Multi Sales Employee Reviews for Purchasing Agent

"This company has an unreasonable GM who manages via fear and humiliation."

What do you like about working at Multi Sales?

"The company has good benefits and a casual dress code, and there are some good people there. They have merit based quarterly bonuses. Very few employees earn them, but if you work hard and have a service minded attitude, your manager can reward you. There is an employee discount program that can save you a lot of money if you ever need to buy a new garage door or related parts and equipment. The company has a good location, close to the 91 freeway."

Do you have any tips for others interviewing with this company?

"If you are applying for a purchasing position at MultI Sales, I hope you enjoy learning on your own with very little support and training from a manager who is almost never available and who will let you take the blame for his own mistakes when the pressure is on. He'll change his story and claim he didn't instruct you to do something a certain way when he's in the hot seat. It's sad because otherwise he's a very nice guy and not unpleasant to work for. But his unwillingness to take full responsibility outweighs all of his positive attributes as a boss.You also must enjoy being micromanaged by the company's general manager, who will repeatedly insult you in front of co-workers, telling you you're stupid and incompetent (in spite of your earning merit based bonuses for your exemplary job performance). After his escalating harassment fails to break your spirit, and instead of quitting, you start putting in more and more hours without pay to try to keep up with the impossible workload, eventually he will tell you that you're being paid way too much and finally will let you go as a reward for your dedication and hard work. This is a recurring pattern for buyers at this company!This general manager oversteps the spineless manager of the purchasing department and he tries to micromanage the purchasing department, but he doesn't have any experience in purchasing and doesn't understand the first thing about running a successful purchasing department. The actual manager of the purchasing department is afraid for his own job, so he doesn't do anything to stop this; he enables it. As long as this General Manager is there--his initials are T.H.--I don't think it's possible to be successful in a purchasing role in this company. If all of this sounds good to you, then good luck. If you are someone who works hard, does a good job, and takes ownership of your work and responsibility for your actions, and you have any self respect whatsoever, then I would recommend you do not interview at all for a purchasing position with this company because you will soon become just another statistic in a long line of former buyers."

What don't you like about working at Multi Sales?

"This company has a very bad pattern: In approximately 4 years, they have burned through 7 buyers in a purchasing department of only 3. You do the math. Something is very wrong there.The general manager rules by intimidation, fear, and humiliation. Most people in the company are constantly looking for someone else to blame mistakes on because they are so afraid of being fired and/or being humiliated in front of their peers at the next meeting. It's very difficult to function productively and work together as a team in an environment with this kind of fear and anxiety constantly present.One very minor thing that never bothered me personally, but that some employees complain about in private, is the rotating schedule to clean the employee kitchen once a month. If you're lazy and/or don't like cleaning up the messes of inconsiderate co-workers, you won't like having to clean the kitchen once a month at the end of your workday."

What suggestions do you have for management?

"Expand the purchasing department to add at least one additional person, and get the general manager to take a step back and stop putting an impossible workload on the buyers that no one can fulfill without working 24/7. (Ideally I would say get rid of the general manager entirely, as he is going to cause every quality employee to leave eventually.)"