Ummm...isn't that kinda obvious? I mean the iPhone 13 is set to launch in September, like always...
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple Developing Hybrid 'Retail Flex' Work From Home Program for Apple Store Employees
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I absolutely love this. 5 days a week in store is too much, but 5 days a week on your headset taking calls is also too much. A balance would be really good, and also improve the quality of the call center employees knowledge with in-store experience.
Come to think of it, the customers were "holding the phone wrong". You may be on to something!Are you sure it's not the customers that need training?
Mate. Most of Apple retail staff are teenagers and collage students who probably don’t care anyway.
Apple Store retail sales metrics in 2017 were $5,546 per square foot leading all other retailers, with the number two position being $2,951. Today, fours years later, I wouldn't be shocked if Apple is pulling in much >$6,000 per square foot.
Apple yearly online sales revenue is greater, but the stores have a vital function with respect to brand development and awareness, letting potential customers come in and see products in the flesh, kicking the tires, and then later purchasing online.
Based on the above, and after the pandemic situation totally gets back to normal transitioning in six months or so, there's no way Apple is going to materially change the dynamics of how its stores operate.
Apple yearly online sales revenue is greater, but the stores have a vital function with respect to brand development and awareness, letting potential customers come in and see products in the flesh, kicking the tires, and then later purchasing online.
Based on the above, and after the pandemic situation totally gets back to normal transitioning in six months or so, there's no way Apple is going to materially change the dynamics of how its stores operate.
I used to do training for new hires at Apple Stores and there is a very simple reason for this.
New hires are first trained on culture (CORE training) - aka brainwashing the Apple kool-aid. This is a 3 day long event. Then they are brought into the stores and work alongside a mentor as a shadow while doing additional workbooks on products.
So, while there is some product training (minimal), most of the onboarding is on culture and sales technique. They figure if they have the right personality, with the right culture, and the right technique and tools, then the product knowledge will come over time. Having seen some hires come in with literally zero Apple knowledge, I can attest to this, however it takes months if not a year + before some of these employees are truly knowledgable. If you get an employee who is relatively new, or was perhaps hired more as a creative, you can sometimes get someone with very little product knowledge.
The technicians (genius) were quite good at repairs, but also had very little product knowledge as they never needed to know much about new products except for how to repair them. Unless of course they were Apple nerds and just loved to learn in their free time.
There are pros and cons to hiring like this, but overall I think it has worked out quite well for Apple Retail.
Apple Retail very rarely hires teenagers (in one of the stores I worked at with 200 employees we had 1 person under the age of 20.) They do have a decent chunk of college students, but a surprising amount of those people end up staying with the company. The median age is higher than you think. A good quarter of one of my old stores had master's degrees (in mostly useless subjects.)
interesting read, thanks) yea, there are also people who aren't knowledgeable and rude at the same time and that's the worst combo. throw in lazy and i'm fuming. oh, and slow af. i recently went in for a quick repair, and i spent 2.5 the amount of time i was expecting to. everyone was moving about the store so calmly, i felt like i was in a museum. i'm not saying people need to run, but move at the normal speed, damn it))
Employees should be on alert whenever a company, even Apple, uses the “culture” argument, as a reason against work from home. It’s really just about control in most scenarios.
Same with the fantasy that your work colleagues are “like your family”. Some, probably. Most, not at all. It doesn’t mean you can’t work together effectively, but that simply is not a realistic relationship expectation.
Same with the fantasy that your work colleagues are “like your family”. Some, probably. Most, not at all. It doesn’t mean you can’t work together effectively, but that simply is not a realistic relationship expectation.
No, it's really about maintaining/increasing Apple's supremely high retail store sales metrics, creating a customer focused environment that fosters that goal.
Last edited:
I really like the people I work with, but it's true; they're not family. They're coworkers! Which is a *positive* relationship; I like having them in my life. But we rarely talk outside of work and that's perfectly okay.
Unlike family and friends.
It all depends on the team and personality. Everyone is different.
The past 1,5 year working from home has been the most productive, innovative period of my entire 18 year career. I have worked with more colleagues and external partner together on projects than ever before. My teams are also working better than ever before. Never have we realised so many successful projects in such a small period because we could have laser focus and efficiency. People were easier to reach and I seem to be way a much better presenter and project leader virtually than on site.
I can skip all the fake smiles, office politics, hiding so I can eat 5 minutes in peace and no sweaty ears from wearing headphones all days. I just love to work at work and working from home has really brought out the best in me.
They really need to improve the impression that no one is available to help in a jiffy, appts are all booked up to do virtually anything (on the sales side) but when you look around, it seems like 10 people gossiping in a circle looking at their iPad doing nothing.
And yes, if you keep observing them, most of them don't diffuse from the circle and continue to just stand there with a blank stare after a few minutes.
They ought to care more about the brand and perception, even if their success is locked in. Its just cheesy
And yes, if you keep observing them, most of them don't diffuse from the circle and continue to just stand there with a blank stare after a few minutes.
They ought to care more about the brand and perception, even if their success is locked in. Its just cheesy
If anything good came out of the pandemic, it’s new ways of working that some (unfortunately a few) companies found to keep people employed and working remote or changing up to hybrid set ups like this.
The company I work for is a big company and the week of shutdowns in March 2020 they got the like 98% of the company workforce worldwide moved to remote working in 3 days with the rest within two weeks later. We’ve been doing it ever since and now moving to new models of working remote or not or both. It’s a welcome change.
The company I work for is a big company and the week of shutdowns in March 2020 they got the like 98% of the company workforce worldwide moved to remote working in 3 days with the rest within two weeks later. We’ve been doing it ever since and now moving to new models of working remote or not or both. It’s a welcome change.
Last edited:
This is key. Everyone is different and work better under different circumstances - we are human after all!
One thing above all else - the pandemic has forced companies to show them multiple works modes can exist and the company won't fall apart. Never again can a boss fudge up excuses on why WFH is not allowed or good for the company.
Timing is also key - if Covid hit us back in 1998 dial up internet would have killed us...not covid!
I have seen a lot of people who say a lot of hogwash about Apple in this thread.
I have worked from home for Apple for 7 years. And during the pandemic the store workers that chose to work from home for the most part loved it, and do would prefer to keep doing it, and while they were not as knowledgable in IOS or MACos, they learned, and I was highly impressed with their energy and willingness to be mentored but us senior advisors.
If you get someone on the phone on the front lines who does not know what they are doing then it is from an outside agency that is outsourced to. We literally have not hired front line workers in several years, but have outsourced them. All of us tenured guys are in senior support.
99.9% of problems that are not hardware related do not warrant a trip to the Apple store but can be handled efficiently and quickly over the phone. But people insist on going to the store because their email does not work or they need help in Pages.
The guys in the stores are not the ones who sit and solve OS problems day in and out or have the access to the engineers. It is Applecare. A 10 minute phone call can resolve an issue much better than you getting an appointment and waiting in the store because you forgot your Apple ID.
Ironically most people do not realize that for the last decade Apple has had a huge at home work force.
If you were hired to work in the store, you can apply to transfer to AHA, and vice versa. But you cannot just decide that you want to split it up. That is not how it works.
I have worked from home for Apple for 7 years. And during the pandemic the store workers that chose to work from home for the most part loved it, and do would prefer to keep doing it, and while they were not as knowledgable in IOS or MACos, they learned, and I was highly impressed with their energy and willingness to be mentored but us senior advisors.
If you get someone on the phone on the front lines who does not know what they are doing then it is from an outside agency that is outsourced to. We literally have not hired front line workers in several years, but have outsourced them. All of us tenured guys are in senior support.
99.9% of problems that are not hardware related do not warrant a trip to the Apple store but can be handled efficiently and quickly over the phone. But people insist on going to the store because their email does not work or they need help in Pages.
The guys in the stores are not the ones who sit and solve OS problems day in and out or have the access to the engineers. It is Applecare. A 10 minute phone call can resolve an issue much better than you getting an appointment and waiting in the store because you forgot your Apple ID.
Ironically most people do not realize that for the last decade Apple has had a huge at home work force.
If you were hired to work in the store, you can apply to transfer to AHA, and vice versa. But you cannot just decide that you want to split it up. That is not how it works.
“You’re asking your question wrong”Are you sure it's not the customers that need training?
Same where I am as well. I don’t doubt that affected store performance too. Speaking personally, the line ups were enough to drive me to online-only purchases from Apple. I doubt I’m the only one.
Its a press photo, staged so you can see the store, its not meant to be full...
At how many Apple Stores have you sampled the foot traffic and at what times during the day did you collect your data to form this highly scientific opinion?
Maybe you failed to read my post? I said "That Apple Store", not "All Apple Stores". As far as my data, I pulled that out of my ass, like most posters on this forum.
This was really meant to be a dig at those whiney Apple employees that sent Tim the letter about how they're going to hold their breath until they turn blue if he doesn't cave and let them continue to work remote 100% of the time.
Your office does sound nice—especially the part about allowing pets. It’s fair to expect people to come to the office if they did prior to the pandemic and some roles benefit from in person interaction. However, there are some benefits to society by allowing at least a portion of your staff to work from home. The main one being fewer people burning fossil fuels in traffic getting to and from work every day. It was nothing short of amazing how quickly the earth started to recover without so much human activity.