Pros
Dog-friendly!! Location: The building is cool and has a unique history. It’s located in between the major highways, so it’s easily accessible. Close to downtown, Busch Stadium, 4Hands and lots of restaurants for lunch. Benefits: The health insurance and vacation benefits offered are truly the only redeeming qualities about this job these days. Coverage is good and the rates are very affordable. As an added bonus, there are decent snacks provided in the office. People: You will make friends here. The previous HR team truly new how to hire great people, though most of the old regime has since left or been fired/laid off. The demographic is young, so it’s easy to find people you can relate to and want to hang out with outside of work. I definitely met people who will be lifelong best friends here. (This statement does not apply to the partners or upper management. See cons below.)
Cons
Environment: This is a toxic work environment... and that’s sad to say because it wasn’t always like this. The glory days of HLK are gone. Now, it’s a cut-throat, every man for himself place. You will not receive support from upper management or the partners. Don’t expect praise unless you’re one of the “favorites.” You’ll be expected to work 60+ hours a week, so don’t count on having any work-life balance. There will be no thanks for going above-and-beyond either. If you try to tell someone you’re at capacity and can’t take on more projects, it will be seen as a negative and you will never recover from being thought of as the person who says no. If you get any feedback, it’s usually only criticism. Unfortunately, there are a handful of extremely rude/mean/condescending individuals that make working on their teams miserable. Sadly, these few people spoil the overall atmosphere, because as I mentioned in the “Pros” there are some awesome people working here. Leadership: The partners show no loyalty to their employees. They hire/fire constantly. They don’t care about employee retention, yet constantly say, “We’re growing.” No, you’re losing your best talent to other local agencies and companies, so you have to hire new bodies to fill their seats. There’s a difference. Why? 2/3 partners are cold and don’t take time to get to know their employees (unless you’re a “favorite”). They don’t provide adequate raises, leadership opportunities or growth. As one partner repeatedly said, “We expect people to leave after a couple years. And that’s fine.” Hearing sentiments like this from a name partner doesn’t make employees feel great about where they’re working. (Truly, that partner just shouldn’t be the one to communicate with employees because this partner has no tact or compassion. Everything out of this person’s mouth or email is harsh, crass and highly inappropriate/unmotivating.) I’ve watched them lay off solid employees and long-time assets to the company due to their own mismanagement of work and client retention. They act like it’s no big deal to lose employees, but it puts stress on everyone else. The partners are the reason the culture here was destroyed. There’s no trust or security. Employees no longer feel valued. Structure: HLK can’t find its footing. There’s a serious lack of consistent process and structure. Recent changes have led to more confusion, frustration and division between departments. They like to think they promote collaboration, but then punish employees for stepping out of their lanes. Communication: The partners only share what they want you to hear. There’s very little transparency and honesty. Good luck getting anything meaningful from your direct supervisor. No one in upper management has a clue what’s going on usually. Probably not their fault, though. Communication with clients is also disastrous. Account Directors, managers and partners tell clients what they want to hear, even if it’s not the truth or what’s best. They don’t communicate team structure changes to clients in a timely manner, which leads to a lot of confusion and frustration with clients. Performance Reviews: In the past, you didn’t actually get feedback on your performance. You just set arbitrary goals for yourself. That process recently changed to a point rating system 1-5. Let me tell you about this utter mess... it had potential to be good, but ultimately was a joke. Partners instructed department managers to intentionally rate people poorly so they could keep egos low and set a precedent. Talk about inspiring... The worst part was the rationale and feedback presented with your rating usually didn’t match. Positive feedback, yet scores under 3. So essentially, it was meaningless and only succeeded in making employees feel worse about themselves. Like most things at HLK, it was superficial and only implemented to save face. Diversity: Let’s be honest, it’s mostly white and heteronormative. This is not a diverse office. You can count on one hand the number of POC and LGBT employees. Suggestions for diversity training were not taken seriously. Sexual Harassment: There were multiple cases of sexual harassment reported. Many more unreported. This is an issue and one that I’m surprised hasn’t been addressed in other reviews. The reported cases were handled quietly with very different outcomes. As a result, employees had to attend a sexual harassment webinar which was a joke and didn’t actually enforce a no-tolerance policy. Mental Health: Working here is disastrous for your mental health and emotional wellbeing. On any given day, you’ll find someone crying in the bathroom, stairwell or basement. Your self esteem and confidence in your job ability will take a huge hit because you will never receive positive feedback and will constantly be undermined or blamed when things go wrong.