Until I started reading the hundreds of negative reviews from current and former salespeople, I thought the nonsense I witnessed and experienced was mostly local, Now I know it's national. Let's get started:
I was recruited from a competitor. After my no compete expired, I was able to bring over a couple of million in business to Sysco. Now that I was let go because of Covid (more on that lie later), those customers are now off-limits to me at a new job, if I could get one. There is a pattern of bringing on reps from competing firms and then divvying up the spoils amongst their favorite MA's when those reps are shoved out.
The Three Stooges could be a more effective leadership team. There is ZERO leadership. Opco management just rolls the corporate dictums downhill, no matter how out of touch and stupid they are. Their days are spent knitting butt covers for themselves, and micromanaging the sales team through 360 (salesforce). They care more about process than results. If you sat on your laptop entering garbage about what you supposedly did, and where you went, that was more important than actually creating results.
Favoritism: Lots of it. There was a nucleus of employees who had survived the various coups over the years, and they do very well being handed the accounts that are taken from those who leave. I had 5 route splits in 2 years, with the easiest to service, high margin accounts given to underperforming (but buddy/buddy with manager) reps benefitting. I was given the accounts that were bungled and manhandled by others along with the negative history constantly.
Despite all these negatives, because I have over 30 years experience in this field, I was able to overcome these hurdles, and actually made "Chairman's Club", a supposed honor at Sysco. Less than 6 months later, when the shamdemic came along, that piece of paper came in handy during the TP shortage! I made the company over 850k in profit-dollars, and I was kicked to the curb. I wasn't on a plan, had no discipline issues, but I am over 60, and I made too much money for the new pay plan... They fired us on a surprise video call en masse, and then just like Mission Impossible, my laptop went dead. In order to get the severance package, we had to sign off that there was no age discrimination (there OBVIOUSLY was) and had this not been such a financial shock, I would have retained a lawyer.
I could keep going, but the last thing is something their stock holders should be aware of. Their pricing is literally crooked. Unless a rep manages avery single price every week, the "system" will jab a customer with 70 dollars a box on potatoes that should be 20. You are trained and encouraged to participate in shady schemes like changing prices by switching numbers around. No matter how high your margins are, it's never enough, until a customer catches you, and then the clowns in management go to the customer, hat in hand, blaming the rep, and transferring the account, all to start the rip-off all over. The internal "pads" are the highest I've ever seen in my long career, as much as 40% on sysco branded items, even commodities that all come from the same sources. We were always 2 steps behind the market when prices dropped, and raised them ahead of the actual increases. I had to spend more time defending the company's nonsense than selling. You also have to compete with all your co-workers for new business. I've never seen anything like it. Literally dog eat dog, with the favorite lap dogs usually winning with management help. I had numerous prospects taken away after weeks or months of work and given to their pets.
