Ascent (Missouri) Reviews

This was a pretty good company to work for until management took on too many new customers without having the proper staff, processes and tools in place. Life is too short and there are a lot of jobs out there to have continued at this mind-numbing, mismanaged, overstressed workplace. Below are a few observations I made during my time at Ascent. These are not embellished in any way and I hope management takes them seriously. Management – There are a couple very good managers but most are truly blind to the amount of work there was and what it took to provide good customer service. There were 100s of work orders that could be assigned to one person and there was no way in hell each work order could be worked, tracked, followed up on and closed out. Due to the work load, things are missed, items fell through the cracks and customer service suffered. Management, please open your office doors and talk to the people that actually do the day to day work. They are real people with feelings, ideas and expectations. Also, I have no idea how managers at Ascent are promoted to the positions they are in. How can people with zero experience, zero people skills and people that are only looking out for themselves lead a company into the future? These are the reasons Ascent is losing clients. Communication/Contracts – Management for some reason was leery about telling their employees, who actually did the work, what was sold to the client. If they don’t or couldn't tell us, how could we execute the work per the customer’s expectations. There were times when the operational staff would ask what was sold in the contract or what the processes or deliverables promised were and management would say that we will figure it out as we go. That is an absurd way to do business and it only set up the employee to fail. Also, there were many times that services were sold and the contracts, engineering and operations departments are given very unreasonable short time periods to get up to speed and execute. Sometimes what should have been given months was only given a few weeks or even less. This is my number one complaint with the company and the main reason I left. Job Satisfaction – At least in operations, there was no tangible satisfaction you can get from the job. The workload is so daunting we can’t even begin to see the light at the end of the tunnel. I’ve heard many people say that they got unhealthy anxiety and stress every day when they are driving to work and pulled into the parking lot. I got the same feelings and it is a very bad situation. Also, employees were scared to death of messing up or being blamed by management when there was an oversight or screw up. Most of the time the assets were wrong in the system, the wrong work order status was listed, the vendors messed up or the clients just didn't want to work with us. Management had no idea what goes into providing quality customer service on the operations level and that the tools, processes and manpower were completely inadequate. Pay – The pay was very low when compared to industry average and recently some of the entry level positions were reduced even lower. In terms of the operations center, these were the first people that a client or vendor would talk to when they call the company. Having low-waged employees put in this position with minimal training set the employee up to fail. At higher level positions, what seemed to be a fair salary was skewed due to the fact of all the after-hour and weekend work there ended up being. Even though the pay was low, I know many past and current employees looking for other jobs that have or will take the same pay or even less to leave Ascent. That is how bad it is. Job Description – It is understood that you will be asked to wear a few hats at a particular job but at Ascent you never know when a task from engineering, operations, business development or contracts will be thrown on your desk with no explanation from your direct supervisor. In all fairness, your direct supervisor may not even know you were given the assignment as management seemed to think the employee pool was at their disposal for whatever they see fit. Obviously, people prefer an expectation of what they will be working on and believe it or not, some tasks are unwanted or were not signed up for. Towards the end of my employment, management had been throwing engineers at the company's problems hoping that they could clean up the mess. Some of the problems had taken years to develop due to the inadequate systems and lack of manpower and to think an engineer can just come in and fix them was just ridiculous. There were many very good, smart, educated employees that simply got burned out and did the smart thing and left. The burn out came from trying to guess what management expected day in and day out or they were tired of getting yelled at due to management’s lack of communication. Start treating your employees like you respect them and not disposable and replaceable when they get burned out. Most of the employees truly wanted to do a good job and make the company successful but after a few months the reality set in that management offers very little support and the workload was overwhelming. Also, stop moving, promoting and demoting staff whenever the wind blows. It is not helping and everyone hates it. Employees were just asking for a good stable job that has a manageable workload and known expectations. Harassment – There was definitely an element of harassment at Ascent, ranging from grade school hijinks to outright sexual harassment and innuendos that had become the status quo. It is understood that we need to let off a little steam while working in an office 9 or 10 hours per day but what would be totally unacceptable at most companies was just laughed off with the explanation of that’s how it always has been at Ascent. I cannot believe that a professional tech company allowed this to go on, it was downright vulgar, rude, demeaning and completely inappropriate. Participants included all levels of staff and nothing had been done about it during the time I had been with the company. This unprofessionalism was my second reason for leaving the company. The reason this was written is to clue in management to some of the issues the front line employees are facing day in and day out. This is also written to let prospective employees know what the atmosphere at Ascent is like and if you are considering a job there, please ask the tough questions in your interview and how these issues are being addressed. I honestly don’t see this company, at least with the services provided when I left, in business in the near future. Also, please to not be fooled or impressed by the fact Ascent received one of St. Louis's top workplace awards for 2012 and 2013. The company applied for this award by having the employees compete a very ambiguous five question survey. Also, this company was very different just a few years ago; the avalanche of problems was just beginning. I'm not sure why HR continues to market this award when it was very much meaningless and non-applicable.