Pros
Nice head office. Laptop and mobile phone were brand new. PPE is good quality and was available from my first day. The induction was extensive.
Cons
I can only speak for the UK side of the business where I worked at Head Office as a Plant and Compliance Training Manager. Poor benefits package and bare bones pension. High turnover of staff across all levels of the business. Their IT infrastructure is a joke; however your personal IT equipment and PPE is excellent. Not enough parking at head office. Too many senior managers riding on the back of the skill sets of others further down the food chain. Too much talk from leadership but very little in the way corrective action and continuous improvements being made at a site level, which would ultimately drive positive change across their business. This Company is a Group but without the Group mentality - 65 locations in the UK all working independently - no joined up thinking and poor communication. Very much a blame culture with many managers willing to point the finger and throw individuals "under the bus" rather than tackle the underlying issues. I was brought into the business to introduce externally accredited plant training for the UK and develop a training team. In 14 months, we managed to train 450 front line employees – equating to half their front-line employees. Unfortunately, EMR did not equipment these people to succeed. Poor or defective equipment, inadequate working conditions and unrealistic performance expectations contribute to the majority of EMR's failings. EMR have a big picture and a clear strategy that senior leadership love to reference during onboarding but when it gets in the way of earning money, it is soon ignored. This company is all about doing it the same way as they have for the last 30 years. People on the ground at their UK locations are hardworking, working very long hours, underpaid and undervalued. The standard of equipment and facilities varies a lot from site to site - generally equipment is poorly maintained and defective. Even new equipment is not looked after properly. Plant equipment only gets fixed when it breaks down and preventative maintenance does not seem to be a word used at EMR. Health and Safety is my biggest worry at EMR. Too many short cuts, time pressures, under staffing and expectation to "get things done regardless" are a recipe for disaster. When I joined this business, I was expecting to ruffle a few feathers as I showed the business what good health safety practice and compliant operating looks like. I was assured that I would have the full support of EMR leadership as I established a new baseline for externally accredited training. What I met was zero support, office politics and a Company Director who went behind my back to the Liverpool site and negotiated a training arrangement that couldn't be replicated nationwide and fundamentally undermined what we were trying to achieve. A Company Director who was not comfortable challenging his peers, the status quo and would avoid confrontation with responses like, "the customer (EMR) is always right!" Sorry but a customer is not always right when it comes to ignoring Health and Safety!