California Rural Indian Health Board Reviews

California Rural Indian Health Board (CRIHB) is in crisis. High turnover of employees and distrust of leadership has caused deep employee dissatisfaction. Leadership has isolated itself and communication from the executive team has been non-existent. There’s a tendency to shift the blame to COVID, however, morale began dropping a few years prior to COVID. The CEO & Deputy CEO engage in some destructive behaviors of micromanagement. Working under this kind of leadership is oppressive and they have little regard for their staff’s professional experience and education – simply, employees do not feel valued or appreciated. (Leadership experts note how damaging micromanaging is to an organization.) The CEO is a gifted policy analyst, but leading and motivating are not his gifts – he’s the ideal example of the “Peter Principle.” The Deputy CEO seems to be in over her head and she was not set up for success. Many employees that work for non-profits do so for the personal fulfillment of the mission and recognize salaries will be lower than the private sector. However, the salaries have fallen far behind, even for a non-profit. Merit increases are random. Since the culture is suffering, there is no enticement for employees to remain and many believe the environment will not improve. With all of the vacancies, resignations and whispers of more colleagues that are actively job searching, it leaves CRIHB very vulnerable.

-Toxic and dysfunctional work environment, lots of gossip and complaining. -HIGH TURNOVER, makes it difficult to get projects done. -Take on projects outside of job description with no compensation or positive feedback. -Poor leadership, primarily due to the CEO who micromanages managers and directors which makes communication and guidance to staff inconsistent and unclear. -Managers are overworked and underpaid. Difficult for them to check in with their staff regularly. -Only department directors have their own office (except the Deputy CEO, they get their own office), everyone sits in cubicles. -Gaslighting is real here -No weekly team meetings or regular check ins which makes it difficult to stay on the same page or stay up to date -HR no longer announces new hires company-wide. Only on department level so you come to the office and see new faces but have no idea who they are which is quite awkward. -Kitchen is still closed even though staff are required to come into the office and no coffee at the coffee station (just leftovers from before the shut down in 2020). -CEO does not engage with staff. We used to have mostly all staff meetings with team building exercises. Since the shut down in March 2020, not a single meeting but departments have held monthly meetings via Zoom then MS Teams (at least the Research and Public Health Department, can't say for others since, well, no one really knows what is going on in other departments without any sort of company-wide meeting so staff have to rely on gossip for info). -Internal Review process is time-consuming and makes it impossible to publish documents in a reasonable and timely manner. They claim 6 weeks but larger reports have been under review going on more than a year. Plus the CEO has to approve EVERYTHING. From event flyers to Power Points to project summary reports, everything must go through: manager -> director -> Communications Specialist --> Grants Writer (if applicable) --> COO --> Deputy CEO --> CEO. This is not a good use of the CEO's time, in my opinion. -No upward mobility to advance one's career.