Pros
Being able to work remotely
Cons
I must first stay the negative comments are spot on! I want it to be noted that I am not here to bash but rather share my experience with SA. hat haSquared Away leadership embodies the part of the military community I hate so much. Cliquish! The favoritism is unreal. They speak of "having grace" and "being kind," but unfortunately, they do not practice what they preach. What you see on the public slack channels is not what happens behind closed doors. The directors and team leads have secret slack channels where they speak ill of others. It's incredibly unprofessional, and it also creates a toxic work environment. We are 1099 contractors but are treated as W2 employees. SA requires us to be online all day, but we are only paid for the hours we work. We are tasked with things that we are unable to clock time for, essentially working for free. Example: We have to check our SA email and Slack channel every hour. We must do check-ins with our team leads every week. We are required to update google documents when asked. Most recently, I've heard from a current contractor that they are required to update their client document every two weeks with the same information that is being asked in their check-ins. Not only is that redundant, but it is also a waste of time, time in which they are not being paid for. If you want to move up to a Team Lead position, you must attend all meetings and extras to be considered. They are asking you to work for free if you want to be considered for a promotion. Is that even legal? There is an option for clients to buyout an assistant's contract, but SA makes it virtually impossible for clients to do so. Clients would have to pay 6x their contracted amount. A 75h package comes with a buyout cost of $18,000. For a company claiming to help military spouses, they sure do make it impossible for assistants to grow with their client or any other company outside SA. Though they have growing numbers, they also have an extremely high turnover rate. I have former teammates tve gone through five and six team leads. Leadership just can't let go of control (micromanage). The CEO and Team leads keep track of the time we clock on SA's Harvest account they created for us. We must CC and BCC leadership on all low-hour emails, end of week, and month emails. If our client doesn't use his/her hours, they taunt you on slack, forcing you to do stuff that you might not be comfortable doing and accuse you of not being proactive enough. When maybe your client is just busy. They make us provide our login information for our client's LastPass account, which all directors and team leads can access. That is something that should be private between the client and assistant. They claim to have an open-door policy, but if you do speak up, you will be treated with passive-aggressive behavior. Despite having anonymous surveys every month or so, the same complaints are ignored, and assistants are met with "If you don't like it, you can leave attitude." Upper management should take constructive criticism and be willing to adjust policies to make employees (let's face it, that's what they are) want to stay. I can tell you my time at SA was super stressful. I did not feel comfortable speaking to any of the directors and had zero trust in my team lead. They should consider outsourcing an HR department so assistants have a safe haven when filing grievances.
