toxic organization to say the least
Pros
--A decent place to do an internship because you aren't there that long. Has a lot of name recognition and (after years of employee and public complaints) it finally pays $15/hr. --The benefits don't cover the full cost of your health insurance, but NARAL does cover your super-high deductible which is nice. --Name recognition, but this is not always a good thing bc alot of other organizations (especially organizations that are run by POC) absolutely hate NARAL
Cons
This is an organization run by and for wealthy white women. Despite alot of junior and mid-level staff demand for diversity and inclusion practices, senior management doesn’t seem to have any interest in actually making any changes. It’s talked about and talked about and then nothing is done. There’s a deep culture of casual racism, ableism, transphobia, and classism here and nothing is being done about it. It’s not a safe work space for anyone from a marginalized community. There is a very deep culture of retaliation going on at NARAL. Senior management threatens staff with write-ups, promotion denials, losing their references, raise denials, firing, losing their hours, etc. for speaking up about the cultural problems at NARAL. Numerous employees have been targeted by senior management with punishment because of (pro-choice) candidates they support in various democratic primaries. Even providing constructive criticism about the organization in a professional and appropriate way can get you blacklisted. Staff’s personal social media and personal political activities are extensively surveilled by senior management and any political opinions that are shared and not the same as NARAL’s official stances are grounds for retaliation or write-ups. NARAL always seems to brag that it’s a unionized workplace but that’s really not true. Of the 85+ employees at NARAL, only about 15 are allowed to be in the union. Senior management does everything it can to bust the union and destroy any bargaining power it has. It strategically hires people out of the union and comes up with ridiculous reasons to exclude new positions from the union. The union at NARAL doesn’t have any actual power and management apparently doesn’t really read the union contract so it’s not really being followed anyway. They have no interest in promoting junior or mid-level staff unless they agree to drop their union status. Your union status is used against you. Everyone knows what’s going on, but there seems to be no shame about it.