Ridgeway Reviews

2.7

33% would recommend to a friend

(24 total reviews)
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Simon Cole

44% approve of CEO

33% positive business outlook

Ridgeway has an employee rating of 2.7 out of 5 stars, based on 24 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have an average working experience there. The Ridgeway employee rating is 30% below average for employers within the Information Technology industry (3.9 stars).

Reviews by job title

24 reviews
2.0
31 Jan 2021
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

* The peers you work with are so hardworking and well meaning. Everyone I directly worked alongside genuinely was friendly, wanted to do their best and look out for each other. * The office is pretty nice - not an immediate benefit during the pandemic, but good if you are able to work in the building. * Client brand recognition is pretty good, the most notable/popular brand possibly being HMV as a client. * I've found no issues with company remuneration or benefits. * If you enjoy working at a very fast pace and being a "workaholic" (always on the go and always being available day or night) then this company will fit with your workstyle. * For all the cons I mention below, the senior management have just started to use a contracted HR company to review all issues found within the company.

Cons

* While your peers are enjoyable to work with, I'm afraid to say the senior management are not. Ridgeway is a very small company so the SMT will be involved in your day to day work more than you would think, to the point of telling you exactly what to do and when. There seems to be a level of distrust with the SMT meaning you will not be able to work under your own autonomy, and your work will be tracked rigorously. * It is a very process driven company. This can certainly help in some regards - such as to try and streamline project work as much as possible - but in reality it just seems to cause bureaucracy and delays, especially due to a lack of internal communication. You will also not be able to suggest improvements to the processes, the senior management will not accept suggestions - if you do not agree with the company's way or working, you will not be a good fit. * There is an extremely high employee turnover, which I've seen in two key areas. Firstly, a large proportion of new hires do not complete their probation, some may be for perfectly legitimate reasons but many are also because they cannot or will not fit into the workflow as described above. The second are project managers, who seem to eventually give up due to high stress and/or burnout. * With the combination of lack of trust, collaboration, and autonomy plus working to extremely tight budgets/deadlines, it is a stressful environment to work in. Some people may thrive on that but for others there is an unnecessary level of pressure which does not need to be. * You will be expected to work beyond your contracted hours on a regular basis. This expectation seems to come from the top down, with the senior management constantly (happily) referring to the fact they work all hours including weekends and during sickness. This unhealthy expectation filters down to all employee levels, causing more stress. This behaviour is also unfortunately rewarded - the people who are visibly working into the evenings/weekends are the ones most praised for their "dedication".

1.0
10 Jan 2022

Do Not Work Here!

Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The only good thing about Ridgeway is that it’s near Sainsburys.

Cons

The senior management are clueless and “involved”’with each other. There is a bully culture at the highest level The processes and technology used are from the 90s You will be blamed for anything that goes wrong even if it’s not your fault. You will watch good people suffer under the toxic environment.

1.0
15 July 2020

FOR YOUR OWN SANITY PLEASE DON'T EVER WORK HERE!!!!!

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

- Nice offices - Great client names (although it'll be unlikely you get to work with them / successfully deliver any work) - It's near a Sainsburys and a nice park

Cons

- Attitude from senior staff is very much 'say yes, take the money - work out if anyone can deliver it later' - Inability to deliver any work on time / in budget / to spec down to office politics and over-promising - Bullying (from senior staff) - Blame culture - Staff aren't trained on how to use the platform they are working on properly - Competent staff are undermined and their input ignored - Incompetent staff with the right image are given center stage - 'Secret' relationships between senior staff means means there is no suitable route for escalating any problems or seeking guidance (if you're silly enough to try do so) - If you're not ready to be a sheep then prepare to be made uncomfortable enough that you are forced to leave

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Ridgeway Response
5y
Thank you for taking the time to leave a review. We love our offices too, and it’s a shame we’ve not been able to spend time there recently due to Covid-19. We’re also very proud of our clients, who are all great to work with. I am surprised you feel you didn’t get to work with any of them, though perhaps your tenure was too brief to experience many, which is a shame. It seems you didn’t have an enjoyable time with us, which is disappointing to hear. Hopefully some context and responses will help to address your frustrations, otherwise please do talk to us further as noted below. We have a robust scoping and costing approach which senior members of the team collaborate on to ensure validity. Given that most of our work is delivered on a fixed-price basis, there is therefore risk on Ridgeway in doing anything other than scoping, costing and delivering work efficiently, so contrary to your suggestions, this is a fundamental exercise to undertake. All new members of the team receive a detailed induction plan including full training in Kentico and other day to day tools that we use, including certification where relevant. Ample time is scheduled to complete such training and attain the necessary level of familiarity. We would be interested to understand where this fell short for you so that we can improve in the future. We take bullying and a 'blame culture' extremely seriously and have policies in place to provide all team members with a clear escalation route, and have always had qualified HR professionals either in-house or contracted, which have always been available should a member of the team feel there is a problem requiring escalation. This did not happen during your tenure, so again it would be useful to understand more detail to address any of your concerns which as it stands we believe are without foundation, given the absence of evidence to the contrary. We also ensure that line and senior managers are provided with leadership and management training and coaching on a regular basis to help provide the different levels of support to their teams. We make clear during recruitment that process is a cornerstone of how Ridgeway operates. We scope and deliver large complex digital projects which are often business critical to our clients. It is therefore vital that we have basic standard operating processes so that collaboration between the teams and execution of work is as efficient and effective as possible. If you felt unable to follow these for whatever reason, it would be something to have addressed with your line manager. Our belief is that a team not operating consistently cannot grow and it enables individuals and the team to then use their talents, experience, and freedom to deliver great work. We have a talented team, as you suggest, and do our best to ensure everyone is supported, engaged, and enabled to do their best work. Office treats are not intended to paper cracks, but a genuine thank you to our hard-working team. We’re sorry you didn’t feel the same way. As noted above, a further discussion would be helpful to us to support improvements, and I would suggest useful to you in terms of providing you with any context to reconcile your frustrations. If you would like to have a confidential chat with us, we would be very happy to hear from you. Please email hr@ridgeway.com and we can set up a discussion with our independent HR consultants.
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Glassdoor has 24 Ridgeway reviews submitted anonymously by Ridgeway employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Ridgeway is right for you.