13 Years of Office Depot – Interview with Andreea Ciornea

About Andreea 

I’ve had a nice and fruitful journey within Office Depot, for which I’m very grateful.  

At present, I’m the Manager of Data Management Services France team, within the Sales Operations department. I take care of Contract customer implementation and lifecycle.  

It’s a role that gives me the opportunity to work closely with my team (of course), but also with a lot of people from other departments and stakeholders. So, it requires me to be a very good communicator, to think fast, and consider multiple perspectives of what’s best for both our business and my team. 

One might think that what’s best for the business is also best for the people, but that is not always true in fact. Sometimes, a particular decision or situation, which is the best solution for the business, involves a higher amount of effort, work, and time for your employees. You can’t always go the easy way. 

I guess that finding the means to motivate people to get involved, to put an extra effort and really care and be responsible for their contribution to the business is my main responsibility.  

It’s definitely not an easy thing to do, but I do my best on it.  

I started to work with Office Depot, on the 17th of July 2015. I got hired on a Process Analyst role in the DMS team. Ever since, I’ve received all the support I needed to learn everything from scratch and to move forward in my career. In January 2017, I got promoted to a Team Leader position on DMS and later on, in June 2019, I became the Team Manager of DMS.  

Sure, there are lots of other opportunities in Office Depot, but I chose to stick with DMS.  

I also had the chance to offer Spanish language courses to some of my colleagues who work in the Spanish business. 

 

First day at Office Depot 

It was a long time ago and I’m not that proud of my memory, but I do remember the feeling I had on that day and a few other details. It felt like a mix of anxiety and excitement, as I’ve never worked in a corporation before. Everything was new to me, I didn’t know what to expect, except for the idea that corporations are impersonal and make you become a robot. I’d heard so from others and that is so not true.  

I remember I got a tour of the company and lots of explanations about many things: internal policies, collective agreements, training programs, teams, departments, and so on. Everybody was so nice, relaxed and so friendly to me. As I walked the floor I was surprised to see the managers and team leaders working close to their teams, sharing the same cluster. I liked that.  

 

Why Office Depot? 

For sure, it’s the people I work with and Office Depot’s organizational culture. There’s so much invested in people here, soft and hard skills training, coaching, programs that help you specialize in your area of interest, personal development plan, and so on. You’ll always find someone to turn to when you need help and that is very important to me.  

 

The people of Office Depot are… 

I’d say we have hard-working people, smart and dedicated to what they do. Really genuine, very nice people. 

 

#GrowingStrongerTogether 

Job-wise speaking, I think it’s already obvious because I started as a novice and I became a Manager. It’s not a short or easy road from one to another and I think that says a lot about our company. I didn’t do it alone, there were many people supporting me.  

Personally speaking, it’s hard to say because we are talking about a smooth transition, that happens day by day. Every experience teaches you something, you learn whether you’re aware of it or not. But if I’m to make a retrospective about myself, I can say my job has made me a lot more attentive to details, more flexible, and patient about achieving things. And more kind to people in general.  

 

Advice to those who want to join Office Depot 

Come to the interview and do your best. Just kidding. 

I’d tell him/her to get out of their comfort zone and take advantage of everything our company has to offer. It’s a perfect place for both fresh graduates and experienced people.