Bring Digital Reviews

• Bonuses not paid in two years despite the sale of the business and growth in both revenue and profit. • Budget for social events has been significantly reduced and the frequency of events also scaled back. • The CEO stated everyone was a shareholder in the business, however when the sale went through he simply used this as a replacement for the existing bonus scheme (which then wasn’t paid), basically making the whole thing a PR piece. • When joining, I was told there was a £500 training budget per person, however requests to use this constantly fell on deaf ears. When pressed, it turned out that this no longer existed and processes were put in place to make training difficult to apply for to “put people off”. In three years, I didn’t have a single penny invested into any training for me (despite multiple requests). • On multiple occasions the CEO told clients I would complete work for them in the evening or over the weekend, without consulting me beforehand. I was never reimbursed for this overtime, nor was I paid for the hundreds of hours of additional overtime I did during my tenure at the company. • The company promoted on its website and throughout interviews that you could attend paid conferences and events - in actual fact this is limited to some of the SEO department going to BrightonSEO and that’s about it. If requests were put through to attend such events you had to make a significant business case to justify the expenditure, or you’d simply not hear back. • Favouritism is rampant at this agency. If the CEO likes you, you’ll be promoted & rewarded, receive constant shoutouts at company updates and more. Over the years there have been multiple instances of people delivering fantastic work and working significant hours of unpaid overtime but others being rewarded because the CEO has a preference towards that person. • The CEO chose to move us into a new office (despite not needing to leave the previous one), which had poorer facilities, yet was significantly more expensive. He then used that additional cost as a reason for not paying bonuses. Not even a year later the office was binned off as it was “too expensive”. • “Anonymous” surveys were sent out asking for honest feedback, however this resulted in the CEO figuring out who wrote anything negative and berating them (face to face and openly in front of the company). Wider criticisms and challenges raised tended to be ignored or senior members went on the defensive instead of looking to deliver improvements. • The CEO threatened people with disciplinary action for talking about their salary/benefits with others at the company. • Recent surveys have shown significant decreases in staff satisfaction over the past couple of years, however the company has done nothing to address this and instead chose to squeeze people further and continue to cut benefits. • Because of all of the above, staff turnover has significantly increased since the sale of the business. The agency has lost a lot of good people who were fundamental to its growth over the past few years, with some choosing to leave with no other job lined up. Almost all heads of departments have left the business in the past 12 months.

no cons to initially report