CNA Employee Reviews about "upper management"

Pros

Decent compensation and benefits, most people are easy to work with, nice office facilities

Cons

Terrible upper management, poor strategic planning regarding staffing, hire and and then lay-off of a yearly basis

Pros

Good 401k benefits, nice location in Downtown Chicago, new building.... If you are an actuary going for your Fellowship, CNA has a good student program. Get your Fellowship while working at CNA and quit the next day....

Cons

The CEO (Dino) is completely destroying this company. He has created a culture of fear at every level and in every department. The company has no vision. The management says they have a vision but their actions don't align with their words. The employee survey conducted last Fall highlighted challenges faced by employees regarding the toxicity of the environment and lack of direction but the upper management refused to take any responsibility. It appears that the people around the CEO are afraid to give him bad news and to demand change. Many senior leaders are at a point where they are simply killing their time and waiting for the right moment to take their golden parachutes and get out. Because of that, there is no strategic investment in people, technology, data, analytics, etc. People who are able to leave are leaving fast.

Pros

generous PTO (3 weeks to start and accrual of 60 hours of PSL); 401k is fantastic, 3% basic contribution by company in addition to matches and bonuses

Cons

very disorganized department, too many resignations in upper management, they come in and change stuff right away and then resign a few months later leaving us to sort everything out. UWs have too much power and management bows down to them. A lot of favoritism for high production/low quality employees.

Pros

Great people working very hard to overcome the lack of vision in management.

Cons

Management in specialty claims is consumed with trying to mandate uniform claims handling and cost savings. Unfortunately, upper management is not interested in hearing from those that are in the trenches and actually do the work. They have implemented several requirements that do nothing but bog down the few claims people that have not yet left. Because people have left and management has been unable to replace them fast enough, those that are left are forced to handle larger loads. That plus the newly implemented job requirements have made it all but impossible to meet expectations. This is a disaster in the making as it will only accelerate the loss of very seasoned and experienced staff, leaving new hires to try to navigate a miserable landscape. Good luck with that.

Pros

Salary is competitive. New building in 2018. There are amazing coworkers that you can learn so much from, but many have been laid off or are leaving on their own accord.

Cons

Complete lack of transparency in every aspect of the IT/Ops organization. Upper management is blind to the fact that their decisions impact actual people and not simply human capital units on a spreadsheet. Middle management is plagued with 'Yes Men' that are either too afraid or simply don't care enough to question seemingly poor and short-sighted decisions made above them. Decisions have not been well communicated and there is no transparency around what leadership's vision is (other than the proliferation of buzzwords such as "world class"). The ask from upper management is for employees to be inspired and passionate and yet they are laying off waves and waves of extremely loyal and talented employees, many of who spent their careers loyal to the company. Sure, change is important if you want to transform the company, but you can't come through the company like a wrecking ball and expect those remaining to feel warm and fuzzy. You have let go of some of your best allies, and had you been leaders and not simply bosses, then they would have helped you pave the way for change. And for what? To cut your expense enough to please investors by year end? Great, you probably accomplished this! But at the end of the day are you going to have the respect of your workforce as a real leader after you bullied your way into meeting your short-term goals? In short, I would not recommend this organization to anyone in its current state. If you join at this time you will be subject to chaotic decision making and extreme political games. There are/were amazing people working in this organization that are truly passionate about their work. But they are leaving quickly, driven out by bureaucracy. Until the dust settles and true leaders emerge to try to undo the damage, this is not a good career investment.

Pros

The people here are very experienced and knowledgeable in their field. With the company being as old as it is, they have/had great employee retention so you have tons of people who have been here for decades and are a wealth of knowledge.

Cons

The IT org is changing its structure completely with little to no communication about their vision. There have been waves of layoffs with no reasoning and no sympathy for employees who ask "why?" The culture is so stuffy and extremely corporate, if you want any kind of an engaging day-to-day experience, CNA is unfortunately not for you. I have experienced a strong "heads down and work" attitude with no value put on forming any kind of personal friendships with the people around you. There's no such thing as an employee experience within IT- other BU have fun, sponsored activities to get everyone together and to get to know one another but that is 100% unheard of here. The company is trying to brand itself as a new, hip, innovative company that is willing to change and adjust to the needs of their employees but I have yet to see even one example of this. The executives point fingers at employees and make claims like "why am I the only one who is looking to cut costs around here, why don't any of you push back on our MSPs?" without spending one day in our shoes. And I know that because if they did spend any time around here, they'd know how hard people work and how there are individuals who are working their butt off to make a difference and help the company as best as they can. Upper management is just too arrogant and self-absorbed to see that. Then we get told that we need to have more "passion" and a willingness to see the company do better, that this is a team effort and upper management cannot do it alone. All I have to say is passion is earned, it doesn't just come with a title.

Pros

Middle management is pretty solid.

Cons

Get tired of revolving door of upper management with changing "vision"