Pros
In short: - One of the few advertising spaces where the majority of employees are BIPOC - Quick interview/hiring process (unfortunately also a con below) - Despite being a small agency, they offer pretty good compensation (and after you read the cons, this makes sense)
Cons
In short: - Skin-folk ain’t kinfolk — it’s a shame that there’s so much BIPOC talent in one place, and yet we run right out the door because Hero treats us the same way “white agencies” do - Ironically, for a Black-owned, multicultural agency, there are no internal D.E.I. practices or programs in place (remember y’all, discrimination goes beyond just racism) - There is no HR department, nor any employee safety/protection programs (for example, there is no sexual harassment training here — a NY state law) - During the interview/hiring process, there is little to no evaluation of talent, skills, experience, and capabilities — this is coming from a creative that had none of my interviewers nor hiring staff ask about my portfolio/relevant experience — not to mention, didn’t even get to meet with anyone on the creative team (this is a pro if you want/need to find new employment quickly, but rapidly becomes a con if not qualified/prepared for the actual work) - There is no proper managerial structure/hierarchy — I’ve seen creatives report to account people, people with no managers whatsoever (*raises hand*), and the CEO act like a creative director and completely re-do finished work - There is no performance review process, i.e., no programs; no goal setting; nothing measurable in place to track your work performance for promotions/raises - There’s a heavy reliance on freelancers and a task-to-talent workforce, i.e., creative files are all over the place, creative consistency is rare, and there is a constant need to onboard and off-board people - There is no structure for how each team/brand operates — project routes happen over email (instead of a separate program like Workfront), timelines are made up based on how long people “think” something should take vs. how long it actually does, on-boarding usually consists of information dumping on you rather than legitimate on-boarding documents/presentations, and files are “organized” in the wild, wild west of Google Drive where it’s anyone’s guess as to where a file goes or how it can be found - Work-life balance doesn’t exist — the expectation here is for you to plan your life around “work priorities” (this is a real thing a manager/team lead had said) - And unsurprisingly, given all the above, the turnover rate is wild — in the short time I worked here, I’d seen 8 people quit (the quickest someone gave notice was only after 2 weeks of working here) and 1 person get fired — and this is just what I saw on my teams, never mind the rest of the agency…