Made redundant less than 10 weeks into the job. Says a lot about how they work. - Recensione dipendente - Senior Consultant presso FNZ

It's fair that you would assume that I'm writing this review in anger after being employed for only a very short time, weeks. It would also be fair to assume that my experience may not be what others have. I'll try to be as honest and unbiased as I can with this. But this is a review of my experience all the same. I was part of a second layoff round in 6 months. I was hired with an approved budget, and I was told as long as I perform, there's always a space at FNZ for me. This was false. Throughout my entire time, I was praised by managers, colleagues, and customers alike, I was trotted around like a show horse as a key hire for the next 12 months of strategy, and I interacted directly with UK leadership and client stakeholders. This strategy, obviously is not a thing anymore. I was unceremoniously let go on a Friday morning, the person doing the letting go couldn't even look at the camera over teams, reading a script. I was doing a really good job, I knew that, my manager has only a few days before had said I was smashing it. "Just keep doing what you're doing", they said. But it doesn't matter at FNZ, it wasn't about me personally, it was about them spending less money, while trying to figure out exactly what they are. I don't think 90% of people at FNZ know that it is, except a tool to "Open up Wealth" - to investors of FNZ that is! Don't be silly and think FNZ are doing what they do "for the average Joe", or for the founder's already wealthy parents. You're a means to an end. That's my personal story, but let's talk about the company itself, and what insight from less than 10 weeks, and zero loyalty to the company tells you. Onboarding HR didn't even tell me I was hired after the checks were done. I had to chase. Red flag. You're sat in front of Workday training videos for most of the first week, which appears to have very little quality control. FNZ is a huge business, with lots of ingested companies, lots of unknown politics, and thorny issues you don't know exist until you rub up against one. your first month is a minefield. Managers will give you work either assuming you know it, or they don't care if you don't, not sure which is worse. The "sink or swim" culture. Some people see it as some kind of badge of honor, but it's toxic and leads to so many problems down the line. It's easier to accept that the good folk figure it out, and the bad ones sink, and it's their fault. Not the fault of leadership. That's poor accountability with a scapegoat excuse. I honestly think the reason why training and knowledge transfer is so bad, is that the only people who work there with long tenure are managers with no idea of the detail who only ever want to say yes to their own manager. There are a good number of back office teams currently, with 40-50% of all employees only having been working there less than 6 months. Put simply, the reason you're not trained is that either nobody can or has the time to. Culture: Further notes on culture. It borderlines on parody. You can see some of this in a BBC3 limited series. Pride week was celebrated with cupcakes in the kitchen with rainbow stickers on them and a raffle for "queer" items (rainbow packaged) run by the building manager. Sure, there was a webinar with a prominent trans spokesperson, but that of course was outsourced and required only to spend money on a speaking fee. The workday training videos are a real joy. It's like they went to build a bear for representation. "yes can I get 1 wheelchair bound with a smile, 1 Asian laughing and I think we'll have 2 black women in this one, and would it be too much if there's a hijab....somewhere?" I get that it's a good thing, and I have absolutely nothing against it, it just, with all the other "culture" stuff that goes on, it feels insincere, and honestly, a little icky. Corporate tone deafness, Blackwashing, Greenwashing, Rainbow washing. Ticking boxes like a GCSE exam. The CEO, Adrian Durham is not an inspiring leader. Some people have mentioned him in the same breath as Steve Jobs and other "visionaries". He is not. He is a small man with a big wallet. It's not brave to throw money at companies to remove the competition. It's not brave to fix your bottom line by indiscriminately making people redundant with zero accountability. A huge number of the senior management were OOO on the last round of redundancies, read into that what you will. The CEO made the news earlier this year by threatening to fire people, essentially for gross misconduct, if they were not coming into the office 3 times a week. This would be enforced, he said, by checking building access logs. Apparently the "data" proved it was better for the company. Obviously, it would be INSANE to think that the timing of this threat, matches up with redundancies a month after. It would be CRAZY to think they wanted to get people to find other work and resign before they had to pay redundancy out. Don't be so SILLY, it's not a tactic most other companies that overhired/promised and underdelivered in the past few years have done. Back to parody - immediately after this email threat, HR/Marketing (same dept at FNZ really...) Emailed and posted about FNZs commitment and mission to reducing carbon emissions. It will always stick in my mind, but HR, especially at large companies, is a service for the company, not the employee. After this experience, I will never forget that. Values: They value money. I get it's a business, its purpose in life is to make money. But it's just not worth it. It's not a tech firm. It's a financial corporation pretending to be a tech firm. They've bought most of the "platform" off other people. Read the reviews from Devs - it's mostly legacy systems and maintenance, bug-led development as some other person put it. Do you know what would be a great way to reduce costs? Close some offices down. Chill with buying out other companies and then figuring out how to fix the balance sheet. Diversity and inclusion: Check the "Our Team" page on the website. Not a single person of color. A few women, sure. Good for them. I hope they're good people.