Pros
- The people you work with at this organisation are incredible. Super passionate, incredibly competent and generous with their time. - The head office is a great, central location - Working here gives you an opportunity to work towards better social equality for a cause that's really important - COO is friendly, supportive and trying his best under what are obviously difficult circumstances
Cons
- There has been a 50% turnover in head office staff within the past 12 months. At no point has management felt the need to address what is obviously causing this; a toxic working environment - The favouritism and nepotism are quite blatant. Personal friends of the CEO, Michelle Thompson, are hired for roles, while her staff favourites seem immune from any performance management for unprofessional conduct. This can be seen from the high turnover of newer staff, but the longevity of preferred employees. - The organisation consistently hires incredibly competent and capable staff. The organisation's mission attracts people who are passionate. However these employees are micromanaged to the point where they have no real authority in their role. This also leads many staff to feel that their expertise, suggestions and work are not respected. - Concerns raised about serious mental health issues and staff burnout (which is not unexpected in what is obviously a very high stress industry) are routinely ignored. Often these concerns are dismissed as not existing at all. Management refuses to participate in any form of employee engagement surveying or other similar efforts that could determine staff satisfaction and wellbeing. - Michelle Thompson seems to have no ability to emotionally regulate and so staff are at the mercy of her constantly changing temperament. She regularly targets teams or individuals and conducts impromptu sessions of berating them in the middle of the open plan office. This does not improve staff morale. - COO receives no support from Michelle Thompson and often appears pressured into accomodating her demands. COO spends extensive hours in the office, while Michelle appears to arrive and depart at leisure, routinely disappearing for hours on end with no transparency as to any projects she is working. - Staff are rarely given updates as to what upper management are working on, which makes it difficult for them to be engaged in the journey or invested in the organisation's success. - Upper management often set unrealistic goals and targets, and then fail to provide the resources necessary to meet them. The overall attitude from Michelle Thompson is then that staff are not working hard enough to meet targets. These targets net Michelle a personal financial windfall, but staff receive no such benefits and often receive no acknowledgement for the long hours and high stress they invest in trying to meet these targets. - The organisation is NFP, so resources are limited, however the majority of staff are highly overworked and under-resourced for the roles they are given. It's not at all unusual for a staff member to leave and for their colleague to then be expected to work both roles without additional remuneration. Despite the lower staff salaries, no alternative incentives are offered, such as flexible working arrangements, additional annual leave, etc. - Upper management seems to be unaware that any of this is an issue, and regularly comment on the inability to retain quality staff. If they are aware of it, they refuse to acknowledge any of the above issues, and instead become hostile towards staff who express any dissatisfaction with the way the organisation is run.
