Elements as a whole is painted as this hallowed hall of retribution for all those who fell victim to the ruthless whims of Agency recruitment and the misogynistic/Sexist/Racist stereotypes that follow it.
Leadership:
There is a distinct lack of leadership across the business that is shielded through many initiatives that are often scrapped and rehashed as the same thing. There have been instances where more serious issues have not be tackled with the same ferocity as more trivial issues e.g Town Halls have been called just to discuss chewing gum stuck on tables, the entire management team being made to apologise to the org. due to jokes on slack about someone eating another persons fish etc. Blowing such things out of proportion does not give the system much credibility especially when more serious issues are not tackled in the same way. Ever since the CEO planted a fake question in the Town Hall addressing rumours towards his personal life, there has been a distinct lack of trust between employees and senior management. In said meeting the CEO inferred that his management team relayed confidential information that employees had confided in them yet again undermining any trust in the system.
Bar very few, senior management consists of a group of (imho) under-qualified people who at regular occasions can be seen to be quite inept at their jobs. They all bow to the CEOs whim but complain behind his back. This can lead to disparities in emotions across the org. as the CEO is often put as the point of blame when in reality it is the subpar management team dropping the ball a lot of the time by never challenging him. However the CEO is not absolved of any responsibility. Favouritism or failing upwards is partly why they have found themselves in this position, justified only by potential longevity within the business or how much you do on the “Elements Side” rather than tangible results achieved on projects.
COVID:
Management deserves some praise for some of the work during the beginning of the pandemic in trying to keep morale high. There have unfortunately been a few instances since that have left a bitter taste in many peoples mouths. We were told we were in negative EBITDA so we had to sadly make our juniors redundant. In the same breath we were told of the need to hire new Seniors to do the same job some juniors were very capable of doing whilst also reminding everyone of a £2000 referral fee. Town halls went from being anonymous to live questions answered in front of the business which left them feeling far less genuine as nobody is likely to challenge someone paying them so boldly without the protection of anonymity.
In the penultimate weeks of furlough, redundancy went from a word that dare not be spoken to our reality ‘we made a promise to the board’. It was made to seem like it would only happen in the most impossible of circumstances especially as our regular finance updates were showing we were slowly making money again and attracting new partners. In the aim of maintaining morale, the news was often delivered as 'it’s bad but it could be so much worse' week after week and many questions around redundancy were often avoided so there was a feeling of security around the business. You can imagine the shock when an impromptu town hall was called immediately after an emergency board meeting that took place just before the bank holiday weekend. The result of which was a written statement, where questions were banned, announcing the risk of redundancies for some including a pregnant team member. Even more shocking is once this was announced for the juniors (some of whom were shoehorned and undercut in salary offers to join) a few weeks later Elements then announced a hiring drive for people with more experience ‘it’s what our partners were asking for’. If that isn't a slap in the face I don't know what is.
Whilst redundancies were being explained to the work force fellow employees decided it would be an appropriate time to ask about new hires and US expansion. This was completely insensitive but encouraged by those leading the conversation. We were all told about how well the business was doing despite the current pandemic. We were fed information under the guise of complete transparency but at the eleventh hour the senior team contradicted every statement they had ever made about caring about the well being of all of their employees. Furlough was made to sound like a personal favour, not a government funded scheme. We were also regularly reminded of how the CEO took a temporary 100% salary sacrifice to help maintain the everyday running of the business. Although this highlighted the severity of the impact of COVID it again was not aligned with the reality for those being made redundant - surprisingly many of which are not majority stakeholders in a company worth a few million.
Racism:
Addressing Racism or 'Unconscious Bias' as it is often referred to as in the workplace. Unfortunately this is something I have found to be present both in it’s casual form and in much more overt and sinister forms. I was shocked to hear a senior stakeholder apparently tell a member of staff not to sit with other black employees as 'as it would be bad for their perception of leadership within the company' as well as an employee being told to tone down their blackness.
Drug misuse:
Drug Misuse in the company is of zero tolerance as we are regularly told but how can anybody take this seriously when the actual misuse comes from top down. This is hypocritical at its best.
