day.

@Dishwashersaurous

It’s all about the mental load. Min wage jobs are physically tiring but don’t have the mental load and the inability to walk away at the end of the day

Having worked in retail and now a social worker, the statement above is the reason people sometimes make these comments. Yes, retail is hard work. But it’s simply not on the same level in terms of mental stress.

I'm not surprised they think they could easily get those kinds of jobs, because it does seem that there are almost always vacancies to fill.

I'd expect retail/supermarket jobs to be more physically draining, compared to sitting at a desk. More lifting, more time on your feet, less flexibility with when you can go to the toilet or have a drink of water. Dealing with a constant stream of people would be mentally exhausting, too, but on the positive side, it does seem like a lower pressure job than many others, with less chance that you'd have to take work home or be thinking about the job on your off hours.

How does this work? Surely managers arent on same (minimum) wage as sales assistants?

I'm an assistant manager currently on min wage.. I wish it was more, but despite this I love my job.

The previous retail management jobs i've had have been above min wage but barely, maybe 15-20p more per hour, which hardly seems worth the responsibility tbh, so I do think you have to love it to keep working in retail for so long.

Supermarket staff work at a slower pace than me

Even Aldi check out assistants?

@Fizbosshoes

Fizzbosshoes, yes, I pack quicker than they can throw my shopping at me :)

Well I've worked both retail and office jobs and it depends on the individual job. But generally the big benefit of retail is when you clock out of your shift that's it until the next shift, don't need to think about work, can relax completely. In the last couple of office jobs I've had I've been worried sick about work 24/7, especially when having a holiday and worrying about all the work piling up waiting for you when you get back

Yes holidays - you get stressed out trying to ensure you've done everything time sensitive and covered everything that's likely to come up while you're away, then you worry about how full your inbox will be when you get back. While in a retail job all you have to do is clock off at the end of your shift and you're away. And no backlog to come back to.

I do get your point but also I have worked in a supermarket and now work in an office and both the jobs I would consider easy.

I have worked in other office jobs that are not as easy and some really difficult but I do find it rude when people who have never done the job call something 'easy' but I take people as thinking about things through their eyes so if a teacher who is sick of red tape says they want a 'easy' job like working in a supermarket I take to be them comparing being a teacher to a supermarket for themselves, not trying to insult people who work in supermarkets

I worked in retail for a few years before moving into banking.
I loved it , found it easy apart from being on my feet all day. Customers were certainly varied but I really enjoyed it.

Banking involved horrid office politics and highly competitive deadlines which were very stressful.

Am now a teaching assistant. Let's just say I'd love to go back to retail and am thinking about it.

@1Morewineplease

I worked in retail for a few years before moving into banking. I loved it , found it easy apart from being on my feet all day. Customers were certainly varied but I really enjoyed it.

Banking involved horrid office politics and highly competitive deadlines which were very stressful.

Am now a teaching assistant. Let's just say I'd love to go back to retail and am thinking about it.

I have had a heaps of variety in my jobs but retail was definitely my favourite it was tiring fun

I think it varies. I have had a lovely job in a newsagents where we could could fairly busy but there were quiet periods too, there was time to chat to people who came in, it was physical in terms of moving boxes around and restocking etc but never onerous and I really enjoyed it. I would recommend to anyone wanting a low-stress job.
I also worked in fast food which was a nightmare. The work is designed to be very simple (literally the same movements over and over again) so anyone can do it but, partly because they understaffed to keep costs down, you would be working very quickly to try to keep up with the long queues, on your feet for 8 hours a day getting burned and feeling the grease settling on your face. Yay fosterism.
Finally working in a restaurant was busy and mentally challenging, you are on your feet all day and trying to remember orders for multiple tables, who had finished their starters etc etc (for some reason managemenr thought it looked bad to write peoples orders down at the table). Although it also worked out at more than min wage because tips.

That said I am only on mumsnet because I have just finished my (easy hah) office job for today. Although it is normal to finish at this time in restaurants too...

In conclusion, I dont think you can group minimum wage jobs as all one thing... they vary massively

WHen I am older though/retired I will open a newsagent or little shop and it will be lovely

@Pixxie7

I think it is a similar situation with nursing and carers. There is little doubt that on the whole carers work is physically harder, but nursing is mentally harder, your the one making the decisions and carry the responsibility.

Wrong! Carers have a massive amount of responsibility and have to make big decisions everyday. Administer meds, coordinate all agencies involved in the care of the person and much more!!!!

I should also say, it also does depend on what level you are at, as an assistant manager and manager, I would have to know a bit of HR, health and safety, workers rights, various different laws.

I also could work from 6.30am till 6.30pm

Before I got out, it was getting very stressful for the till staff as they started to bring in TPCs and those staff were getting disciplinaries for not selling enough

I've worked various retail and hospitality jobs when younger.

Yes, they can be physically taxing, boring etc. But they are not demanding. When your shift is over, you are done. You don't carry a mental load, and there are no serious implications if you make an error.

@BeyondMyWits

The key behind a minimum wage retail job is you get to walk away at the end of the day... every day... The peace of mind that gives you should not be underestimated.

Peace of mind is a good regular income - many min wage jobs do not provide a regular predictable income that delivers enough to live on so whether you have to use your brain or not - that is stressful.

I'm a little surprised though at the idea an office worker couldn't get a supermarket job because of lack of experience. It might be different at the moment with Covid, but generally where I live supermarkets hire quite a few young people in their first jobs when they are in high school or university. It's often mums working till sin the school day and teenagers after school gets out.

I worked my arse off in retail when I was younger. This was in the days of Mon-Sat, 08:30 till 17:30 and the only late nights were one a week for the 3 weeks up till Xmas. Closed on Bank Hols.

I would not do it now with the extended shopping hours and Sunday opening. Much harder.