Fake, immature, mean girls club - Casual Retail Stylist DISSH Employee Review

Before joining Dissh in their new emporium store, we were so excited to be a part of a female-led, supportive community that valued inclusivity, timeless fashion and great customer service. I trusted in Dissh’s intentions to foster a positive work culture without prejudice or clique behaviour, with leadership staff exclaiming things such as “I’ve never been in a company that has genuinely cared me”. Around 45 people were present at the Dissh Armadale and Emporium 2-day training session, which involved 9-4pm lectures in an extremely cramped, hot, stinky room. That should’ve been the first red flag. During the introductions, the Dissh Emporium store was informed that we were actually a pop-up store (which had not been advertised on the job listing, so it was a complete shock to us). We also learnt that Dissh casual employees only get a 30% discount, and don’t receive a starting uniform or uniform allowance. While it was stated that they didn’t mind if we wore unbranded items at the start of our contract, we were shocked that such a big brand doesn’t want to incentivise their staff to wear their garments over plain Supre or Glassons pieces. The piecer nature of Dissh pieces, did prohibit those without the funds from fitting in with the other staff. The training lacked any effort in getting to know the team hired, team bonding or interactive learning. Which is crucial to develop team moral, empowerment within the stores and a supportive culture. When we got in to start setting up the store, before all team members had a chance to complete 1 shift, unofficial roles formed within the casual staff, with leadership favouring conventionally attractive and privileged girls. From then on, store management formed a clique with their favourite employees, excluding those they “didn’t vibe with”. Discussing inappropriate topics with their young staff, spending large amounts of time on and off the shop floor chatting, and ignoring other staff members’ attempts to get to know them or be included. Store management seemed to support our concerns and motivate us to continue working hard in private discussions. However, we later found out those sentiments were not genuine from talk among the store staff. When it came to light that a group of girls (including management) had gone out drinking after work without inviting others or planning any other team bonding activities, the excluded team members expressed their desire to bond as a group. No effort was ever made by management to involve other team members and the weekly exclusive girl nights continued, with rosters designed around the group of girls they wanted to hang out together. Team members repeatedly expressed their interest, desire and competence in gaining responsibility and leadership opportunities within the store and beyond, with management supporting these statements to our faces, but then went ahead and promoted other staff who had not expressed these same desires, who had less experience and frequented the girls nights out. Without allowing employees who wanted to interview for these roles, or giving any training to those that were promoted. These fake attitudes occurred the week before 7 highly skilled girls (most having worked in retail for a considerable time and studied/ing fashion degrees) were let go from the company due to “not enough hours in the budget”. With girls arguably less hard-working but more conventionally attractive being kept on. For the first month of our contract, Dissh offered 10-25 hours per week, however, this quickly halted when the store budget came into effect and many employees received around 3 hours per week, until the time of their dismissal. Several employees approached management to understand if they could do anything to gain more hours, in search of feedback or a constructive solution. Which was met with reassurance that it wasn’t our work that was the issue, it was Dissh’s lack of planning, organisation and care for the staff that led to them undertaking too many store openings at once without proper research into the amount of staffing hours needed to run the store. To prove even further they didn’t care about us, rosters were published 3 days before the next week was due to start, making it impossible for staff to make plans, and adding to the anxiety of being excluded by those that were meant to care about us. Furthermore, employees were informed at training that hours would be rostered according to performance, without detailing what they meant by performance. This was continually used as an excuse for the lack of hours per employee, through the minimal communication we received in the group chat. The Dissh Emporium store won incentives as part of the company-wide staff Christmas incentives, however, employees of the store never saw any reward for their hard work. This, combined with the quarterly rewards for hitting budget (that they promoted to make up for the lack of discount on products) that the employees dismissed never had an opportunity to receive, made the big-budgeted company feel extremely cheap and ungrateful for their employees. Upon dismissal, all previous employees were told that the reason for their contract’s conclusion was that Dissh Emporium was unable to give enough hours to staff, therefore they had to reduce the team size. However, a little birdy has said that the store went ahead with hiring more candidates that they felt matched the Dissh branding (including one of the casual manager’s cousin). When current employees were asked why the previous employees were dismissed, reasons such as “we didn’t vibe with them” were given. Thanks for the kick in the face!! Way to make a girl hate her body, individual look and inability to fit in with the conventionally privileged and attractive crowd! Didn’t think that Dissh was part of the mean girl club, but turns out it’s just as exclusive and judgmental as the rest of them.