employer cover photo
employer logo
employer logo

Clean Energy Collective

Is this your company?

Actually fired 1/2 the team that was hitting quota! - Solar Specialist Clean Energy Collective Employee Review

1.0
10 Oct 2014
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Selling a product that makes sense ecologically. Feeling like the work made a difference. Providing solar to homes & business that previously could not have solar.

Cons

CEC hired an awesome sales manager/sales trainer in January '14 who hired 10 inside sales reps on March 10th for his team. He trained us for 6 days. All 10 of us hit the 1st month sales quota of $60,000 within 2 weeks. Rather than congratulate our team for our record breaking effort, CEC asked our awesome trainer/sales manager in May to pick 5 of us to fire because CEC "hired too many sales people" ...when his team was out performing the existing team! Our awesome trainer/sales manager refused, and resigned-even with a wife and 3 kids depending on him. It was THAT despicable. 5 of the 10 of us were fired that day and since then, CEC has hired countless new employees yet the sales team is slowly being picked off because few if any are consistently hitting the $140,000 quota. CEC sales people are required to sell solar panels in arrays (gardens) that do not even exist yet and may never actually be constructed! On top of that, the solar panels are over priced and hard to sell. ($800-$1,300 each) and the lack of actual sales support is appalling. With most companies, sales is respected and honored for bringing in money that sustains the rest of the company. At CEC this is NOT the case.

Explore other reviews about Clean Energy Collective

5.0
17 May 2017
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The IT and Development department are some of the best people to work with ; patient, collabrative, and hard working. In my time with them I grew more than I could have on my own.

Cons

It is a start-up, so there are occasionally bumps :/

2
1.0
7 Sept 2018
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

I had some fantastic coworkers during my time here. I also loved working for a renewable energy company and felt like I was making a positive impact on the world.

Cons

So many cons it's hard to start! First, the CEO has awful people skills and does not care about employee satisfaction. He surrounds himself with people he can trust to have his back rather than people who will be honest and improve the company. It’s unfortunate he cares more about his ego than listening to advice that would save his company. Second, the company was ridiculously top heavy. There were far too many VPs and Chiefs with inflated titles. Fancy titles aren't going to motivate people as much as good treatment. Third, the environment was very toxic. Due to the inept CEO and lack of focus on employee satisfaction, everyone was very unmotivated and unhappy. I truly believe the company could have been successful if the employees were happy, motivated, and empowered to make changes. Fourth, and most importantly, the company is going out of business. They've done three rounds of layoffs in the last year and don't have enough income to keep the business running. Even if you can deal with a toxic environment, I wouldn't recommend working here if you want your job to be around in six months.

4
See reviews by: Helpful|Rating|Date|All