Pros
Great customer focus from the service teams. Frontline, client-facing staff are very well-trained professionals. The Financial Assistants and Certified Financial Professionals are top-notch. They really care about their customers and will often go out of their way to help someone in need.
Cons
In general, Brightside has very poor executive and mediocre mid-level leadership, resulting in poor execution of the mission and vision. Too much infighting within the leadership team. Problem management is a continual problem with no end in sight. Brightsides technology solutions or financial products are often broken. Nepotism is a serious problem at Brightside, especially within the leadership ranks. Effective communication is a constant problem all throughout the company, and executive leadership continues to avoid solving the problem after being made aware of it countless times. Proper human resource management is an afterthought at Brightside. The companies internal HR practices are an employment attorneys' wet dream. Leadership often uses the phrase "we are scrappy" as an excuse for bad behavior, practices, and failed execution of company initiatives. Company goals are almost always unrealistic and unattainable. This leads to moral issues within the workplace. Executive management won't let good managers be leaders. Executive management lacks trust in their team and often has to dictate every move made when the mid-level managers are totally capable of taking the right action if they were given the authority to do so. Executive management doesn't listen to or value feedback from its staff even though they continually keep asking for it. Ideas and suggestions are often ignored, only to resurfaced later by members of leadership who then get praised for their contributions. Executive management doesn't care if highly talented people leave the company, instead chalks it up to "they weren't a good fit" rather than addressing the issues driving the high turnover. Industry experts are often hired at Brightside, and then side-lined and not listened to because what they have to say often conflicts with Executive management thoughts, ideals, or narratives. Keep in mind, none of Brightside's executive leadership team are considered financial experts. Brightside continues to say that it is the leader in the employer benefits sector for financial solutions and that they are holistic and unique, which they are not. Their are many companies in the same industry that offer even more than what Brightside offers. That general detachment from reality causes lots of problems that leadership fails to solve. In fact, several of Brightsides staff have left the company to work for direct competitors because of this. Regardless of what's listed on the website, the company itself doesn't actually create any in-house financial solutions. It simply directs its Financial Assistants to offer partner-provided financial products, like high-interest rate loans through TrueConnect, SalaryFinance, and other credit-related products. This is really odd since this is a company that is selling itself as a holistic financial solution for those that are down on their financial luck. There are no real budget tools to help struggling clients plan their finances better. There are no financial plans being drawn up for clients that have the ability to save money. There are no sound 401k investment strategies, no asset allocation plans for clients who don't need the basic services offered. As a Certified Financial Planner, it's important to know that Brightside is not a registered RIA and their staff are not investment adviser representatives or certified credit counselors. Even though a portion of their staff are Certified Financial Planners, legally they should not/cannot provide actual financial advice, even though that's exactly what they are offering to their customers. Working here as a CFP can be worrisome as you're on your own, personally, in terms of addressing the risk of providing quasi-financial advice at a non-RIA. Honestly, Brightside has potential with the right leadership running it, but it seems like a company that hasn't figured out what it wants to be, which is a problem as they go up against very well-funded and well-run competitors that do exactly what Brightside says it does, even though it doesn't actually do much of what it says it does.
