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I appreciate your taking the time to express your opinions about the company. I am disappointed that you did not bring these concerns to me and/or other team members directly. We have a goal and practice as a company to provide an open, honest and accountable management culture and this is evidenced by regular public and anonymous feedback opportunities. We share direct feedback to the team on each such comment/idea/request being made.
For those reasons I find the feedback expressed in this post unusual and unexpected. After learning of this a few days ago, my immediate action was to carefully canvas the entire company to ensure that there were not lurking concerns or grievances that had not been yet aired through our standard process. I found no other team member sharing the concerns expressed here.
That being said, it is critical that we take every opportunity to maintain the healthy culture that we have built, so I would like to address each point raised here.
“Small company with lots of talk (meetings)” – As we have grown rapidly to our current size of 20 employees, processes and communications have become more formalized. We hold meetings when necessary. We set agendas and objectives for the meetings. I have polled our team recently on how they think we are doing against the ongoing challenge in balancing the need for effective collaboration, communication and decision-making against the evil of unnecessary or inefficient meetings. The team feels, based on their experience with many other companies, that we do quite well on this front. And we will continue to evolve and improve.
“They pay when they are supposed to” – while this is listed as a “Pro”, I read it in this context as either sarcastic, or as someone to whom that is perhaps the focus of their value of the job. Either way this is a problem that we must address. We work toward a goal of having employees who find value in our mission, and in working with a committed and professional team, that goes beyond a paycheck. Not every company is a fit for every employee. During the past 4 years with Sensera I have heard consistently strong positive feedback from employees at all levels about our culture, about employee satisfaction with the company and their passion for our mission.
“Small company with closed mind” – this comment is, frankly, mystifying. While we are a small company relative to larger companies, I see no evidence of a “closed mind”. As part of the best-practices of healthy growth, we regularly revisit each practice and process in the company, and redesign what needs changing. We do this fearlessly and continuously.
“Marketing is ineffective” – In less than 4 years we have gone from non-existent to a recognized significant player in the transformation of the construction industry through automation and innovation. We have done this through first creating truly innovative products, delivering a quality customer experience, and then, through our marketing, efforts to build brand and product awareness in our targeted customer and industry base. The proof of the effectiveness of marketing is in part our double-digit growth rate. We have developed a solid digital marketing program that fuels our sales growth. There is always more to do and we will continue to invest in our marketing.
“ ‘upper management’ huddles in their secretive meetings – aka not transparent”
There is nothing secret about our management meetings or one-on-ones I have with the team, and I struggle to understand what is meant by ‘upper management’ given our flat structure. I would suggest that the goal of transparency would be better served by bringing your concerns directly to me and with more detail than is expressed in this post.
“Listen more than talk over employees (sic) ideas….” See above. Regarding talking over someone, I agree that this is rude, and not acceptable. We strive to have orderly meetings and to interact with one another in polite respectful ways. However, people can get passionate about a topic, impatient with the process, or otherwise carried away. I have been guilty of this myself. I am passionate about the business and can be eager to get problems solved. We can do better. However, I will not reduce my passion for Sensera Systems and our team.
We encourage a direct, open and honest communication within our team. Vague, anonymous postings to social media are not an effective way to contribute to the company or to get ideas and feedback put into action.
Sincerely,
David Gaw
CEO, Founder
