Brunswick Group Reviews

Brunswick doesn’t have a real strategy as a firm. As an employee, you will hear a lot of positioning about it being a “critical issues advisory firm,” but once you cut beneath the facade, there is little substance. In my time, I found the firm seeks to latch onto the next shiny thing (Geopolitics, ESG/climate, Tax) which it can dangle in front of clients, but doesn’t truly invest in building a durable offering with the resource backing to truly scale.. So instead you have some world-class experts who come into the firm, get frustrated over time as their skill sets are not being deployed, and then inevitably move on. Part of this may simply be a reflection of the business model. When you advise 1/3 of the FTSE, you are conflicted from working with competitors, so in my view, this lends itself to an anti-entrepreneurial environment where those who own the client relationships are reticent to push the boundaries in how they advise clients and really take the time to understand the expertise available to them in Brunswick. It’s far easier to keep the client happy and just give the client what they are asking for, especially when you are unlikely to see any comp upside from growing the account (see below), Another contributing factor may be the “black box” nature of comp and the incentive structure. In my time as a Partner, I did not meet anyone who had a clear understanding of how they would be compensated if they were successful in growing business, So instead everyone creates this impression that they are incredibly busy, doing really important work for clients to help them on their latest crisis, when the reality is much different.

Work/life balance for the compensation is joke. Especially at the junior levels (AR, Exec and AD), and this fosters a toxic culture. 24/7 commitment is expected on all teams although it’s inefficient to service clients in such a way because firstly, they don’t pay the firm enough to make this profitable and secondly, it causes burnout and attrition at the firm’s lowest levels, which are burdened with the 24/7 monitoring and odd hour requests. Weekend duty is part of the AR program, and also a requirement on some client teams. It is therefore hard to ever feel “offline”. If you are away from your desk longer than hour, you are expected to notify teams of your whereabouts. It can be an extremely high-stress environment. Work can be “capacity” driven instead of thoughtfully assigned in consideration of business needs and professional development. Management is opaque– for example, rotations in the AR rotational program are completely skipped with no comment, promotion timelines and overall company strategy are unclear. Further, the company structure feels too disorganized given its size (~600 employees) and age (~30). It’s very easy for those with big personalities or an “in” with senior management to affect professional development positively or negatively. On the other hand, if a mentor or supervisor is not outspoken nor connected with senior management development professional development in the form of team assignment or promotion may be hindered. ARs can end up handling an excess amount of admin work (scheduling meetings, taking notes, editing notes, distributing notes). ARs development can also be hampered depending on the personality of the executive they are assigned to. Brunswick can have a Napoleonic complex when it comes to its place within the hierarchy of the advisory world (order of importance: bankers, lawyers, consultants, then comms), thus some leaders at the firm encourage employees to pull all-nighters when they aren’t necessary to complete work just to have a seat at table. At the end of the day some companies see communications as a box to tick, so Brunswick gets sidelined and feels the need to overcompensate. Overall some company policies and attitudes can feel corporate and old-fashioned. And if you don’t want to pursue a career in communications then be prepared to get annoyed at the self-important attitude of some colleagues– “its PR not ER” is a common refrain.