Virtual Reviews

The two male partners -- polar opposites in temperament and personalities -- do not get along, seldom agree on anything, and have this weird passive-aggressive thing going on with each other. This has a ripple effect throughout the organization as employees are more or less forced to "pick sides," which puts everyone in different camps. Not exactly an ideal situation for building a harmonious, drama-free team. The partners also play blatant favorites, and everyone knows it. If you're one of the chosen ones (basically, you suck up to them at every moment; laugh at their stupid, unfunny jokes; and tell them how wonderful they are), you can do no wrong. It also helps if you're an attractive 20- or 30-something female and bat your eyelashes at them. If you're not one of the anointed ones, you end up being placed on their infamous "list," from which there is no return. If that happens (and you'll know when it does as you become a noticeable outcast), start planning your exit strategy. The two partners also have a track record of getting irritated with people who have the gall to disagree with any of their pronouncements or ideas from on high, especially the partner who is the self-proclaimed extrovert. They also are very big into the "blame game" and like to assign fault to everyone else but themselves when things go awry with clients, even though they are frequently at the center of the issues in question. They also seldom stand by their employees, and have a reputation of bouncing the workers who they (unfairly) label as the scapegoats.

Cons: Overworked and underpaid. There are times when you would do the work of five people, and when you asked for help, you were told, "That is not within my scope." Client services felt like the catch-all for anyone who didn’t know what to do or just didn’t have the time to do it themselves. You are given 3+ clients and expected to pretend, with each client, that they are your only priority, making it difficult to set expectations with them. You would work insane hours for what felt like peanuts given the amount of work and responsibilities you have. It often felt as if the employees in Wakefield were the priority. From a non-Wakefield-based employee's perspective, they seem to be the ones promoted more. If you were with the Wakefield crowd, you were recognized more, making the environment very polarizing. It never felt like the leadership was listening. We would take surveys regularly, and the feedback always seemed to be the same: staff is burned out, we need more staff, we are overworked, etc., but nothing was really done to resolve the issue. It always felt impossible to succeed like this, and my clients suffered because we were overworked, which led to mediocre results.