Red Bee Media Employee Reviews about "senior management"
Updated May 15, 2021
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Found 9 of over 181 reviews
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Pros
"Some of the best people I have ever worked with are at Red Bee Media" (in 11 reviews)
"There is a fair work life balance" (in 9 reviews)
Cons
"Red Bee has a habit of hiring and promoting the wrong people to do the wrong job" (in 10 reviews)
"Looks like senior management made some bad strategic decisions over the years" (in 9 reviews)
Pros & Cons are excerpts from user reviews. They are not authored by Glassdoor.
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Reviews about "senior management"
Return to all Reviews- Current Employee, more than 10 years★★★★★
Pros
the people i work with directly are the best you could ask for. the job is enjoyable and for me fits in well with my family life.
Cons
lots of work arounds to get tasks done although these have improved. don't always agree with senior management about how things are communicated. Bonuses don't exist. Pay increases have to be fought for hard by the union as these are not offered automatically. RBM is not a profit making company.
Hello and thank you for your review. I’m glad to hear that you like your job and it fits with your family life. As mentioned in other responses we conduct regular annual salary reviews and set our salary levels in line with the market. Steve Nylund, CEO
- Former Employee, more than 8 years★★★★★
Pros
The initial novelty of working on TV programmes is enjoyable.
Cons
I was a manager in this office years ago and left when I couldn’t tolerate any more. I’ve spent much time in the aftermath reflecting on this departure and have come to, for me at least, a definitive conclusion that made sense of my experience there. If you’re thinking of joining, then please consider my thoughts before applying. The fundamental problem is mistaken identity. Since the early 2000s when I joined, subtitling has become a factory. A word-production plant. But this is never acknowledged and the self-denial gives rise to flawed recruitment. Red Bee has a habit of hiring and promoting the wrong people to do the wrong job – myself included. Subtitling is relentless and monotonous. It’s all about productivity and accuracy, with everything accounted for. This isn’t a criticism of the role: it’s a fair description of its nature. It suits a specific type of person; the vast majority of people I worked with did not match the ideal model, because management held a different one in their imagination. The candidates who sailed through interviews were intelligent, expressive, highly educated and creative. This leads to an inevitable workforce disaster: these individuals – and they are individuals – begin to view themselves as automatic word-churning machines. One of a huge number on the factory line (hello, ‘sick’ days). It’s a relentless, monotonous job that’s been aggressively corporatised through the years. There is no room for freedom, let alone creativity. Of course, applicants should be bright and, yes, it’s hard to seek lovers of language who aren’t creative. But think about the job function: subtitlers support all that exciting stuff that goes on in TV land. Big shows, fast-shifting schedules, round-the-clock action, crazy deadlines. Except subtitlers aren’t the creatives in a BBC studio – they are providing an auxiliary service. They experience the long unsocial hours associated with television without any of the prime-time glamour. The ideal candidate therefore needs to enjoy repetitive work spread over long, variable hours, while coolly handling any mini emergencies. A cross between a data entry clerk and a security guard. Don’t picture it to be an office: ‘on the floor’ would be a better term. If this sounds like your idea of a great job – something ceaselessly high volume and meticulous – then go for it because the department needs you. But if you’re in any way dynamic, then you would find the role something of a professional stranglehold. Forget it if you have a big personality. Doubly forget it if you have a big social life! My error was to assume that I would be able to express myself when I got into management. Not so. Essentially, my job was to ensure that all work got covered. But a more accurate description would be: my relentless and monotonous job was to ensure that all relentless and monotonous work got covered by staff who were fed up with the relentless and monotonous nature of their jobs. The cognitive dissonance was unbearable. I apologise if this comes across caustic; as I said before, I was simply not suitable for the world of subtitling. It was my own mistake to believe otherwise (I now work in the creative industries). Reading contemporary reviews, it seems the issues have persisted. I am not surprised. For the unhappiness to fully dissipate, it'll take (a) many, many more waves of the right recruits (b) a comprehensive replacement of management as they wither away (c) new-generation management to keep hiring and promoting staff in their image. At the end of the day, there is nothing wrong with the job, much like there is nothing wrong with being a plumber, a seamstress, or a snooker referee. It suits a certain type of character, and that needs to be properly underlined in the job description. Stop hiring candidates with flair and earmarking them for progression, since cracking senior management (the point at which it becomes non-relentless) is ultra-rare. And accept that the job is a slog, instead of taking offence when this is fed back. When you’re job hunting and the Red Bee Media Subtitler advert pops up, it’s all too tempting to buy into the promise. The pay’s good, the novelty's twinkling, it’s sort of like working in TV. I mean, it’s even got ‘Media’ in the title. That’s pretty cool, right? Proceed with caution. There’s a good reason why this office suffers a bitter legacy. It’s a niche job for niche workers. To source them, I have thought of an apt question they should ask at interview – it may come across as sarcastic but I do feel it’s an insightful query, given my significant history with the organisation. Have you had any call centre experience before… and did you enjoy it?
Continue reading - Former Employee★★★★★
Pros
Great place to work, amazing colleagues
Cons
Looks like senior management made some bad strategic decisions over the years
- Current Employee, more than 10 years★★★★★
Pros
Some flexibility in working hours and arrangements available to SOME employees. Really dependent on who you are, who you know and how persistent you are prepared to be.
Cons
Very poor, inept and inexperienced management, mainly due to the mass exodus of talented staff over recent years and the reliance on existing poorly qualified and experienced staff to fill managerial vacancies. Predictably, working conditions have continued to decline, mainly due to poor leadership, virtually no support and an unfortunate combination of ignorance and stubbornness on the part of the lower and middle management teams. Senior management is undoubtedly clueless and disinterested in what is happening beneath them though as there is virtually no contact from them, this is only a general perception by those of us actually doing the work. This culture of chaos and reactive management styles has provided a fertile breeding ground for a number of opportunistic contractors who have come in to fill the obvious gaps in leadership at many levels and who are milking what is left of the company to its inevitable conclusion. Aside from the contractors who are basically running the show at the moment, the bulk of the dogsbody work is being shipped over to India and Eastern Europe who in general don't seem to mind the poor working conditions as much as their UK counterparts. Ericsson's management of this company is negligible. There has been no effort whatsoever on their part to get their hands dirty and to see what is actually going on below senior management level. This has allowed the existing management teams to carry on unchecked, unsupervised and hastened the downward spiral. Inevitably we now have lazy paranoid lower and middle management teams who are cultivating a growing blame culture. Most of the talent has gone voluntarily and the few of us who remain are just hanging on for the next redundancy offer. Having worked here for over 10 years, it's sad to see a company decline in this way but my advice to those looking to join, unless it's very short term and you need to bulk up your CV, give it a wide berth. Salaries are low and remain low, there are no worthwhile staff incentives and no career progression.
Continue readingRed Bee Media Response
HR Generalist
Hello. I was sorry to read your comments. Your feedback is important to us therefore I would be keen to discuss your concerns confidentially in more detail. Please let me know if you are comfortable talking to me, another member of LT or HR? Steve Nylund, CEO
- Former Employee, more than 1 year★★★★★
Pros
Only pros are flexible hours and good relationship with colleagues - can't really attribute the latter to the workplace, that's only luck, really.
Cons
Ridiculous pay, stingy company - don't care about their employees - can't trust senior management as there is really inappropriate and unprofessional behaviour among them - shacking up can apparently progress your career, and they don't hesitate to stab other people in the back for selfish reasons and personal gain
Continue readingRed Bee Media Response
HR Generalist
Hello and thank you for your feedback. Comments like yours are not something we take lightly. I’d welcome the opportunity to learn more about your specific experience. If you’re willing to expand, please can you contact me on HR@redbeemedia.com. Steve Nylund, CEO
- Former Employee★★★★★
Pros
A great roster of clients at the Tier 1 side of the broadcast market. Willing to give new talent a chance at entry-level. Some seriously talented people. A good coffee machine.
Cons
Wrong-headed decisions have been made over the years - even senior management won't support them. A tendency to make over-optimistic assumptions about what is needed to deliver things. And a plethora of broken processes that don't do what they're supposed to. The impact is felt by everybody and it's soul destroying.
Continue readingRed Bee Media Response
HR Generalist
Thank you for taking the time to leave your review and apologies it took us so long to reply. I would like to assure you that we’ve made a lot of changes since your review. Since joining as CEO, with the leadership team, RBM has structured a very clear strategy which is openly shared with our employees. Thank you very much for providing your feedback. Steve Nylund, CEO
- Former Employee★★★★★
Pros
Great team but now all sadly leaving The management used and abused the good nature of the staff
Cons
Sexism, bullying, victimisation (BECTUs opinion not just mine) working out of hours considered vital if you want to be considered for work. Favouritism rife. Senior management largely ineffective and absent. Creative had over ten years from leaving the BBC to get more work. Now those two contracts are up - they've not been renewed. There's no work left in the department but staff aren't being told anything about what's going to happen.
Continue readingRed Bee Media Response
HR Generalist
Hello and thank you for your review. Many apologies for the lateness in replying. If you would like to share any further comments or feedback, please do not hesitate to contact us on HR@redbeemedia.com Claire Allen, Head of People
- Current Employee★★★★★
Pros
The staff (as opposed to Exec team) are far and away the best bunch of committed, highly- skilled and professional people you could ever hope to work with. Sadly, our Senior 'managers' do not appear to agree.
Cons
Senior Management are out-of-touch, invisible and unsupportive. They need to get 'back to the floor' and engage in a meaningful way rather than display the meaningless gesture management-style which doesn't fool anyone. It is very, very hard to get annual Leave, the rotas are badly administered with dreadful and exhausting turnarounds. Staff feel they have no control over their lives and work/life balance might as well not exist. I could go on BUT by far and away the worst thing about this company is the way they invite staff to apply for jobs which are 2 or 3 grades higher. Staff apply, go through intense interviews and selection processes, and then, when they get the job they are not paid any more. At Red Bee Media you can be promoted and then find you are earning less than you were before. Management's response is that these promotions are 'career development'. Simply put, it is exploitation. Staff are afraid to complain because of the fear of a black mark against their name. I sincerely hope Ericsson have the morals and ethics to break this awful cycle.
Continue readingRed Bee Media Response
HR Generalist
Hello and thank you for your review. Many apologies for the lateness in replying. If you would like to share any further comments or feedback, please do not hesitate to contact us on HR@redbeemedia.com Claire Allen, Head of People
- Former Employee, more than 3 years★★★★★
Pros
They know how to aquire companies,
Cons
Continuous restructuring of management. Irresponsible senior management, where their decisions impact people’s lives without second thought. So many tedious processes, where the focus of maintaining a profitable company is totally lost. So many layers of management where they have no clue on key employees or the extra effort you put in, as they are more concerned with their own internal politics. Every man for themselves in this company and ALWAYS watching your back...
Continue readingRed Bee Media Response
HR Generalist
Thank you for your review. We appreciate current and former employees taking the time to leave their feedback. Steve Nylund, CEO
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