Low morale due to the following long-standing issues:
- Little or no information from the leadership team on the direction of the department to staff. This meant big projects were undertaken with no plan and as such enormous amounts of time, effort and money are wasted, which for many hard-working staff members is deflating.
- Big architectural decisions made without consulting experts (the developers in the department) has made development and stability of the software difficult.
- Salary had not increased adequately as staff gained more experience and qualifications at the company. Some people in IT were hugely underpaid, despite being invaluable assets to the company. The pay for newer recruits is more in line with industry which is rather unfair. Requests were made for appropriate pay rises but not met.
- No defined career path or progression. Hard-working, motivated members of staff had not had applicable skills developed for many years, despite asking during 1-2-1 sessions and appraisals. Although VC allowed staff to do courses on another e-learning site, it was not always directly relevant and had no bearing on progressing in a role.
- I witnessed bullying in more than 1 team in IT, some occurring on multiple occasions over a long time. I don’t think these have been dealt with properly and for the people on the receiving end, there’s very little solace. The seating in tech is very carefully planned and basically moving desks is limited as these matters are still ongoing (when I left).
- The Leadership team in IT does not have the expertise required to run the department. They are not from a technical background and the department needs someone with applicable experience.
- Several middle managers in IT felt unsupported and there was a sense of hopelessness for the future if the leadership team remained the same.
- Customer service received by major clients is below par. I have 15+ years of dealing with customers in many industries, and I considered VC's approach to be cavalier at best, but more often reckless. Communication is poor and I witnessed more covering up than I was comfortable with when we had committed to delivering products.
- The actions/inaction of the leadership team made it completely impossible for me to get any traction with plans I had for my team. I have never struggled to add value and motivate people but with my time spent mainly firefighting and personnel issues, I had no opportunity to move us forward.
