Pros
I've been along for the ride for the past decade as Sixthman grew from privately owned company with a full-time staff of 15 to a subsidiary of Norwegian Cruise Lines with a full-time staff of 50. Although the company has grown, it has happened in a very intentional way and not in a way where leadership has added new events just for the sake of increasing the quantity of our portfolio. There have been many changes along the way but one thing that has always remained the same is that the Leadership team makes sure that we stay true to our roots and that no matter how big we get it still feels like a family. This care trickles down to the 30,000+ guests we serve per year, and this is by design. Sixthman is a company that's always understood how to engage, surprise and delight their communities and their team before it became trendy to talk about. This is a company that not only takes team feedback seriously, they ask for it regularly. The entire staff is surveyed twice a year about areas where we can do better to serve our guests and each other. There’s also a set schedule of company reviews and regular cost of living and performance based raises every summer which I’ve learned from previous jobs is not something you can take for granted or assume happens everywhere. I started out in an entry level guest services job find I've advanced more quickly and been given more responsibility than is possible in more corporate environments.
Cons
There have been some stumbling blocks such as not creating growth opportunities quickly enough and losing some good people along the way but the executive team have worked with managers to put intention into putting the right people in the right jobs and promoting from within whenever possible and our turn over over the past 5 years has been incredibly low. People are much more likely to move to another department inside of the company than to seek jobs elsewhere. Compared to other companies of similar size, it is a very young company and at times it has not felt like the company was adapting fast enough as team members moved into other life stages. Although the change won’t happen overnight, there is a lot of intention being put behind accommodating those wanting to start families. When I had my first child there was not a lactation room available and there was a lot of gray area in the family leave policy. When I had my second child I began to speak up more and advocate for these things and found that leadership was extremely open and receptive to making changes and taking recommendations. There are still things that can be done to make the life/work balance easier for certain roles but this company is very adaptable to its team’s needs and change does happen over time.